This article is a follow up to The #1 key to saving money with gardening.

The #2 key to saving money with gardening is eating more of what you produce.

Reckless planting

Have you ever seen a large garden so full of weeds you can't even walk through it?

Producing more from your garden isn't about reckless planting. A lot of people will plant far more than they could ever hope to eat, get tired of taking care of it, and then let it go.

Calculate

In deciding what to plant, you should make some attempt to figure how much you can actually eat. If you are planting for your neighbors, friends, and family, go ahead and factor that in, but do it on purpose. Feel free to factor in a margin of error for whatever factors you want to consider. Granted, your figures will be very inexact, especially for first year gardeners, but give it a try.

You may find you don't really need 6,000 radishes all ready to eat at once while you do need more than five pound of potatoes to last until Christmas.

Just because there are enough seeds in the packet to plant sixteen rows in your garden doesn't mean you should plant sixteen rows. Plant only about what you think you will eat. When you are finished planting, carefully pack those precious seeds that are left, and you will be able to plant them next year.

Carefully calculating the size of your plantings will save on water, fertilizer, and any pesticides you might use as well as reducing your work load, focusing your energy on the plants you really need.

Time your plantings

Part of profiting from the harvest involves controlling not just how much you plant, but also when you plant it. If you want fresh sweet corn all season, you will have to stagger the plantings and possibly will want to experiment with different varieties with different rates of maturation.

Some plants must be planted very early in the season when the weather is still very cool and others very late after the soil has warmed sufficiently. If you plant too early or too late, you risk harvesting produce that optimal or even loosing a crop entirely. Through much of the US, a fall harvest of short season crops is possible, but will require a lot of watering for many gardens.

Food storage

Eating more of what you produce involves storing it until you want to eat it. I won't go into food storage here, but know that you can refrigerate, dry, can, freeze, ferment, pickle, or just store stuff in a cool place.

Ya gotta eat it

No matter how much you produce and how well you store it, eating more of what you produce, means you actually have to eat it. No matter how much eggplant you grow, if your family won't eat it, it won't do you any good. You want to plant things you like to eat.

Less obviously, there is a lot of difference in flavor between different varieties. For instance, tomatoes come in all colors from red to white to yellow to orange to black to pink to green. In addition, there are different sizes, shapes, and color patterns. Moreover, there is a world of difference in flavors. Other vegetables show similar variety, but to unlock their potential, you will almost certainly want to dive into the world of heirloom seeds. Commercial hybrid varieties don't show nearly the variety and won't let you save seed from year to year.

Of course, eating what you produce isn't the only reason to garden…

—Luke