It's a start!

First year gardner here. Just got my first things planted in the past few days. We put in four 4x4 beds. Here's what we have so far:

SE Square - screened

11 June-bearing strawberries (bare root) in half, 11 Ever-bearing strawberries (bare root) in the other half. Planted onions in the corners of each square.

NE Square - unscreened, left open for taller plants. Still trying to figure out how to protect from deer, etc.

Open Open Brussel Sprouts 4 Lettuce
Open Brussel Sprouts Open Open
Open Open Brussel Sprouts Open
Open Brussel Sprouts Open Open

Also planted onions in the corners of each Brussel Sprouts square.

NW Square - screened

4 Mixed Lettuce* Open Open 4 Lettuce
Open Cilantro* Open Open
Open Open 16 Beets* Open
4 Mixed Lettuce* Open Open 4 Mixed Lettuce*

SW Square - screened

Open 16 Carrots* Open 16 Green Onions
16 Carrots* 16 Beets* 16 Carrots 1 Thyme
Open 16 Carrots 9 Beets Chives
Open 16 Green Onions 4 Romain Lettuce 4 Mixed Lettuce

*Not yet planted. Waiting either for warmer weather (Cilantro) or to try to continuous harvest (lettuce, carrots, beets).

Not sure if I should plant any more now, or just wait until summer. I have a lot of empty squares (25!!!) but I'm nervous that it's getting late for spring crops and too early for summer. Any advice appreciated!

Here's a shot of the unscreened box. Currently has four squares of Brussel Sprouts and a sacrificial square of lettuce to see how much damage the deer will be.

Here's a shot of one of the screen covers closed:

And here's a shot of the SW Square with the screen cover open:

Apologies for all the posts! I haven't yet figured out how to put more than one picture in a post.

All advice welcome on any topic, but particularly wondering how it's going to work to put all the tall stuff in one square. Will it be an issue to put tomatoes, peppers and zucchini in the same box with the brussel sprouts? We have a lot of four footed visitors in our yard, so we're trying to figure out how to screen in the tall box also. Might put something like screen doors on all four sides so that I can open them to get to the garden, but hook them closed the rest of the time.

Also, should I plant anything else now or just leave the open squares until it's time to plant summer crops?

Thanks!

Christine

There is a picture posted in Scubadoo's personal album in the gallery that might give you some inspiration! I can't figure out how to post it here so that you can enlarge it.

Hyzleyes

Wow Those boxes are super nice and the screened one is truly beautiful.

I am not sure about what you should plant or not, I am still learning myself. I just had to chime in on your boxes.

These look fabulous!! Thanks for sharing.

Tomatoes, bigger bushes/vines including peppers and cucumbers, should be placed on the north sides of your boxes so they don't shade any sun from smaller plants. Brussel sprouts do grow, but not as tall as your vines. If you keep in mind the "mature" heights of all the things you plant, and think about "layering" them from tallest to shortest from north to south, you should be just fine.

One thing catches my eye.....how deep are those boxes? I ask because they look half full. If they are 8 to 12 inches deep, you are likely fine. If that is only 6 inch deep wood, though, I think you should look into topping up your MM. It likely settled when watered, like mine, or you came up a little short when mixing and putting it in......also like mine...lol. Bottom line: Make sure it's at least 4 inches deep at an absolute minimum.....but striving for at least 6 inches. Otherwise, your veggies may suffer.

A quick google search for "mature height brussel sprouts" gave me this... http://urbanext.illinois.edu/veggies/brusselssprouts.cfm

Wow! I hope I don't need as big of an enclosure as Scubadoo. I don't think anything's getting in there! Might try to build something like that around the tall box. Just have to make sure I can get to at least two sides, preferably all sides.

Thanks for the kind compliments on the screened boxes. My husband did an awesome job! Now let's hope I can grow some veggies worthy of the boxes...

Thanks for the great Brussel Sprout resource, BBG. We did use 2x10s for the boxes, so they don't look very full. Didn't put a false bottom in them. Hope that works out alright. We calculated our MM on 6 inch depth and then rounded up, so we should have enough. The SW box has more than the other three, so that's where I'm planting my carrots.

Hmmm... Thinking now that maybe I should move the BS to the south side of the box. I didn't realize the cucumbers, zucchini, tomatoes and peppers would be taller. I think that's just about everything I had planned for that box. Is it okay to plant all of those things together? Will the box be too crowded without smaller crops between the bigger ones? Should I go in this order?

North Row: Zucchini & Cucumbers
Row 2: Tomatoes
Row 3: Peppers
South Row: Brussel Sprouts