1Crops the nursery has
Tick what you can buy. Share % is how much of the 300 cm planting length each crop gets as a full-width strip — area, not number of plants. Whatever is left stays empty. Spacing is centre to centre; you can raise it to match a nursery tag but not lower it.
2Trellises
Recommended: leave both trellises bare so the greens get every bit of the limited sun.
Peas want full sun and cool weather, so at about 3 h of sun this is an experiment. Local calendars put pea sowing in November–December: don't buy them today. Use only one side — climbing peas on both trellises would shade the whole bed.
Turning this on reserves a 40 cm strip along that side first. The greens then use the remaining 100 cm width, so their counts may drop.
3Bed plan
4Shopping list
How the numbers work
- The bed is 320 × 160 cm. A 10 cm edge all round stays unplanted, leaving 300 × 140 cm to plant.
- Each crop gets a full-width strip along the 3.2 m length: share × 300 cm (30% = 90 cm). Strips run left to right in list order; unassigned share stays empty at the right end.
- Plants per strip = whole spots across × whole spots deep, rounded down. Every plant sits at least half its spacing from its strip edge, so different crops never crowd each other.
- The 10 cm edge, the empty share and the rounding down are the safety margin. Nothing extra is subtracted on top. Buying fewer is always fine.
- Spacings are deliberately roomy planner choices, not exact figures from the sources. If a nursery tag asks for more room, enter it; smaller numbers are ignored.
- The bed is assumed reachable from both long sides (80 cm to the middle), so there is no path inside it.
Planting day
- Plant in the cooler part of the day — early morning or late afternoon.
- Set each seedling at the marked spot, at the same depth it sat in its cell.
- Water gently to settle the soil around the roots. After that, push a finger into the soil and water again when the top few centimetres feel dry, rather than by a fixed amount or schedule.
- Seeds: sow 2–3 per spot, keep the surface moist until they come up, then thin to the strongest one.
What to expect from 3 hours of sun
- About 3 hours of direct sun is the low end even for leafy greens. Leaf lettuce, spinach, chard, kale and pak choi are the most forgiving choices.
- Parsley, coriander and arugula usually prefer 4–6 hours, so they are marked trial at 3 h.
- Bright sky light between buildings helps but is not direct sun, and the low winter sun may lose more hours behind buildings. Expect slower growth; this plan makes no yield promises. Pick outer leaves a few at a time.
- Choose leaf (loose-leaf) lettuce, not large crisphead types.
- Carrots are a root crop that wants full sun (at least 6 hours), so at about 3 hours they are only a trial at 3 h: expect slow growth and no promise of usable roots. They are sown in place, never as plugs, into deep, loose soil free of stones and clods.
- Winter cucumber is listed because you asked for it by that name; it is not a specific cultivar, and not winter melon. Cucumbers are a warm-season climbing crop, so this is an optional trial at 3 h with no promise it will grow outdoors in winter or at 3 hours of sun. It needs a support to climb.
Sources and assumptions
Sources (paraphrased)
- Iowa State Extension — vegetables for partial shade: leaf lettuce, spinach, chard and kale are the leafy crops that can manage with around 3–4 hours of sun; other vegetables are less dependable.
- Iowa State Extension — growing edibles in shady areas: stricter; spinach and bok choy tolerate moderate shade (2–4 h), while herbs such as parsley and coriander and greens like arugula do better with 4–6 h. Shade means smaller harvests.
- Yagev nursery — Israeli planting calendar (Hebrew): October suits lettuce and spinach (and carrots), autumn suits parsley and coriander, and chard is a winter crop.
- Gina Mezina — winter vegetables guide (Hebrew): September–October can still be hot in Israel; leafy winter crops can be started, avoiding the heat of the day; root crops such as carrots are best sown directly in the bed.
- Malo et HaAretz — year-round Israeli vegetable calendar: lettuce, spinach, carrots, parsley and coriander in September–October; peas in November–December.
- University of Maryland Extension — growing lettuce: row and in-row spacing guidance for lettuce.
- University of Maryland Extension — growing carrots: carrots want full sun (at least 6 hours, preferably 8–10), are sown directly into deep, loose, stone-free soil, and are thinned to 1–4 inches (about 2.5–10 cm) apart.
- University of Minnesota Extension — spinach and Swiss chard: spinach is usually sown directly; chard can go in as transplants.
- Purdue Extension — leafy greens: spacing guidance for greens.
- University of Minnesota Extension — growing peas: peas are a cool-season crop that want full sun and a support to climb.
Assumptions
- Planner spacings (centre to centre): leaf lettuce 35, chard 45, spinach 25, kale 60, parsley 35, coriander 25, arugula 25, pak choi 35, carrot 10, winter cucumber 60 cm; peas 20 cm in one row. These are roomy on purpose and are not quoted from the sources (carrot sits at the wide end of Maryland's thinning range).
- Counts are final plant positions, not seed counts. Seed crops need one small packet whatever the count.
- Spinach, coriander and arugula default to direct seed; you can switch spinach (or any crop except carrots, which are seed only) to seedlings if the nursery has suitable young single plugs.
- No weather forecast is used. If it is still hot on planting day, wait for a cooler spell or plant late in the afternoon.
- Trellises stay bare by default. The pea option reserves 40 cm of the 140 cm planting width on one side only, for a November trial.
- Choices are saved in this browser only.