High Produce
Depending on why you are growing a vege patch, you might want to plant accordingly. If it is simple a hobby patch, you are more likely to try out all sorts of weird and wonderfull veges, however if you are like me and want to have tasty meals all the time, you will be more inclined to go for the high produce low space and low maintenance varieties.
Winter:
Potatoes
very low maintenance. Just get a pack of seeding spuds, cut each spud into 3 or 4 pieces keeping one or two eyes on each piece and plant in rows about 10cm deep and about 20cm apart.
Beans
Pretty much the best vege ever. In temperate climates they can grow all year round, and they taste great. They are also very quick to grow and have a large harvest per amount of space taken up.
Silver Beet
This is a must. An all year round vegetable, one of the healthiest things you can grow and tastes great in a bunch of dishes. You only need a couple of plants however.
Snow Peas
These taste good and are a little trickier to grow, but usually it is worth the effort. I would go for snow peas over normal peas though, because of the additional time it takes to pod normal peas.
Summer:
Tomatoes
This is my number one favourite plant to grow. High yield, easy to grow and once they have grown one year, you will see a number of baby tomatoe shoots popping up the following year as the seeds lie dormant during winter.
Beans
The second favourite crop. Quick easy and tasty. You can do runner beans which take slightly longer to grow, but can take advantage of fence lines. You can even experiment and grow them up sweet corn plants or something. You could stop here and have a great patch, but there are a bunch of other plants which are good to grow, but sometimes don't work out the best.
Zucchini
In my experience these can go averagely or fantastically. I have found that sometimes, the sun is too strong and they struggle, or they can go mouldy and die. But if it is a good season, they are one of the highest producing plants you can grow.
Sweet Corn
These are low produce for the amount of space they take up, but boy do they taste great. A tip for sweet corn however. When you go to pick them, take a bucket of water out to the vege patch and drop the corn straight into the bucket of water. Then take it inside and throw them straight into the pot of boiling water. This prevents the sugar from turning to starch and you will have the sweetest tasting corn in the land.
Other Veges
Also there is:- Artichokes
- Strawberries
- Lettuce
- Cabbage
- Cauliflower
- Broccoli
- Carrots
- Parsnip
- Radish
- Cucumber
- Pumpkin
There are heaps more, but these are the main ones you will want to try.
Replanting for the next season. Let one of your plants go to seed, and then try and harvest those seeds to avoid spending again at the shops. To plant up a patch with shop bought veges will cost you about $50, however using your own from the previous year, you can do it for almost nothing. Another thing to note, is that you should rotate your crops. Each plant desires a slightly different mix of nutrients, so mixing up the plant varieties will ensure one nutrient isn't depleted before the rest. Another thing that rotating your crops does is reduces the occurrence of nematodes which attack the variety of plant. As you repeatedly plant the same crop these soil based nematodes will get stronger, and make your plants weaker.
