Spreadsheet Wednesday: Garden Planning

Before we even had space for a garden, I had fallen in love with Square Foot Gardening.  Never mind that I hate dirt, bugs, and anything resembling hard work.  The possibilities of raising tons of produce with such little effort really caught my eye. (And my husband would point out that it doesn’t hurt that this gardening method takes place in beautiful, little, tiny grids. I can’t deny it.)

Now I’m approaching my third summer of square foot gardening.  I’m working on a major expansion to my garden, and I’ve mostly gotten over my fear of dirt.  We’ve had some successes and some failures over the last two years, but like every spring, I’m optimistic that this is our year.

Like most things in my life, there are several spreadsheets in my files for garden stuff, but this garden planning sheet is the one I’ve found most useful lately.  Simply enter the total square footage of your square foot garden and the total number of squares of vertical space (climbing trellis) available.  Then mix and match plants to your heart’s content.  The spreadsheet will calculate how much room your desired plants should take up and let you know when you’ve reached maximum capacity.

To add new plants, you’ll simply need to know how many fit in a square foot.  You can use this conversion chart to calculate from the spacing on the seed packet.

Once you’ve finished selecting your plant, I highly recommend you take a look at this companion planting sheet by My Square Foot Garden.  It’s a lifesaver that prevents us garden noobs from planting potatoes and tomatoes next to each other. One of the niftiest garden tools out there.