Draw your ground to scale, lay in beds of any shape, then drop plants sized to their real spacing. We label each plant, show the dimensions, flag neighbors that dislike each other, and build a planting calendar for everything you plant. Free plots go up to 20 ft per side and Homeowner plots to 40 ft; a Pro plan takes the same tool out to field and greenhouse-bench scale.
About this tool: spacing, beds, and sunGarden Planning Steps
Watch the spot through a day. Fruiting crops need 7 to 8 hours of direct sun; leafy greens get by on 3 to 4.
Measure the sunny area and set those dimensions here. Every foot on the grid is a real foot, so what fits on screen fits in the ground.
Beds about 4 ft (1.2 m) wide so you reach the middle without stepping on the soil, with 18 to 24 in (45 to 60 cm) paths between them.
Each box here is the plant's full-grown footprint. Keep boxes from overlapping, and put tall crops on the north side so they don't shade the rest.
The planting calendar dates each sowing, transplant and harvest from your frost date. Next year, move each plant family to a different bed.
Related Tools
When to start seeds indoors, when to plant out, and when to expect a harvest, based on your frost dates.
Open the schedulerGrowing degree days for your location compared with an average year, for timing crops and pests.
Open the calculatorWhich plants grow well together and which to keep apart.
Open the guideEnter your soil test results and get an amendment plan.
Open the calculatorFour inches apart looks generous in June and is a mildewed thicket in August. The between-row number on a packet exists so you can walk and hoe; in a bed you reach into, space equidistantly in all directions instead. That is what this planner does.
| Crop type | Direct sun |
|---|---|
| Fruiting crops (tomato, pepper, squash, cucumber, beans) | 7 to 8 hours |
| Root crops (carrot, beet, onion, potato) | 5 to 6 hours |
| Leafy greens (lettuce, spinach, chard) | 3 to 4 hours at least |
Tall crops on the north side, and use the shadow: lettuce behind staked tomatoes runs weeks longer. Field beds are set by your equipment first.
Pests specialise in families, so tomatoes where the peppers were achieves nothing. (To work out which pest or disease you are rotating away from, use the Plant Problem Diagnosis Key.) Three or four year cycle:
Spacing: Colorado State. Root depths: Wisconsin, USDA NRCS and Utah State. Sun: Cornell. Bed sizes: Georgia. Rotation: Iowa State. Heights, spreads and the rest are Bizon estimates (sources).