Garden innovations - mini vegetables

Mini vegetables have become a boom business, in top level supermarkets and - even more - chi-chi restaurants that love to display a whole tiny stuffed marrow as an hors d'oeuvre or a little pyramid of sweet corn as a side dish. Specific breeding has produced special mini cultivars popular with both hobby gardeners and restaurateurs and you can either opt to invest in these or to use ordinary vegetables which will remain mini when grown at closer than usual spacings but will mature to normal size at regular spacings.

The advantages to mini vegetables are manifold:

The smallest garden can provide sufficient for the family. You don't even need a garden. Mini vegetables can easily be raised in growing bags, pots and other containers on the patio, or even in a window box.

Home growing is economical and provides more choice of variety and crop.

When planning your mini veg harvest, bear the following in mind:

For best results with mini vegetables it is even more important to prepare the ground well before sowing seeds, or setting out young plants, than it is with full sized crops. Mini vegetables lend themselves very well to growing in raised beds made about 4 feet wide so that weeding/watering can be carried out from each side without treading on the crop. Plenty of well-rotted garden compost, leaf mould or other organic matter added to the soil each year will keep it in good heart and retain moisture.

Sow, or plant, your vegetables close together in broad drills, or blocks, rather than in rows so that the growing plants will cover the ground and reduce the need for weeding. Nevertheless, use space between widely spaced crops such as squash/courgettes for a quick maturing catch crop of radishes, mini silver skin onions, kohl rabi or lettuce.

Grow vegetables of similar height next to each other to minimise shading of short vegetables by tall ones which prevents competition for light.

Check regularly for pests and diseases. While most mini vegetables mature fast enough to avoid problems, flea beetles can be a menace on radish, cauliflower, kohl rabi and other brassicas during hot, dry weather. Caterpillars can be removed by hand but slugs will need controlling by nematodes or slug killer.

Garden innovation mini vegetable photograph by ilovebutter, used under a creative commons attribution licence.