Making the Most of Every Inch

If you have ever looked at a postage-stamp back garden, a narrow side return or a courtyard paved from wall to wall and thought there was no room for a veg patch, take heart. Some of the most productive plots in our villages are barely bigger than a dining table. The trick is not to think in terms of ground area at all, but in terms of volume. Once you start growing upwards, outwards and in containers, a modest space can keep a household in salads, herbs and roots from April right through to the first hard frost.

The other advantage of growing in pots and raised beds is that you control the soil. In a village where the ground may be heavy clay, chalky or full of old builder's rubble, that is a genuine blessing. You can give your plants exactly what they need, and you can move them about when the weather turns.

Choosing the Right Containers

Not all pots are equal, and the ones that look most handsome in the garden centre are not always the ones that grow the best crops. Size matters more than style. A pot of 30cm diameter is about the minimum for anything beyond herbs and cut-and-come-again salad. For tomatoes, aubergines or peppers, look for 35–45cm across and at least 30cm deep. Root crops need depth rather than width, so a tall, narrow pot suits carrots far better than a wide, shallow trough.

Terracotta dries out quickly in a hot spell, which means more watering than most of us have time for. Glazed ceramic, plastic and even old galvanised buckets hold moisture far better. Whatever you choose, make sure there are drainage holes; sitting in soggy compost is the quickest way to lose a crop. Raise pots onto small feet or broken tiles so water can escape freely, and stand them where you can actually reach them with a watering can.

Compost matters too. A peat-free multipurpose with added grit or perlite works well for most vegetables, but hungry crops such as tomatoes and courgettes will repay you for mixing in a handful of slow-release feed at planting time.

Raised Beds: Small but Mighty

A raised bed need not be large to earn its place. Even a bed measuring 1.2m by 0.6m will give you a surprising amount of produce if you plant it carefully. A depth of 20–25cm suits salads, herbs, onions and most roots; go to 30cm or more if you fancy carrots and parsnips with room to stretch.

Position is everything. Most vegetables want at least six hours of sun a day, so watch your garden across a sunny day before you commit. If you only have a north-facing patch, don't despair: salads, spinach, chard, rocket and most herbs will cope with considerably less.

To get the most from a small bed, think in squares rather than rows. Divide the surface into 30cm squares and sow a different crop in each. This cuts down on wasted path space and makes successional sowing much easier:

• Early spring: radish, rocket, loose-leaf lettuce, spring onions.
• Late spring: beetroot, chard, dwarf French beans, herbs.
• Summer: a second sowing of salad, plus winter kale and spinach.
• Autumn: garlic, overwintering broad beans, hardy salad leaves under cloche.

Feed the bed each spring with well-rotted compost, and top it up as the level drops. After a few seasons you will have built genuinely good soil, which is half the battle won.

Growing Upwards with Vertical Planters

Walls, fences and sheds are wasted growing space in most small gardens. A simple trellis, a length of wire, or a purpose-made fabric pocket planter can transform a blank fence into a productive strip. Climbing and trailing crops are the obvious candidates, but plenty of others will happily grow up a support if given a little encouragement.

• Runner and climbing French beans will scale a 2m frame with ease and crop for weeks.
• Courgettes and cucumbers can be trained up canes, saving precious ground and keeping fruit clean.
• Tomatoes in a grow bag against a sunny wall will thrive with regular feeding and watering.
• Trailing herbs such as thyme and oregano look handsome spilling from a wall-mounted planter.
• Strawberries in tiered pots or guttering fixed to a fence keep fruit off the slugs' patch.

Bear in mind that anything growing against a wall will dry out faster than a pot in the open, and it will also need more feeding because the compost is being asked to do more work. A weekly liquid feed of a general-purpose organic tomato food from midsummer onwards keeps plants productive.

Small Crops That Earn Their Keep

Some vegetables simply give you more return for the space they occupy. Cut-and-come-again salad leaves are the classic example: sow a pinch of seed in a 30cm pot or a half-metre of bed, and you can be picking baby leaves within four weeks and continue for months. Loose-leaf lettuce, rocket, mizuna and spinach all work this way.

Herbs are another obvious winner. A single pot of basil, parsley or coriander will give you more than a supermarket bunch and keep going all summer if you pick regularly from the top. Mint is best kept in its own pot, or it will colonise everything around it. Chives and thyme are almost indestructible once established.

Root crops need more room, but they are worth including. Radishes are ready in three to four weeks and can be tucked into gaps between slower crops. Carrots will grow happily in a deep pot or raised bed; choose a short, stubby variety and sow thinly to avoid the fiddly job of thinning. Beetroot does well in containers too, and the leaves are as good as the roots.

Finally, don't overlook the value of growing a little of something you genuinely love to eat. A pot of cut-and-come-again salad by the back door, a few herbs on a sunny windowsill, and a raised bed of courgettes will between them supply more than you might imagine. Small spaces reward attention rather than acreage, and in a village garden even a modest plot can keep the kitchen well supplied from spring to autumn.