Some of you may grow vegetables in containers on your patio or deck. Others may have a small vegetable garden in your backyard. And like us, a few of you might even have a large garden with lots of space to grow lots of different vegetables. Regardless of the size of your garden, your experience level or the vegetables you might grow, it is our hope that this website will provide all of the information you need to successfully grow your own food.
First, a little bit about ourselves...
My name is Marcus. I was born and raised in the Midwest. Some of my first memories include playing on my grandparent's farm, roaming the fields and tending to their vegetable garden.
By the time I was 5 years old, I was begging my parents to put in a vegetable garden in their suburban backyard. My wish finally came true and summers were spent growing tomatoes, peppers, rhubarb, lettuce, radishes, spinach, sweet corn, squash and cucumbers. The garden continued to thrive, year after year, even after I left home and went to college. Along the way, much was learned about growing vegetables.
After college, I landed a job in the Carolinas. After a few years, I managed to buy an old house and several acres of land in the foothills of the Blue Ridge mountains. Although the soil is much different in the South than it was in the Midwest, I was determined to put in a large vegetable garden. I spent most of my free time tending to the large yard. I dug a garden from scratch in the dense clay soil. I planted lots of different vegetables that first year, and also planted some grapes, berries and fruit trees. The garden is still there today, but has grown in size over the years.
A few years after buying my house, I was lucky enough to meet and eventually marry my wife, Kristen. Outside of a few houseplants, Kristen didn't have much gardening experience before she met me. However, she was more than willing to learn. She now helps out tremendously in our garden and has learned to grow lots of different vegetables. She's also a talented cook and baker, and finds new and interesting things to do with the produce from our garden.
We now have a family of our own and are passing on our love and knowledge of gardening to our son. Like my parents and grandparents before me, we now grow much of the vegetables and produce that our family eats. We have many years of experience planting, watering, fertilizing, harvesting and storing many different varieties of vegetables. Additionally, we are partnering with the Arbor Day Foundation to introduce different varieties of hazelnut trees to the Carolinas. We are also currently cross breeding different varieties of hot peppers. We hope to develop the ultimate hot pepper variety - one with just the right amount of heat and flavor.
Most of the information found on this site is from personal experience. Over the years, we've grown almost all of the vegetables listed in the navigation bar on our home page. After years of learning, research and trial and error, we know what works and what doesn't.
We decided to create a website to share our knowledge of vegetable gardening with anyone who might be interested. Our goal was to create a comprehensive vegetable gardening guide. This would enable any visitor to easily access lots of information about growing vegetables in one, convenient location. Although we are constantly adding new content, we hope you find our site well organized with easy to find tips and how-to advice for growing your own vegetables.
Best Wishes and Happy Gardening,
Marcus and Kristen
P.S. We love helping our website visitors by sharing our gardening knowledge and experience. Please help us continue to make this possible by visiting the websites of our advertisers and sponsors.