How to have Victory with a Victory Garden
These days with so many lockdowns because of Covid 19 persons are getting involved in gardening not only as a favorite pastime but also as a means of growing edible foods. With edible gardens, you are in a good position because you get to grow your food crops first of all that gives you saving, and secondly growing edible foods in a healthy way.
There are so many garden styles to choose from but in this article, we will be discussing how to construct a victory garden. These gardens have been around for some time now and are being enjoyed by many home gardeners.
The origin of victory gardens
Victory Gardens was first introduced during world war I, these gardens were also known as “defense gardens” or “war gardens”. Its believe that during this era civilians were encouraged by the government to grow food crops.
At that time Americans grew their own food crops in their backyard gardens, playgrounds, churchyards, and city parks. These gardens were constructed so persons would not have to ration foods, the idea of victory gardens was to empower persons to become self-sufficient thereby not putting a strain on the economy.
Steps in Growing a Victory Garden
Things you will need to know
- Location
- Preparing the location
- What will you be growing?
- Installing your vegetables
- Watering methods
- Fertilizing methods
- Insect control
- Keep disease at bay
- Weeding your victory garden
- Maintaining your victory garden
1. Location
The first step in growing a victory garden is the location, choosing the right location is so important for your victory garden to thrive. Choose a location that gets at least 5-8 hours of sunlight.
2. Preparing the location
Preparing the location involves the removal of weeds, rocks, and other garden debris. Mixing compost in with the native soil will improve soil quality for water and fertilizer absorption along with proper water drainage.
3. What to grow in your victory garden
There are a number of vegetables and herbs that can be grown in your victory garden, you can either grow vegetables/ herbs from seeds or get a jump start by growing from seedlings. Before installing your seeds/seedlings read the instructions for proper spacing and planting debt. Below is a list of veggies and herbs that can be planted in your victory garden.
4. Watering methods
This step is so important, your plants are depending on you to give them the right amount of water. Too much water will lead to root rot while insufficient water will lead to plant decline. Know the watering needs of your veggies/ herbs and give them that amount.
In the case of rain, discontinue watering until plants show signs of needing a drink of water or check the soil for dryness. If the first few inches of soil are dry it’s time to give your garden another drink of water. The garden soil should dry out somewhat before giving plants another drink.
5. Fertilizing methods
The use of fertilizers will give your veggie and herbs a good boost to ensure a better harvest. In my opinion, the ideal fertilizers are organics such as cow, chicken manure, etc… these fertilizers however can be costly. What you can do to save a few dollars is to build your very own compost pile.
6. Insect control
Garden insect pests can become a real issue if not brought under control, whichever plants you’re planning on growing, find out as much as possible about garden insect pest identification, and how to bring control. A word of caution, when growing edible food crops it’s best to use organic pesticides to avoid food contamination.
7. Disease control
Disease control is another factor to keep an eye on, one of the main causes that lead to plant disease is overwater which will lead to root rot, installing plants to closely will encourage poor air circulation, etc… again get to know all you can about the proper care of your plant. The more you know about the proper maintenance of your plant you will be in a better position to keep your plants growing healthy.
8. Weed control
Nobody likes weeding but weeding is a must because allowing weeds to remain will not only cause your garden to look unattractive but weeds will compete with your veggies/herbs for sunlight, watering, and nutrients.
Weeds also encourage garden insect pests and disease, it’s better to hand weed, do not use herbicides around edible plants which is very dangerous. To make weeding much easier put a weeding program in place. I would say going in your garden at least once a week with a garden hoe and turning the soil when the weeds are small.
9. How to maintain your victory garden
Putting a maintenance program in place is so important, Going in your garden once a week to weed along with removing other debris will help greatly. Having a pruner on hand will also help in removing broken and diseased plant parts. Ensure that the hand pruner is shaped and in good repair after each use sterilize the blades with bleach and water.
Food crops to grow in a victory garden
The final word on how to grow a victory garden
Constructing a victory garden is a great way to grow food crops in a healthy way along with saving a few bucks. A victory garden is a good investment and will put both you and your family in a good position to grow your very own food crop so consider growing a victory garden to enjoy the fruits of your labor.
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About the author
Norman loves being in the garden, both at home and for his job....
he is 'Natures Little helper' being outdoors, growing his vegetables and flowers from an early age.
Now having spent over 22 years in the profession he want to give some of his knowledge to others...
his vast array of hints and tips you will find scattered over this site will help you no end growing plants in your garden.
Thanks so much for sharing good information to read to know more about what is a Victory garden and good tips to help anyone to grow one at home.
As you well said on your article, I see people are growing interest to grow a garden to have fresher and healthier food to give to our families. You have provide great information that will help me to work better to grow more vegetables in our garden, as we live in Canada, we have a small garden with a few selection of different vegetables, but I’m looking for suggestions on more vegetables to grow.
Currently we are dealing with a few bugs that have attacked to our raspberry plants, we miss all the production from this year, we are even talking about building a screen house to protect the plants, but it might avoid bees to get to the plants too, what do you think?
Do you have any tips about how to grow vegetables indoors as winter gets too cold here, I will thank you for giving us some good tips!
You are welcome and thanks so much for your kind words, so sorry to hear of your raspberries. What you can consider using is Diazanon or Carbaryl which are 2 insecticides that are used in the garden. Another suggestion is to use a strong spray of water.
You can grow vegetables in containers with the help of grow lights or consider creating a cold frame garden that will also give you good results. Hope this helps.
https://staging-gardenofedengardencenter.siterubix.com/cold-frame-garden#more-20584
I’m really excited that you created a website that shows people step by step instructions on how to grow a proper Victorian garden! This is fantastic! You website is very thorough. You have water methods and I think I saw a pop up of an email mailing list. How did you do that? That’s awesome. Keep it up!
Hello, thanks so much for your kind words. That pop up came up because of an autoresponder ( mailer lite ) once you join one of these emailing systems they will show you how to create this feature or you can go on youtube and learn there. Hope this helps.
What an awesome website, great layout and very good content. I really like the Eden Garden blog which was very informative. The butterfly garden idea was very interesting to me I love seeing butterflys and ladybugs in my garden. I liked the photos it makes the website very professional and colourful. My garden didn’t do well this year my radishes went to seed really fast before they developed properly, last year they were as big as maderine oranges. My broccoli went to seed before they develpoped. We had 2 major hail storms which devasted a lot of my plants, flowers and vegies. As far as your website as a whole, the only thing I found was in your list of vegtables to click on the two vegtables listed at the bottom of the list didn’t have the ability to click on it “and Beets Cabbage” so you might want to fix that as well this little error “Get the All the Latest Garden Tips! “the word the is in there too many times in the side menu. Other than that I didn’t find any other errors. I love gardening so really like the read. Thank you great job, Deborah
So sorry to hear of your food crops going to seed early, hope you have good success next time, and thanks so much for your help. All the best to you and have a good day.
helllooo Norman, thanks alot for sharing such an amazing site with us all , i was actually doing some research online when i saw your article, first i really want to commend your effort in bringing up these site together i always wanted a garden of my own, cause i have these nice backyard and a fertile ground, my mistake was i always thought i really just needed to have a fertile ground to have a garden, i never really knew it was more than that, cause currently i do have a fertile ground but dont know how to go about it, but thanks to your article it might just be able to render me help in having a nice garden, thanks alot for the info
You are welcome and thanks so much for your kind words. I am happy to help.