Beth Skwarecki

So our garden gets bigger every year. This year we've got our eye on 1/10 acre of my grandpap's land (which conveniently comes with a tractor, plow, etc). There's more space if we need it.

This is by far the largest we've tried, and we know that what works on a small plot doesn't always translate to a larger scale. We're in need of good resources on mini-farming. We're not afraid of hand work, but there will be a lot of it (50x100 feet) and will use machinery when it will make our lives easier. We're also cost-conscious and don't want to plant a lot of seeds that will need to be thinned, if we could just plant the seeds more economically in the first place.

We'd like to provide for the veggie needs of 2-6 adults: Chris and I would like to eat from the garden as much as possible, and we plan to have enough to share with 4 adult relatives.

There will be lots of potatoes (they grow well here and everybody likes them) and sweet potatoes (since we did such a good job last year). I'm bad at tomatoes but we'll be giving them another try - along with eggplants and peppers.

We're growing plenty of collard greens for the iguana, winter squashes for him and Chris, and a buttload of onions because I can never have enough onions. Same goes for carrots. We have a favorite variety, Scarlet Nantes, that does OK even when totally neglected. Carrot tips appreciated - they are hard to weed and we will be growing thousands of them.

There will be melons (experimental), zucchini, and brussels sprouts in small quantities. No garlic or perennials this time, although we're looking forward to the apple harvest - anyone know where to rent a cider press in Butler, PA?

I've never loved row crops (all the cool kids grow their veggies in beds) but mounded rows worked great last year for the sweet potatoes and they will probably work well for the squashes (For potatoes we will use a potato plow both to plant and harvest).