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How and Why we started Square Foot Gardening My wife and I have always wanted to grow our own vegetables in our back garden. The problem is that we don't really have much of a garden to boast about. A small portion of paving outside the back door followed by a patch of grass big enough to place a few camping chairs on when we braai and that's about it. Yes, we live in a typical South African urban townhouse complex with a postage stamp sized garden.
Over the years we've tried growing a small herb garden in a metal tub and also a few pots with a green pepper or two. We even planted a tomato plant in the corner of the garden nestled in amongst the huge variety of weeds that seemed to flourish there. The weeds continued to do very well and, after a few months, we harvested two small tomatoes for our efforts. Not surprising really considering that our soil consists of about 80% clay and 20% stones and rocks.
We have been plotting and planning for years, to be able to find and move onto a smallholding with good soil and enough space for substantial veggie gardens, rows of fruit and nut trees, a few chickens and maybe even with a small stream running through it. As per usual however, life always seems to get in the way of our plans.
Then, a year ago I was surfing the internet when I stumbled onto the Square Foot Gardening method of growing veggies, in raised boxes and in very small spaces. The idea really appealed to me but all the references and information that I found online were about US and European gardeners using this method. It seemed as if nobody was doing it in South Africa at all, or if they were, they were not talking about it online.
I like a challenge. I like fresh, juicy, tasty, homegrown organic veggies. I also like finding creative ways of making things work and then teaching others how to do the same. So the Square Foot Gardening in South Africa blog was born and over the next few months we managed to turn our small weed patch into an incredibly productive mini vegetable farm.  How productive? Well so far this season (August '09 - Jan '10), we have managed to harvest over 45kg of vegetables including beans, tomatoes, cherry tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers, chillies, aubergines (eggplant), strawberries, beetroot, onions, cauliflower, spinach and Swiss chard. This total does not include all the lettuce, chard, Chinese cabbage and a large variety of herbs that we treat as "cut-and-come-again" plants i.e. we cut the leaves as we need them and they go straight into the pot or salad bowl without even being weighed and recorded. It also does not include the many handfuls of beans, strawberries and tomatoes that were lost to the... ummm... "picker's palate"? - Let me just state here for the record, just how difficult it is for one to pick all those delicious goodies without popping a good few samples into one's mouth while you are busy. |
Outdoor Living 
