Winter Vegetable Garden
Tips on Planting Your Winter Vegetable Garden
You might think of vegetable gardens as being endeavors that are best taken in the spring and summer, but planting a winter vegetable garden is actually a very old practice. Not only can it produce vegetables, but the practice can also help keep your garden fertile year round.
If you would like to plant a winter vegetable garden, then you need to take your climate and precipitation into account. A lot of areas in the southern part of the United States are very well suited to growing winter vegetable gardens, while some of the northern regions might have to use greenhouses, cold frames, or hot beds.
The most important thing to know, other than what plants are suitable for winter gardening, is when the first frost is going to set in. In some areas it might be October and for other areas it might actually be later. The idea is to plant your crops and to let them mature before that first frost comes in. For the sake of this article, we will assume that the first frost is coming in late October.
Some crops that are late maturing include globe onions, fava beans, Brussels sprouts, carrots, parsnip, beets, cauliflower, cabbage, and rutabaga. These can be planted around mid-July if you want them for your fall harvest. As an alternative, they can also be planted later if you want them for a spring harvest. They take around 90 days to mature.
There are also mid-season crops such as leeks, turnips, early cabbages, winter cauliflower, early carrots, Swiss chard, collards, and perennial herbs that can be planted by mid-August and harvested in the fall. They take around 60 days to mature.
If you want to plant later in the season, then you should consider early maturing crops which mature in 30 days. These can be planted in your winter vegetable garden in mid-September. Crops that fit into this category are radishes, chives, broccoli, spinach, leaf lettuces, and mustard.
Cold frames can be used as means of lengthening the growing season of your crops. They protect your crops from the elements and are permanent structures. In areas that have a short season, they can actually let you seed 8 weeks earlier.
A cold frame can be built using an old window sash and plywood. It should be about 12 inches in the front and 18 inches in the back with the glass covering on top. It should also face south so that it gets a lot of sunlight and be built on a slight slope in order to encourage drainage. When it’s cold, you can cover the frame with a heavy cloth.
Raised beds can also be used. They can be made out of bricks, concrete, stone, and even old tires. The soil in a raised bed can even be as much as 12 degrees warmer than it is elsewhere in the garden. Tires can be particularly good because they absorb heat.
Of course, greenhouses can also be used to grow anything from winter vegetables to tropical fruit.
If you are growing a winter vegetable garden, then it is important that you mulch. Mulching helps insulate the plants and helps keep away weeds and grasses. During periods that are dry, it can also help decrease evaporation from the soil. Sawdust, bark, shredded newspapers, and peat moss are some common materials that are used in the wintertime for mulching.
It is also important to rotate your crops too and not to plant the same crops in the same location that they were in the year before. Not only will this attract the same diseases and insects, but it will also weaken the soil. By letting that soil “rest”, it is able to restore its nutrients. You can also plant cover crops such as fava beans, red clover, alfalfa, and lupines which can be plowed into the soil to add organic matter to it.
Lastly, don’t be afraid to experiment with the timing. In fact, parsnips are actually at their best when harvested in January or February once they have been touched by frost. The frost makes them taste sweeter. Likewise, Brussels sprouts also have a better flavor if they have been touched by frost, too.