Prepping your patch

Before you can start planting outside, you’ll need to find a suitable spot in your garden to dig over for growing vegetables. If you already have a plot that you’ve used before, it should just need a simple turn of the soil to de-compact it. Or, why not create a little garden project? Hannah in our Marketing team decided to turn a rotten, old raised bed into a fresh new one, simply by digging out the old wood and replacing with new!

Before

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If you’re prepping a new plot, once you’ve decided where you would like it, dig over the plot by removing any grass, stones and weeds.

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Then turn over the soil by digging your spade straight down into the ground, lifting it back out and placing the soil back where you found it. Be sure to break up big clumps of soil and remove any artefacts and bits and bobs you find as you dig.

After

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Here’s where you might need to use a bit of gardening nouse – if your soil feels heavy, like clay, it can help to mix in some rough sand to loosen it up. This can readily be found online at DIY shops, garden centres or builder’s merchants.

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Once you have the soil to your desired consistency, create thin ‘trenches’ in straight lines into the soil, about a foot apart and about 1cm deep. You can do this with a hoe, or you don’t have one, you can drag a garden cane, or if you don’t mind getting mucky, even your hand along the soil to make the trenches.

These trenches will be where you sow your seeds, so make sure you mark them at the ends with a seed marker or piece of wood to indicate where things are going to be planted!

Once all this is done, your patch should be ready for seeds to be planted into it.