Many gardeners are turning to organic gardening techniques as a way of growing lots of tasty edible crops without the use of man-made chemicals and fertilisers. The food is healthier, tastier and you'll have the peace of mind of knowing exactly what has gone into producing it. It's not difficult to change your style of gardening and while it might initially feel daunting, you'll reap the benefits long-term.

Starting an organic garden isn't that difficult. If you already grow vegetables, fruit or herbs, all you need to do is change some of your methods, so that, for example, instead of blasting a pest with chemicals, you protect the crop so the little beastie can't get to it. Or you might introduce a predator to eat the pest.

If you want to get a taste of how much fun an organic garden can be, the best thing to do is just pick one crop from the annual varieties (because that way you start getting results before you get bored, hopefully).

Planning is the best way to achieve the results you want from your organic garden. You need to ask yourself a few questions to work out the needs of your family. You also have to decide what space you have to make available

So, you've allocated a sunny area for your organic veggie garden beds. You've got water available. It's a good idea to measure up your area and decide if you want to create individual beds. Make it no wider than about 1.2metres. That way you can reach in from either side without having to stand on the bed. You want to avoid any compacting of the soil. The beds can be as long as you like.

If you're going to have drip or trickle irrigation, now is the time to do it - before you start planting. It's pretty easy to install irrigation and you can even include a timer - especially handy for those of us with poor memories.

It's better to have water going directly to the roots where it's needed. Watering too frequently encourages shallow root growth which leaves plants very sensitive to water shortages. Deeper, less frequent watering promotes deeper root growth.