Seven edibles in just 40 square feet

Sunset, March, 1989

How much space does it take to grow vegetables? Dr. and Mrs. Alec MacKenzie of Menlo Park, California, fit generous quantities of seven edibles into only 40 square feet. A raised bed and wide-row planting make their big harvest possible. The advantages of their system are especially apparent in the cool, damp weather of late winter and early spring. Inside the bed, loose, heavily amended soil (purchased by the truckload) is easy and pleasant to work, even when wet. By standing on gravel paths around the bed, tbe MacKenzies keep their feet clean and relatively dry as they scatter seeds, weed (although this is seldom necessary with imported soil), and harvest.

The bed consists of two boxes (one belowground) of construction-grade heart redwood 2-by-12s bolted together at corners and anchored every 3 to 4 feet with footlong stakes nailed to the insides of the boards. A chicken-wire bottom keeps out gophers. Along the back of tbe bed, a permanent chicken-wire trellis supports peas in fall and spring, beans in summer. Beds for most crops are 1 to 2 feet wide. Before planting, Dr. MacKenzie loosens all the soil with a garden fork, adds fertilizer, rakes soil smooth, and traces each vegetable's area in the soil with a hoe. Then he plants as directed on the seed packets, except that furrows are only about a hoe's width apart. He spaces onion sets 1 inch apart, harvesting them to use as green onions until they are about 5 inches apart; these he allows to mature into bulb onions.

Later, when soil warms and frost danger passes, he transplants a single summer squash plant. To finish the edges facing the street, Mrs. MacKenzie adds dwarf marigolds.