iGrowVeg

Planning your Vegetable Garden Part 4 – Choosing Your Seeds

Posted on 16. Feb, 2010 by Tracey in Plan Your Veg Garden

Please view Parts 1, 2 3a and 3b in my series for more information on Planning your Vegetable Garden.

In Part 3a and b you created your vegetable plot plan on paper or online and now you’ll need to choose what varieties of vegetables you would like to grow and buy for sowing.

Seed Catalogues 2010

1. Choose which seed companies you want to buy your seeds from.

Check out my Seed Supplier Catalogue Links to request paper catalogues or take a look at their online catalogues.

Its worth browsing online catalogues to check prices and ranges before choosing. I would say use a maximum of 4 suppliers so you don’t have to make too many purchases from different shops.

• Are you Growing Organically? Then check out The Organic Gardening Catalogue
• Are you looking for heritage or unusual seeds? Try Real Seeds or Seeds of Italy
• Are you not sure what to start growing? Try SowVegetables.co.uk Seed Collections.

The Real Seed Catalogue

2. Browse online or look through paper catalogues for vegetable varieties to grow.

Top Tips when Searching Catalogues

• Sweet Peppers and Chillies are sometimes found under the Capsicum Category,
• Mange Tout are sometimes listed under the Pea category,
• Perpetual Spinach may be listed under Leaf Beat which is its alternative name,
• Pak Choi and Chinese Lettuce might be found under Oriental Vegetables.

Take a look at any vegetable varieties that catch your eye in colour or shape. Then read the description for more details on the variety.
Please view my post What to Look for in a Good Variety? for more information.

Wording to look out for depending on your requirements:

• Early Maturing – will be able to harvest earlier than other varieties.
• Large Fruited or Long Podded – Bigger harvest, bigger plants, but may take longer to grow.
• Ideal or Suitable for Pots, Raised Beds – It is good to know if it is variety well suited for pots or raised beds.
• Good for Freezing – Worth looking for if you want to freeze your harvest to make it last longer,
• Compact Variety – Small growing plants, good for pots, small spaces or windy areas.
• Resistant to Bolting, Blight, Carrot Fly – Plants bred to be resistant to certain diseases.
• RHS Award of Garden Merit – An award that is given as it is an all round good plant to grow for home gardens.
• Recommended for Exhibition – A good variety to grow if you want to take to vegetable shows or exhibitions.
• Can be grown indoors or outdoors only – this usually applies to cucumbers, tomatoes and tender vegetables where specific varieties have been developed to survive in certain temperatures.

3. Write a list of the vegetable varieties you are interested in.

Write down a list of potential seed varieties that you are interested in, remembering to note the seed company and page number of the paper catalogue so you can find it again.

Free Resource – Veg Seed List Excel Template

Seed List Template

Description:
Create a computer copy of your vegetable seed list so you can easily check what seeds you have chosen and automatically calculate the price of your seed orders. This template allows you to add and remove vegetable seeds so that you can make a final decision on price and seed variety to buy.

Veg Seed List Template
File Size: 20 KB

Don’t worry if you haven’t got Excel, you can view and edit excel spreadsheets for free in Google Documents or OpenOffice.

Alternatively View and Print this Template with Google Docs Viewer here: Veg Seed List Template

This is a useful way of recording your seed orders, just in case you can’t remember where you put that notebook!

4. Finalise your list by checking the total price of your seeds.

This sometimes makes the decisions for you, you may have to remove or may want to add more seeds on your list.

5. Go ahead, you’re ready to buy those seeds!

Make a note of the date your ordered your seeds on your notepad or the excel Veg Seed List template so you can chase up the order/s if necessary. Then sit back and wait for those seed packets to arrive.

In my Next Post, I’ll be sharing what seed varieties I’ve chosen for my Vegetable Plan in 2010.

iGrowVeg – Planning your Vegetable Garden Series

• Part 1 – Grouping Vegetable Types and Crop Rotation,
• Part 2 – What Can I Grow?
• Part 3a – Drawing a Plan
• Part 3b – Creating a Plan Online
• Part 4 – Choosing your Seeds
• Part 5 – My Vegetable Plan and Seed List
• Part 6 – Putting Your Plan into Action
• For Free PDF’s and Templates to accompany the series, please view my Free Resources.