about 3 hours sun. I probably will grow fruit bearers in the front yard and in containers which i would hate but I have no choice.

Here are a list of the many previous discussions about shade gardens you might want to read through for more answers and tips.

Shade garden discussions

Dave

Is there a community garden nearby? Nancy

no and i don't have time to join one. Ive a busy life being a mom to an athlete and Im always on the go. so a small garden is what i can handle

I already got plenty of helpful suggestions. I guess green vegetables at the back, fruiting vegetables on the balcony. Thats the only solution.

I agree that the leafing vegetables are the best bets. Look at Asian greens to expand the variety and interst of leafing vegetables. Scallions are also supposed to be reasonably shade tolerant. Chives, garlic chives, oregano, and members of the mint family, are also reasonably shade tolerant. Actually, I've had thyme survive reasonably nicely in shade, too--enough to season my own food, though not enough to harvest heavily.

I find that the behavior of plants in shade is often surprising. Something that's a category that is listed as needing full sun, but is also extremely vigorous, may express that vigor by tolerating shade and producing a decent crop, though a smaller crop than it would have in full sun. Or, of course, it may fail miserably. So it may be worth testing the fruiting plants in very small plantings, just to see.

I'm going to try Withner's White Cornfield Bean in a part-shade area this year or next year--it's reputed to tolerate the shade within cornfields, while many other "cornfield" beans don't, and it would be handy to have a bean that will tolerate some shade.

You could get some compact tomato plants for small (3 gallon) containers (Early Annie, Jagodka, Russian Cherry), and even some tiny cherries (such as Hundreds and Thousands, Whippersnapper) that do well in hanging baskets. Dwarf tomatoes require 5 gallon containers (Rosella Purple is an excellent one from the Dwarf Project). They would need to be started from seed though because they can be difficult to find as plants.

Linda