Best Garden Box Placement

So your ready to ‘dig’ in and get started with a garden! Yay! You will be so glad you did! Gardens are work, no doubt. But anything worth doing will take some work and dedication. Your garden will reward you with an abundance of nutrient dense, delicious food!

Placing a garden box in the right place is a permanent decision and deserves some thought and attention. Here are some things to consider before making a permanent home for your garden.

Sun

Most vegetables need 6-8 hours of direct sun to fully produce and ripen, so this needs to be your first consideration. The sun will change it’s position as the season moves along. In winter it is lower in the sky, casting long shadows onto the ground, which is fine because there isn’t a lot of gardening happening in the winter. But as it gets closer to spring, the sun starts to be higher in the sky and the areas that were once shaded by winter light are now available for planting. In winter, my garden boxes are fully shaded by my fence and the house next to me. But by late February they start to get enough sun that I can get out and plant. In contrast, during full summer, my garden has sun from 7am - 8pm which is more than enough! Another thing to think about is if you or your neighbor has trees that might cast a shadow onto your garden. If it is a smaller tree, you will be fine because it will only cast a shadow across your garden for a little while, but if it’s a big tree….find somewhere else.

A garden placed to the south of your home and as far to the east or west as possible is ideal, but it can still work if your only option is the north side of the house. If your garden area is to the north of your home, you’ll need to place your box as far from the house as possible, keeping it away from the shadow line of your home. If north facing is your only open space, take time to track the shadows throughout the season to find the best placement that will get the most sun.

Position

The position of the box can be flexible, but here are some things to think about.

Ideally you want to place your box with the short sides pointing to the north and south. This gives your plants the best sunlight exposure. It also means you want to keep your shorter plants on the southside of the box and your taller plants on the northside so they don’t cast shadows on the small ones. You can also keep taller plants to the east or west side of the garden box and use the other side for short plants.

Water

Water access in crucial for your garden beds. Close access to a spigot or the ability to hook into your sprinkler system is essential. If water access isn’t close by and you don’t want to mess with the sprinkler system, you can run a hose from your house to the bed and add soaker hoses or a rain wand from there. You can also use a retractable hose, like hose links, that make dragging a hose around so much better!

A more permeant solution would be to dig into your underground sprinkler system and add a water line into it. From the new waterline, you can add small hoses that you can run to each bed and from there add the type of watering hose you want.

Conclusion

Take some time to think about and consider these factors so you can have a productive and thriving garden year after year.