GROW YOUR GARDEN "UP" AS NATURE INTENDED

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In assigning garden location and locating vertical-growth supports, you should also differentiate between vines that grow straight up and as high as they can, those that grow out flat and expand laterally, and those that leapfrog. Then, erect support systems appropriate to the plant. Those that produce a single stalk such as peas and beans and that climb without help do best on vertical string supports.

Those that grow several lateral stems such as squash vines and yams must be manually lifted and woven through strands of a mesh support. The "leapfroggers" need to be tied up or contained in a crib or bin. Lastly, be aware of which varieties will grow how high. It is always better to give climbers a little too much room to grow than too little.

Highest-climbing garden vegetables should be arrayed at the northern downsun end of the garden so as not to shade out lower growers placed behind them. At the very top of the garden, I maintain a planting of perennial Jerusalem artichoke, a small-flowered but tall-growing sunflower that produces ample, self-perpetuating crops of edible tubers that are delicious raw or in salads—or cooked as a substitute for water chestnuts or potatoes. Then just below it, at the top of the cultivated garden, I plant a row of giant sunflowers, thinning them to two feet in the row. Growing up to ten feet high with huge seed heads, just a few can provide a winter's supply of high-protein snacks ...plus a great contribution to the compost heap. Next comes seed of varieties that produce single stems (peas and beans) and that should be planted close together in narrow rows.

Those that branch out (tomatoes, cucumbers, and melons) need wider spacing but are lower growing, so come third in height order. Next come the taller unsupported varieties such as brussels sprouts, and finally the greens and low root crops. Seasonality as well as growth height determine planting order and timing. I like to start tall-growing, cold-tolerant peas at the back of the garden in early spring (often before the last snow showers in April). Peas are one of the few vegetables that freeze well for me, so I plant a lot. First to go in are tall-growing, edible-pod snow peas, sugar snaps, and "Frosty"-type cold-tolerant sweet peas.

Reluctantly, and for these superearly plantings only, I have compromised my organic principles and bought seed treated against the soil-borne rots that consume virtually all seed planted before they emerge and the June sun warms and dries out our cold, wet New England spring soil. But I am experimenting with a way to avoid those ugly red-poison coatings—by planting early peas in three-inch-deep trenches filled with State of Maine ocean-beach sand. (I can't see why a clean inland sand from a sandpit, lake beach, or river bend wouldn't work as well.)

Sand contains few plant nutrients, but it is also free of inland soil and its seed-rotting organisms. Peas and beans have more than enough food stored in their first cotyledonary leaves to fuel root growth down into nutrient-bearing soil and greenery up to the sun.

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