The Most Profitable Plants in Your Garden

Here's a CHART of the most profitable plants in your vegetable garden. It shows US Dollar value per square foot.

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And an even better (more comprehensive) article:

P-Patch

sfg4uKim wrote:Here's a CHART of the most profitable plants in your vegetable garden. It shows US Dollar value per square foot.

Excellent information, thanks for sharing.

When I started gardening, it was in containers on a balcony, and I had to buy EVERYTHING including soil and compost, etc. So... I only grew the most expensive stuff from my grocery, purple bell peppers, mesclun mix for lettuce, etc.

Having an acre now... well, it's still the same. How much time/energy am I putting into different things and how worth it is it.

For example, usually, corn is a silly crop for me to grow as EVERYONE around here grows sweet corn, it's at all the farm stands, and it's dead cheap.

Except this year, I have a 10-yr-old gardening assistant who loves corn and wants to grow it, so to heck with it, we'll grow a few squares.

I grew potatoes a few times, and it was fun, interesting, got good yields, but... potato is one of the cheapest veggies I buy, so not going to repeat that.

I made soap a few times too, same kinda of thing, neat to know I could do that. But I can buy 10 bars of Ivory for under $5 so... not a good thing to continue wasting time on really.

Some things are fun for trying, but not so good for actual productivity. My garden has to be BOTH a hobby AND produce a yield on the investment as I can't afford it otherwise.

Another interesting article showing how much can be grown in 100 sq ft. This is not a SFG.

https://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.rosalindcreasy.com%2F&h=yAQFMjH9i

We grow varieties that you can't find in the stores or farmer's markets on nearly everything.
When we do potatoes, we do those little fingerlings that run $3+ per pound in 2x2x3' boxes and get nice yields as a rule (roughly 20 pounds per box)
We grow some of our own fruit (yellow and red raspberries, blueberries, strawberries, since it's difficult to get really good organic ones) that typically sells out at the Farmer's Market within an hour.
Some things we grow that can be purchased easily, but it's so much nicer to have them minutes fresh instead of a day or more old.

I would think that a chart like that should be in relation to your area.
I cannot imagine cilantro being worth more than artichoke. Being in a colder climate there are some things just are not available for any price.
Cilantro grows here more like a weed, yet to grow something like artichoke takes an enormous amount of work. (yet it grew like a weed down in Oregon).
Basil to me is priceless because it costs 2.50 for a few little leaves at the store, yet I can grow enough of it that I could eat 20 dollars worth every night in the summer for almost nothing.
Value depends on climate.

I think one of the reasons artichokes are considered lower value per sq ft is that it takes 9 sq feet for one artichoke plant, and you only get 4 to 6 buds per plant.

Interesting. Happily I grow for the love of the crop and the enjoyment of growing it and not for profit.

Yeh, that's how I determine what to plant. But I thought it was interesting to see just how much I'm actually saving by not having to purchase these items.

Even though it's not "profitable" to grow corn, I just can't resist snapping off a Silver Queen out of the garden. And I DO admit to some SATISFACTION in growing my gourmet salad greens.

Happily I grow for the love of the crop

me three.
Some people say "why grow potatoes because they are so cheap at the store?"
However I try to grow everything I like so that whatever I want to cook, I never have to go to the store.
I just hate having to go grocery shopping all the time in the winter.

Oddly enough I had a guy this week say to me that he never grows tomatoes because they are so cheap at the store.......... I figured he does not truly savour the flavour of garden fresh tomatoes.... or everything for that matter.

Organic heirloom tomatoes cost a FORTUNE at the grocery... and are only there about 3-4 weeks anyways...

I had a peek into one of the links , someone was asking what " Cilantro " was , a reply of " Clinatro is Coriander " was given ..

A keyboard worrier came back a bit later somewhat full of themselves .... anally .

Along the lines of "Cliantro is what the whole world calls it and they are laughing at you Brits calling Cilantro .. corriander when its all the world calls the plant Cilantro & the seeds corriander ".



It made me smile for they obviously do not know the root source of the word is Latin and much English is Latin based... something to do with the Romans around 2000 yrs or so ago apparently

Coriandrum sativum; Coriander



Mirth now over ...

I enjoyed reading the lists. A quick trip out for groceries yesterday turned most of it upside down for over here. The biggest thing that stood out is only grow what you plant to eat and only grow lots of what you eat lots of .

If it grows quickly and you can get several crops per sq foot so much the better .

We eat onions by the pound ... big round bulbed ones not skinny green salad scallions , we have over 200 onions in sqf MM beds ( 9 per sq foot ).....come winter the prices will be well up almost double what they were yesterday .

Carrots are also high on our list of all year round veg .. grated , fried in a bit of butter, stews , raw batons etc. so far we have four sq ft with another ten planned because the stuff from the shops is so badly bruised and stored it it frequently develops weepie patches after only four days in the fridge veg drawer at 3 oC

Kale here is sold pre cut into shreds in most supermarkets and it is rarely sold on market stalls , so for us our luxury everyday veg is decent kale almost all year round in the garden not in raised bed . Shop & market stall Brussels sprouts tend to be rubbish as well , nothing beats a few taken off the stalk and scoffed within the hour.

Cauliflowers are also high up on our list for the shop sold stuff is normally old long term cold stored most of the time and it tastes sulphury .

Whereas fresh with snow white curds and big dark green leaves is a sort of melt in the mouth job with edible greenery as well when cooked correctly or a crunch when used in a soup rather than being like old rubber .

Organic heirloom tomatoes cost a FORTUNE at the grocery... and are only there about 3-4 weeks anyways...

Yes I agree, in fact all tomatoes cost a fortune, and nothing even comes close to heirlooms just off the vine.
My sister (non gardener) didn't want any of my heirlooms last year, she said they were "too juicy"
I had heirlooms from the beginning of July last year until christmas (I had the green ones ripening in the basement for 2 months)

I have wonderful Kale plants now that are about 3-4 inches tall and I am just hardening them off a bit and plant to make them my official first SFG plant
I made my first 4x4 yesterday and mixed up my first LARGE batch of Mels mix and have just decided Kale is it....
It apparently can be transplanted up to 5 weeks before last frost.

Interesting plantoid that they chop up the kale in the grocery store.

Most of the shops / supermarkets and lots of green grocers sell it prepacked in plastic bags by weight for it's so much easier for them to buy it with a weeks shelf life when in the bag and there is no mess & little waste .... it's evil

SPINACH vs. KALE
The winner: Kale
Kale's nutritional might would win over even Popeye. Gram for gram, kale contains four times more vitamin C, and one and a half times the amount of immune boosting vitamin A and vitamin K. "Vitamin K ensures that blood clots properly," says Eberle, "but it's also needed to make a bone protein essential for strong, healthy bones." Kale contains three times more lutein and zeaxanthin, antioxidants deposited in the retina that work together to protect eye health.

HEALTHY CHOICE: Make kale "chips": Spread bite-sized pieces on a baking sheet. Spray with olive oil, season with salt, and bake for 15 minutes (until crisp).

I had never really tried Kale short of that tiny piece that garnishes your plate in restaurants until I came across this recipe and I grow it just so I can make this recipe
at least once every 2 weeks in the summer. It require a lot of Kale and so having at least 10 plants in production really is needed.

http://www.vegetariantimes.com/recipes/10862?section=

This will be my second year with SFG, and I'm making some changes based on what's cheaper at the grocery store. Our family eats mainly tomatoes and green beans, which is what I'll be planting the most of this year. I have a whole bed of strawberries, too. Herbs are great to have just so you have access to fresh ones when needed, but I found last year that one square of each kind was plenty, except for basil. I made a ton of pesto and froze it, and I plan to plant a bunch of basil again. We love pesto, and it can be fairly expensive at the grocery store.

I'm cutting out carrots this year. The ones I got were fairly small for all the space they took up in my beds, and I had to leave them in all season long to get decent sized carrots. it just wasn't worth it-- all that space, and I could have spent about $6 for the same amount of carrots at the grocery store. I feel the same way about onions-- they were too small, and they took up too much space for something that's so cheap to just go buy.

I love having lettuce on hand, but I'm probably going to have to pass on that this time around. It's time to be planting that now, and I'm stuck inside with bad morning sickness for at least another few weeks, so I'm going to focus on summer crops this year once I start feeling better.

Overall, I plan to grow bits of this and that so I have some variety, but tomatoes, basil, and green beans are really the only crops I'm going to plant multiple squares of to get larger yields. The rest is easy enough and tastes good enough to me to buy at the store (granted, I'm not exactly into veggie gourmet, so I understand this type of plan wouldn't work for those who like to grow more exotic veggies).



edit: Forgot to add peppers! I'll do a variety of those, too, and at least in my area, peppers are really pricey in the store, so that is a significant money saver. I freeze them if I end up with too many in the fall. If they're chopped up in something, you can't tell they were frozen. I knew there was something missing.