Fall Vegetable Garden

I planted winter radish, kohlrabi, and winter carrots today. I’d like to plant sugar snap peas but can’t do that outside, too cold. May do that later in the greenhouse.

I haven’t done much of this so not sure of planting dates.

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I’m trying to figure out some of this too, but not so much root crops- I’d like to have a fall season of sugar peas, lettuce, and spinach. Kale will keep going by itself, but now that my summer greens and garlic are gone I’ve plenty of room for new greens. Probably should get that done in the next few days.

I’ll have toms until the first hard frost- which could be next week or not until October. Won’t know until it happens.

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I have directly sown lettuces, arugula, spinach, rabe, purple top turnips, daikon and watermelon radishes, bok choy, mustards, and Asian greens. I started kolrabi, kales, broccoli, cauliflower, and cabbage in flats. I have to, annoyingly, make another raised bed because I have no room for my brassicas.

I planted around 100 carrot seeds, put a floating row cover over them, and watered everyday, but much like that children’s book, nothing came up. and nothing came up.

I don’t know what the rule is for plugging things, but if you go to “one yard revolution”, he has a fall planting excel sheet that you can enter your first frost date and it tells you when to start your seeds.

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I learned planting times in San Diego environs by trial and error. At first I killed 9 out of 10 things, now only 2 out of 10.

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These are all small seeds so I loosened up the furrows where my corn was this spring, rebuilt the basins, planted, raked the seeds in shallow, covered with cardboard, and watered. It’s now thundering…that must be a good omen…!!

I’ll have to keep a close eye on things and get the cardboard off as soon as things start coming up. And hope it’s not just weeds.

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So true!

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Mine are just up - a week or so behind the shelling peas

2nd planting of spinach up now too

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I planted my fall garden a week or so ago. Snap peas, lettuce, beets, carrots and oats (cover crop) mostly

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I have a couple of planting guides that list spring and fall dates. It is put out by gardening services in my area. There is also this web site I’ve found that will taylor info to your location.

Not sure if it’s statewide or national

Katy

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Already made the mistakes and made my own calendar for my location (all gardening is a local ‘fire and adjust’). Planted celery & celeriac in early July. End of July, sowed some cauliflower, broccoli, scallions, romanesco, kohlrabi, leeks and carrots all in cells. It is way too warm (for good germination) and too brutal (pest pressure) for these to succeed sown outside. Any direct sown seedlings are toast here in July->Sept. I use the AC vent to get close as possible to the best germination temps for brassicas. A discussion on winter growing was started here and continued for a few posts.

Early August, Cilantro, Rutabaga. Late August, Lettuce, Celtuce, Parsley, Basil, Spinach and white Turnip. Early Sept. Pak Choi, Sugar snap peas.
Most of this is growing under poly by mid November. I don’t have a heated greenhouse but the hoop house (high tunnel) works fine. I construct several low tunnels for the brassicas mainly- they need lots of room. When temps get down to the mid 20s I add row cover inside the poly of the hoop house (high tunnel) to capture ground heat and my celery and lettuces have survived down to 5 deg that way.
It is so rewarding pulling together a fresh salad in the middle of winter. :blush:

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Hey Anne, or anyone
How long do you wait to move the seedlings you start in trays into the ground. I think the brassicas we spoke about earlier have about 5 leafs are ready to be transplanted. I have already moved the Napa Cabbage, which is a great vegetable. Also, do you just sit your row cover on the seedlings or are you using a frame of some sort?

The last two years I have been able to make a salad for my wife and I using greens from the garden up through New Years. The store bought greens are terrible in the middle of the winter.

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I threw few packages of old seeds,kale,collard, out to the garden in the spring。guess what,these are not as old as I thought they were。they all came up and occupied my garden space. They grow huge for veggies and will continue growing till frost. they are my spring, summer, and fall garden of year 2017!

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They go from small germination trays to flats and when there is room in the garden, or, when they are at least 7" tall they get planted out. Then they have a fighting chance. :blush: I think because I have grown food for many years I have high insect pressure. I used to use just Spinosad as infrequently as I could. Now I use Bt + Spinosad every 10 days and I think that will lower the population. If you are growing brassicas, say, for the 1st time you’ll have beginners luck. After 1-2 years it gets harder to defend your food. Pak choi and napa are insects’ favorites. When those are around nothing bothers collards or kale - which, unfortunately I don’t care for either.

Brassicas grow fine in my zone under poly only down to 5 deg, maybe more. My 1st year doing this I used 2 mil painters drop cloth. :blush: I’ve not tried just row cover for cold and frost protection for them. If you are using it for more frost sensitive crops then it is best to keep the row cover off the leaves - but that depends on the temp. If I recall correctly, one year when it got really cold one January, I pulled row cover over the lettuces, etc in the high tunnel and the lettuce leaves were burnt where the row cover touched the leaves, but not elsewhere. I don’t remember what the temp was. So I have small hoops to support the row cover inside the high tunnel and pull it on and off. My cut off temp for pulling it on is 25 deg low night time temp, BECAUSE, the weather man can burn you too. :blush:

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A few days ago, I had some space where I dug up potatoes and decided to replant beans there. I’ve never tried picking the bean and planting it, but I think it may work- I let a few get pretty old, to the point that they dried on the bush.

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I just planted winter squash last week. They are already up and growing. Beets, broccoli and cauliflower soon!

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I planted my butternut squash in July - it’s just now starting male bloom

Hoping it’s not too late to get them hardened off before frost

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Planted a bunch of daikon and radishes and after 3-4 days they are sprouting :slight_smile:

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Isn’t it early for fall radishes? I never had any luck with them unless I plant them in April or in the middle of September. I guess the day is not short enough for them.

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So I planted Monday morning and Friday evening I’m thinning radishes. These are winter radish. Not the small, early maturing stuff planted in spring. Winter radish can reach a lb or two in size and should last here until they start bolting in Febr.

I also have a good stand of Kohlrabi but think I failed with the carrots. I’ll try them again and take the cardboard off sooner. I think I left it on too long with the carrots. They are very hard to even see as they start to emerge.

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Daikon?

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