EFFICIENT ENOUGH

Early spring-sown crops: peas, broccoli, lettuce, radishes, savoy
cabbage, kohlrabi

Overwintered crops: onions, broccoli cauliflower,
cabbage, favas beans

Endive Kale

Garden sorrel

Indeterminate tomatoes

Giant kohlrabi

Parsley--leaf and root

heirloom summer squash (sprawly)

Pole beans

Herbs: marjoram, thyme, dill, cilantro, fennel, oregano

Root crops: carrots, beets, parsnips


MARGINAL


Brussels sprouts (late)

Potatoes

Determinate tomatoes

Rutabagas

Eggplant

Leeks

Leeks

Savoy cabbage (late)

Peppers, small fruited


INEFFICIENT


Beans, bush snap

Peppers, bell

Broccoli, summer

Radishes

Cauliflower

Scallions, bulb onions

Celery

Sweet corn

Lettuce

Turnips

Have fun planning your own water-wise garden!

Optimizing Space: Planning the Water-Wise Backyard Garden

Intensive gardening is a strategy holding that yield per square foot
is the supreme goal; it succeeds by optimizing as many growth
factors as possible. So a raised bed is loosened very deeply without
concern for the amount of labor, while fertility and moisture are
supplied virtually without limit. Intensive gardening makes sense
when land is very costly and the worth of the food grown is judged
against organic produce at retail--and when water and nutrients are
inexpensive and/or available in unlimited amounts.

When water use is reduced, yield inevitably drops proportionately.
The backyard water-wise gardener, then, must logically ask which
vegetable species will give him enough food or more economic value
with limited space and water. Taking maritime Northwest rainfall
patterns into consideration, here's my best estimation:

Water-Wise Efficiency of Vegetable Crops

(in terms of backyard usage of space and moisture)