- The size of the garden depends on the degree of use and maintenance
- Space required by vegetables - You need to plan this much space for certain species
If you only want to grow a few tomatoes or cucumbers, plus maybe strawberries and kitchen herbs, you will find space on every balcony, no matter how small. However, if the vegetable garden is used for self-sufficiency, possibly for a larger family, it must be significantly larger.
If you plan correctly, you can feed yourself exclusively from your own garden in summer
The size of the garden depends on the degree of use and maintenance
The minimum size for a "real", colorful vegetable garden is around 10 to 20 square meters, on which around four to eight beds can be created. On the other hand, at least 20 square meters per person are required if the majority of the required vegetables are to come from your own garden. If you also aim for lush strawberry or asparagus harvests and stocks of potatoes and stored vegetables, the space requirement per household member increases to at least 50 to about 80 square meters - fruit trees are not included. In terms of care, you have to reckon with around 30 minutes of work per week per 10 square meters of vegetable area - during planting and harvesting times, the time required is of course significantly more.
Space required by vegetables - You need to plan this much space for certain species
The table below gives you an overview of how many plants of a certain type of vegetable you can plant per square meter and how much yield you can expect from the subsequent harvest. Also, when planning, keep in mind that some vegetables can be harvested more than once. For this reason, the relevant information about the expected harvest is not the number of pieces, but the yield by weight per square meter. You can use this table to calculate how big your garden needs to be after you have identified the vegetables you want and the number of plants.
| vegetable type | Space requirement: Plants per square meter | Yield: pieces per square meter | Yield: kilograms per square meter |
|---|---|---|---|
| Kohlrabi | 8 to 16 | 8 to 16 | |
| carrots | 80 to 120 | 80 to 120 | 2 to 3.5 |
| celery | 5 to 8 | 5 to 8 | 2 to 4 |
| parsnip | 10 to 15 | 4 to 5 | |
| radish | 120 to 150 | 120 to 150 | |
| potatoes | 4 to 6 | 3 to 4 | |
| onions | 100 to 120 | 100 to 120 | 3 to 6 |
| leek | 25 to 35 | 25 to 35 | 2.5 to 3 |
| pole beans | 15 to 18 | 2.2 to 2.8 | |
| bush beans | 25 to 36 | 1.2 to 1.8 | |
| peas | 78 to 80 | 3 to 4 | |
| pickled cucumbers | 5 to 10 | 2.5 to 4 | |
| tomatoes | 4 to 6 | 7 to 10 | |
| zucchini | 1 to 2 | 4 to 6 | |
| pick lettuce | 10 to 16 | 1.5 to 2 |
tips
Pole tomatoes and runner beans produce higher yields than their bushy relatives in the same area. Incidentally, this also applies to cucumbers and courgettes on climbing aids.