Edible Landscaping is a great way to incorporate vegetables, herbs, fruit bushes and more into your garden. If you’re thinking of incorporating edibles into your landscape, here are a few general tips to keep in mind before you get started.

1. Start Simple

If you like to plant annual flowers every year, incorporate some edible flowers into the plan. Some of our favourites are calendula, nasturtium, and violas. Another easy way to get started is to add in a perennial herb, fruit bush, or fruit tree. These generally require less maintenance than annual edibles like lettuce and tomatoes.

2. Incorporate Succession Planting for an Ongoing Harvest

Your look and feel of your garden will change over the course of the season, especially if you have a large area set aside  for annual vegetables. Succession planting allows you to stagger the harvest by planting a new area over the course of several weeks. This means a bit more initial work up front, but a more manageable harvest throughout the season.

3. Choose Forgiving Edibles

When it comes to an edible landscape, finding forgiving plants that are drought tolerant, able to stand up to the summer heat, and resistant of disease can be tricky. Avoid tricky and advanced plants that require more diligent care. Here are a few of our favourite substitutions.

  • grow celeriac instead of celery

Botanically, both plants are very similar, however celeriac is more tolerant of a wider range of conditions, more tolerant of less regular watering, and stores very well.

  • grow sprouting broccoli instead of regular broccoli
Sprouting broccoli allows you to harvest individual florets over the entire growing season. Regular broccoli gives you one head that you harvest  only once.
  • grow mizuna instead of lettuce

Mizuna is a Japanese green that is commonly found in many spring salad mixes. It has a mild taste, juicy texture and works great as a young green. We like mizuna because not only does it stand up to the heat of the summer without bolting, it is vigorous in its leaf production, can be harvested young and old, and can be harvested throughout the summer.

Want More Tips?

These are just a few of the many ways we help make edible landscaping simple and easy. Contact us if you are interested in creating an edible landscape for your home or if you want help in creating a plan for your garden.