Walking out your door and being able to pick food that you grew is incredibly rewarding. Having a garden area dedicated to growing your own food is nice, but it’s not feasible for everyone. Maybe you don’t have the space for that, or maybe you don’t have extra time to take care of a veggie garden in addition to your other landscape maintenance. Growing your own food in your yard does not have to look like a dedicated garden area nor do you have to rip up all of your grass and make your yard look like a farm. There are many food producing plants you can incorporate into your landscape that look beautiful and add ornamental value. Incorporating edible plants into your landscape is a great option for those who have a small yard lacking space for a garden, but still want to grow their own food. It’s also a good option for those who don’t want to dedicate a lot of time to caring for a larger garden space. If edible plants are incorporated in your landscaping, they will be on the routine watering and maintenance schedule of your other landscape plants.
Things to consider
Before you dive right in, there are a few things you need to consider first. If you are replacing landscape plants with productive plants it is important to consider how harvesting will affect the aesthetic of the plant. Especially for plants that you continually harvest from, such as herbs and greens, they will look different than well groomed ornamental landscape plants. You can pay attention when harvesting to make sure everything is as aesthetic as possible, but this does take more care and patience when harvesting.
When pruning your productive plants more care does need to be taken to get the most produce. You won’t be pruning your productive plants the same way you would the ornamental plants they have replaced. For example, hedge trimmers are perfectly fine to use on boxwoods but pruning blueberries into a tight square hedge will decrease the health and yield of the plant.
In addition, to be well producing plants, they will require a bit more fertilizer than ornamental plants might for highest yields. Pay close attention to the types of fertilizer and pesticides you use as some are not safe for consumable plants. Make sure to read the label. There could be restrictions for use on plants for consumption or minimally a harvest date interval. If you have any questions please reach out and ask! It’s better to be safe.
One final caution I have to mention is the mess. Fruit bearing plants will be messier and may attract unwanted pests if fallen fruit is left on the ground. Take into careful consideration before planting if you have time to harvest, use, and/or clean up all that the plants produce.
Planning it out
Before you go to a nursery and buy plants to put in your yard, think about a plan first. What plants do you have in your yard that you could replace? Are there particular shrubs or perennials that you aren’t fond of, or are there bare spots that you could fill? Walk around your yard and try to visualize what you want to do.
For the specific locations in your yard what types of plants would grow well there? You don’t want to buy a bunch of blueberry bushes only to realize that the spot you have is in full shade. One of the most important things is putting the right plant in the right place. Otherwise you may end up with dead plants, low yield, and time and money wasted.
What kinds of things would you like to USE? All too often people, myself included, purchase plants that produce something they will never actually consume. There is no point in caring for something and spending precious time and money if it is going to go to waste. Start out by only planting the things that you will enjoy eating or sharing with others.
What do you have time to care for? If you can barely manage to mow the lawn when it needs it and prune the boxwood hedge once a year, maybe stay away from higher maintenance plants like espalier fruit trees. Our lives are busy and chaotic at times anyway, gardening is meant to be stress relieving not add more on by making the to do list longer. Opt for lower maintenance plants if you won’t be able to spend much time caring for them.
What do you have space for? Once you have a good idea of what you can care for, will use, and know the areas you can plant in, figure out what will actually fit. A great way to do this is to write a list of what you would like to plant, and then list the mature size. After you have this list measure out your planting spaces and see what you can fit in those areas. Some things can be interplanted for more space. If you need help with this aspect, send me a message! I would love to help you draw it out and design the space. Don’t forget that there are plenty of space saving options for many of the things you may want to plant. There are dwarf or semi dwarf varieties of many different types of plants as well as fruit trees that are espaliered or have multiple varieties grafted onto one tree.
Do you need specific varieties? Are you needing to find dwarf varieties? Or maybe a variety of a plant that can handle more or less sun or water than its traditional variety? There are also plants that fruit longer, or at different times of the season. Know what varieties you should be looking for for your specific needs. Remember that some varieties have more ornamental value than others as well. Do your research to find out what will work best for the plan that you have.
In the coming weeks I will be sharing mini blogs about productive plants you can add into your landscape for more than just ornamental value. I will be sharing them by category ie. tree, shrub etc. so stay tuned! All of the plants I will list grow well in the Fresno/Tulare area. If they require specific considerations, I will list those in the description.
If you have any questions or want help with your project send me a message on my contacts page. Or if you prefer, head to your favorite nursery and ask them to help you out so you can see the plants in person.
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