There are so many seeds available now that trying to decide what to plant in your garden can be overwhelming whether you are a seasoned gardener or planting a garden for the first time. How will you choose?

I am going to help you organize your thoughts to narrow down your choices and make it easier to decide.






First, you need to ask yourself these questions and then I will discuss each one in more detail.

1. What is your budget?
2. How much space do you have?
3. Are you growing food, herbs, flowers, or some of each?
4. Is your food garden a necessary supplement or are you gardening more for fun?
5. What zone are you in? What type of climate?
6. Do you have some good seeds leftover from last year?
7. Will you start your own seeds indoors for longer season plants or buy starter plants?
8. Are you planting an organic garden?
9. Heirloom or Hybrid?
10. Will you buy your seeds in the local stores, through mail order seed catalogs, or both?

1. Consider your overall budget and then how much of your budget can you spend on seeds. The cost of seeds can add up very quickly especially if you have little self-control like me. If you keep this budget in mind when picking out seeds, you can shop wisely by choosing some very inexpensive seeds for standard varieties or small quantity packets and spend a little more for anything special you would like to try. Have an idea of specific things you definitely want to plant and be prepared to buy those first.

2. If you have unlimited space, then your choices will not be affected by this consideration. If you have a small area, then you first need to decide what you want to plant and how much space it will need. If you think you will not have enough space, you can make more space by choosing different varieties. Gardening is not just close to the ground. Think about how much vertical space you have. For example, choose pole beans instead of bush beans, vine cucumbers instead of bush, four indeterminate (plants continue growing bigger all season) tomatoes instead of eight determinate (plants only get a specific size – usually a couple feet tall) tomatoes to get the number of tomatoes you want or need. Keep in mind that you will need to provide necessary support for your vertical garden choices. Also, if you have space elsewhere, you can move some out of the garden area and into containers. Use these same concepts for flowers and herbs.

3. If you planting a mixture of food, herbs, and flowers be sure to determine the percentage of each and plan your space and budget for each.

4. If you are dependent on a successful crop of food, then stick mostly with old reliable varieties. If you have the space, try at least a small amount of something different. If you are gardening mostly for fun and can afford a few failures, have a blast picking out the most unique varieties you can find and that are not readily available in the grocery store.

5. Now that you have an idea of what you would “like” to grow, know your zone and length of your growing season. Also, consider your climate. Do you need drought tolerant or cool, wet tolerant varieties? Some things will be ruled out by these factors. However, if you are willing to consider hybrids, there may be a new variety works in your zone and climate.

6. Take an inventory of left-over seeds from last year. Make a list and keep it handy when shopping at the store or relaxing with your favorite catalogs at home. There is no point in buying more of something you do not need. You will have more of your budget available for other seeds, starter plants, or other gardening supplies.

7. Depending on your zone, some plants may need a head start indoors to have a long enough growing season outdoors. In the northern zones, tomatoes, some herbs, and some flowers fall into this category. Will you start everything from seed including indoor seedlings? If not, leave them off your seed list and make another list of plants you will need to buy at your local greenhouse or gardening centers.

8. If you are planting an organic garden then this minimizes the number of seeds you have to look at. Suddenly, the rows and rows (or pages upon pages of catalogs) of seeds are not so overwhelming. Find the organic section in the store or a mail-order company that specializes in only organic seeds to help stay focused on what you need. There are organic Heirloom and hybrid varieties so that is your next consideration.

9. Have you already decided to just grow Heirloom varieties? If so, you have narrowed your choices a bit more although there are still thousands from which to choose. For Heirloom and hybrid, look for characteristics you want to help you choose. Do you want short carrots, midget melons, or huge pumpkins? If you want to ensure a true variety then only plant one variety to avoid cross-pollination. You can also plant two with different length growing seasons (this is a little trickier) that will not be blooming at the same time or two separate crops (the second planted after the first is done) for anything that has a very short growing season. Some plants generally will not cross-pollinate such as beans, tomatoes, lettuce, and peppers so you can plant several varieties of peppers side by side and not worry. Those classified as “open pollination” will cross breed with nearby varieties in the same group. Another factor to consider is whether you want to save your own seeds. If so, you can only save seeds from Heirloom varieties to ensure your seeds will be of the same variety. Hybrids can revert to the parent plants used in the crossbreeding process and some may also be sterile and not germinate at all.

10. Where will you buy your seeds? The advantage of buying from a catalog is that you will find unique varieties that you can not find in the stores. There is usually more information available in the catalog compared to what you find on the seed packet in the store. The disadvantage is that you usually have to pay shipping. Also, catalogs don’t often have $.30 or $.99 packets like you might find in some stores. However, you won’t find the unique varieties in the store at that price.


I hope this information will make it easier and fun to choose the seeds for your garden. There are a few more things to keep in mind. If you are gardening with kids, let them choose a couple seeds that they can call their own. Get them involved. If you can’t decide between two or three varieties of tomatoes, let the kids pick and decide for you!

If you want to try growing anything indoors during the colder months (herbs are great for this!), wait to buy the seeds at the end of the growing season. Most stores discount the seeds to get rid of them. You can often get seeds as much as 75% off! Don’t wait too long though or they will all be gone. It is all a matter of timing to get in on a great deal.

If you have a very small budget, you can find free (or nearly free) seeds for the price of a self-addressed stamped envelope or participating in a seed exchange or seed saver program. Just search the Internet for seed exchange, seed swap, seed saver, free seeds. You can narrow your search for flowers, herbs, or even specific types of seeds like “free tomato seeds”.

Also, if you are planting flowers be aware of your state’s list of noxious weeds and DO NOT plant these! You will see seeds for some of them in the seed catalogs. What is a weed in one state may be fine in another and the consequences for planting and allowing a noxious weed to get out of control is not pretty in some states. Be aware.

Have a fun and bountiful growing season!