Top Tips for Growing Your Own on a Balcony

It doesn't matter how small your outdoor space is. Even if you only have a compact city balcony installed by Leeds fabricators, you can still grow your own delicious vegetables that will save you money and reduce waste.

Here we've put together some top tips to get you started with your very own balcony allotment.

Don't Overfill Pots

Plants need space to grow and become stronger, so choose deep pots and don't over-seed them if you want to achieve the best yield. You don't have to use traditional pots, and this is a great opportunity to get creative and recycle some everyday items, such as using a welly to grow carrots.

Easy Growbags

A quick way of sowing seeds on a balcony is to cut open a growbag and place them directly into it. There will be enough space for a couple of courgette plants or lots of salad leaves, and you can even put two bags together, with a hole in the bottom of one, to give enough depth to plant beans.

A Little at a Time

Depending on the size of your balcony, try sowing a few vegetable seeds to start with and then adding some more after a few weeks so you'll have a continual harvest rather than ending up with too much at once and wasting some of it.

Growing Up

You can even grow tall vegetable plants, such as French beans, on a balcony, as long as there is something for them to grow up, like a wall or trellis. When you're planning your balcony with Leeds fabricators, look at how the design can give you more growing space and ways in which you can protect areas from the wind.

Don't Forget to Water

Plants becoming too dry can be an issue with balcony gardens, as pots can only hold a certain amount of water, and overhanging roofs can prevent rain from getting to them. Keep an eye on moisture levels in your pots and water all the plants regularly but not too much at a time, as this can be just as destructive to plants as letting them dry out.

Nice and Colourful

Some vegetables, such as beans and courgettes, flower as well, so you should grow them where they can be admired or even pop a few flowers into the pots to brighten them up.