The best gardens are the ones with a plan behind them—or at least that’s what I’ve found. Knowing when, where, and how to plant something pretty much means I can garden on auto-pilot throughout the season. In this post I will walk through how to do your garden planning in Google Sheets in a way that is easy to customize and update. Let me walk you through what info I chose to include and how to plot everything you need to do month-by-month!

First, I Create a List of What to Plant for the Season

I sort my planting into three pages.

1. Tending for all my biennial and perennial plants that come back year after year that need to be looked after.
2. Spring for the plants I will start this spring and harvest this year.
3. Fall for the plants I will start this fall, overwinter, and harvest the following year.

Plant & Variety

I always note down each plant and its variety because I do sometimes grow multiple varieties of the same kind of plant. This is a good way to keep them organized and know what you have.

Number of Plants

Before I start planting I decide how many plants to start. I normally add a few extras in case all don’t make it to planting. So for instance if I want 12 onion plants in the end I’ll probably start 14-16.

Growing From

This is where I note whether I am growing the plant from seed, bare roots/bulbs/sets, or if it is a mature plant. I do this because some plants I buy from the nursery and will have different planting timelines than plants from seed, so it is helpful to track.

Sow Type

Sow type is whether a plant should be started indoors, sown as a seed directly outside, or transplanted directly outside because it is a mature plant.

Starting Period

When I start plants indoors I like to jot down how many weeks before I need to transplant them outside. This way I can figure out when to kick things off indoors and line up the dates on my calendar.

I usually sort my plants into groups based on when they need to be started: 10 weeks, 8 weeks, or 6 weeks. The cool thing about this method is that any plants in the same time group get started, hardened off, and transplanted all together.

Transplant Date

This is the day I will move the plant to its permanent location outdoors.

Location

Location is where a plant belongs in my garden. I have a small balcony garden so my locations are simple, like “left railing planter.” But if you have a large garden you could label your garden beds and divide up sections within the beds to get more specific locations. I can also use location to plan companion planting.

Minimum Soil Temperature

This is the minimum soil temperature each plant likes. I use annual soil temperatures to pinpoint the best time for planting different kinds of plants. For example, if I know my soil temps reach 50℉ in early May, then my cool soil crops like lettuce can be transplanted outside then. I can plan backwards to determine when to start lettuce from seed.

Related Post: A Gardener’s Guide to Understanding Your Growing Season

Then I Build the Calendars and Plot My Tasks

Making the calendars is very easy! I followed this tutorial to format everything quickly. Each month gets its own page. Then I mark my estimated first and last frost dates since those mark the start and end of my growing season.

I look at my plant list and figure out when to direct sow or transplant each group of plants based on the minimum soil temperature. For example, all my warm-weather plants get hardened off and transplanted or sown on the same day. But since some need to be started indoors, I make sure to note when to kick those off, too.

I just keep doing this for all my plants until I’ve got a complete calendar.

Let’s say I want to plant some Genovese basil because I’m really looking forward to making some pesto. Basil loves warm weather and needs soil temps to be at least around 50°F, but I aim for 60°F for good measure. In my area, the soil usually hits that 60°F mark around May 22, so, that’s my planting date. I like to start basil 6 weeks before it should go outdoors with the last week being used to harden it off before transplanting. So based on my planting date, I should start the seeds indoors on April 10 and harden them off May 15-22.

I’m still figuring out my garden calendar as I go, and I hope to put together a downloadable version eventually for others to use. In the meantime, try creating your own calendar. And if you’ve done garden planning before—perhaps using a different method—let me know how it went.

I hope this helps!