The first step to starting a new vegetable garden is to map out your garden. Simply draw up an approximate plan of where you'd like everything to go, keeping as close to scale as possible. Make sure you take into account paths and such.

Sit down and write a list of the vegetables you would like to grow. A couple of tips here… 1. Check your local area and only list the vegetables that are easy to obtain. 2. Resist any temptation to list any rare, exotic vegetables. They will be hard to get, expensive and even harder to grow.

Now go back to your garden map and decide what plants go where. The importance of a good plan is to avoid any problems as your plants start to grow, so plan carefully. It's also important to follow your plan closely.

Put a lot of thought into your vegetable plants requirements. You need to know you're planting your chosen vegetables in the best position for maximum growth. For example, learn which ones tolerate shade and which ones require full sun.

What if you have limited space? The French have an ingenious way of making full use of a small vegetable garden. You plant fast and slow growing vegetables together. This simply means that you mix something like packets of spinach and carrot seeds with each other.

The thinking behind this method is that spinach grows a lot quicker than carrots, it also breaks up the soil and gives the carrots a better chance to grow. Just sow your mixed seeds into a 1/2 inch deep furrow and cover with soil.

In about four weeks you will be able to start harvesting your young spinach which in turn allows your carrots the space to grow. You'll have a good crop of juicy carrots by the time your spinach harvest is finished.

This method can successfully be used for many different types of vegetables. Radishes can be planted well with lettuce or parsley, for example. The French will often sow early radish varieties with lettuce and turnips all at the same time.

The quickest growers are the radishes, which will be exhausted before the lettuce are mature enough to be harvested. Likewise the turnips will be ready to pull up by the time the lettuce are just about finished. Also, if your rows of plants are in an east-west pattern, you need to sow your tallest plants to the north side of these rows. This is to make sure that your shorter plants don't get shaded by the taller ones.

This is to ensure that the taller plants don't block the sunlight from reaching shorter plants. Corn is the tallest plant that is normally grown in vegetable gardens, so it should always be placed where it won't block sunlight from other plants.

Make use of this tactic for plants that like plenty of shade by deliberately planting them beside taller ones. You're then creating their ideal growing conditions. As an illustration, plant a cool weather plant like spinach in the shade of taller growing plants such as beans or peas.

By being imaginative in where you place your plants, you can have vegetables you would otherwise think you can't grow. So don't think you're limited by the position of your vegetable garden, you can create the ideal growing conditions by being selective with your planting!