A few class ago , while researching my bookThe Northern Gardener : From Apples to Zinnias , I come across a fantastic pamphlet from the University of Minnesota calledLet ’s All Grow Vegetablesby Grace Keen and Arthur Hutchins . Published in 1944 , the volume includes a treatment of what it would take to grow food for two from a 9 - by-12 invertebrate foot plot — what they called a “ rug garden . ”
“ There is no such thing as a space too modest for a garden , ” Hutchins wrote . The rug garden idea come from another University of Minnesota professor , William H. Alderman(yes , the Alderman Hall guy ) . Alderman implant the garden as an experiment to shew how much food can come from even a small space .
He started in mid - April , measuring out the space and planting his first nerveless - season crop in north - Dixie rows . These included sugar , spinach , radish , carrots , beets , Allium cepa sets and turnips . The radishes , which sprout and grow quickly , were sprinkled amid lettuce , carrot and beets with the theme of pulling them as they matured to space plants decently . Generally , he plant thing close together — at least by standards of 80 year ago .
Here’s William Alderman’s rug garden layout. Vary yours to fit your family’s food preferences.
By May , some widow’s weeds had sprouted and those had to be pull . Later in the month , he engraft his strong season crops , includingKentucky Wonder pole beans(a variety that is still usable and very proficient ) and six tomato starts that were staked to help them grow up rather than out . Alderman snip these throughout the summertime to keep their foliage development in check .
Rabbits and cabbage maggots invaded the garden , but with some replanting and conducting wire covers , he was able to protect much of his crop . white turnip turned out to be a failure , but Alderman carried on . He realise later he had also planted too much lettuce for his home of three to eat . Plant what your family wish is the advice he gave , and we wholeheartedly consort with it .
Alderman harvested his first Raphanus sativus longipinnatus on May 23 and his last beets and carrot were put in entrepot Oct. 3 . The garden produced the eq of 537 servings of vegetables , harmonise to Alderman , most of which were eat impertinent . The family canned some tomatoes , froze a lot of bean and stored beets and carrots in their dry basement . Onions also were dried and stored for several month . The six tomato plants produced 66 Lycopersicon esculentum and the pole beans more than 56 pound sign of beans . They were able-bodied to lay in 40 onion for the wintertime . Not bad from such a little space !
Here ’s what Alderman enunciate , “ It cater my family with a very significant fortune of our yr ’s food supply , and it provided me with a lot of estimable sport and refreshment to say nothing of a never failing conversation piece when Guest were present . . . .I am confident that I can produce more for the yield of the item-by-item crop was not surpassing . ”
Mary Lahr Schieris a Minnesota nurseryman , writer and editor in chief and author of The Northern Gardener , From Apples to Zinnias , 150 yr of Garden Wisdom ( Minnesota Historical Society Press , 2017 ) , winner of the Silver Award of Merit from GardenComm in 2018 . For 18 old age , she edited Northern Gardener magazine , the publication of the Minnesota State Horticultural Society and the only magazine publisher dedicated to horticulture in USDA Zones 3 , 4 and 5 ..
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