Late Season Veggies

The gardening season is almost over and all that remains to be done is harvesting, a bit of weeding, and putting the garden to rest, right?

Not so fast!

Most of the same vegetables that you planted in the spring are also happy in the cool autumn weather. So go over your list for your March and April plantings and most of them that mature with out a lot of fussiness will be good for planting mid August.

Here is a quick list:

Beets
Turnips
Cabbage
Kale
Lettuce
Onion
Rutabaga
Spinach
Peas
Garlic
Swiss chard
Mustard greens
Dandelion

Have fun with your fall garden!

Designing Gardens for a Better Future

What I do is hard for most people to understand. The idea of growing food at home seems to have a hard time getting beyond the idea of the back yard raised planter. Much of that problem is caused by the concept that food production must be something that is hidden in the back yard, or put where the neighbors are not going to see it.

Many Americans have gone even further and decided that growing food is the job of professionals far away and that anyone trying to do it themselves is a menace and should be stopped. This is not far fetched if you look at city ordinances and HOA bylaws.

Since I am taking a step or five in the opposite direction of those trying to prohibit gardens, and since that still puts me a few steps away from the average gardener, I can see why there is a gap in understanding. To help clear up this gap here are some of the ideas I work with:

• Food and support of food should be the primary goal of the yard and home landscape.
• Plants do better with different types associated together.
• Planting different food crops in layers prevents waste of energy and plant nutrients.
• Food plants are beautiful.
• Perennial flowers are good for the food garden.
• The right balance of animals in the garden are better than trying to kill all the insects and critters.
• Perennial flowers are good for balancing the critters and insects.
• Fertilizer creation should be done at home whenever possible. 

To achieve these goals, thinking and design have to be stretched further than most people have the experience to do themselves. So, I try to do it for them.

Now that you have my ideas, what do you think your landscape should provide you?

Vegetables for the Novice Grower

Everyone is new to gardening at some point. So here are some common vegetables for the novice grower:

Beans
Beet
Carrot
Collards
Jerusalem Artichoke
Kale
Parsnip
Peas
Pumpkins
Squash
Swiss Chard
Turnips

Seed Quality

Seed racks are out at the big box stores and catalogues are arriving, it must be time to think of spring planting.

Starting seed is like anything else, good materials make for a good experience. But it is hard to tell what seeds are good and what are not. After all, you can't see through most seed packets.

The importance of quality seeds has struck me with almost an urgency after failures for the last five years. My swiss chard was a mixture of varieties, tomatoes the same, two squash varieties failed, and my beloved kohlrabi turned out to be radishes. What is a gardener to do?

First: Keep good records. If you have a record of failures and successes, you will know whether it is the seed or how you are growing it. You will also be able to see patterns for the seed companies you use. One problem is not that important, every company will make mistakes once in a while. But once you have a pattern you know that you need to look for a new suppliers.

Second: Choose seeds from a source that has a good reputation. This means talking to other gardeners and evaluating the sales materials. If a company has not put thought into quality advertising, they will not likely put the thought into quality seed production.

Third: Don't buy cheap. You don't have to pay $20 for good seed, but you have to wonder what you are getting if you pay $1.

Fourth: If you save seed, learn your business and do it right. Saving seed is more complex than just scraping the seeds out of a squash.

Fifth: Understand that you will get better quality and uniformity from hybrids. I prefer open pollinated seeds, but I know I will have different results from some of my neighbors.

For a good start look at Johnny's and Territorial. You should also look at Burpee. I don't use Burpee much now-a-days, but I never had problems.

Have a great time buying seeds!

I don't need to plant, that was done last year...

Lettuce gone wild.

While other gardeners are bemoaning the last days of winter, I am already started on this year's planting. Well, actually I started last spring. The lettuce plant you see above is a seedling of lettuce I planted last year. Half-a-dozen plants bolted before I could eat them and I left them in place to give the wind a chance to do its job.


Surprisingly, the new lettuce plants are near where the originals were. Less surprisingly, they are all in divots where the wind is too weak to blow them back out. While I have never been strong on a smooth seed bed, I think it is time to make them even more rough.

Rhubarb and a pea.

A few peas have found a way to sprout in mid-January as well. The one above will be an interesting companion plant to the rhubarb and strawberries that I planted last fall.

I will plant a few more lettuce and pea seeds since I don't quite have enough to cover my expected needs. I will be sure to leave a few of the best plants to give me seed for next year.


Now my biggest problem is what to do with the time that I was going to use for planting. Hmm, maybe it is time to talk to the landlord about digging up more lawn....

First Spring Planting

Looking out my door in January. Maybe not time to plant yet.

Every late winter I get asked, "What can I plant in the spring?" This is a difficult question since planting is best layered over time. This list covers most of the early plantings that go in as soon as the ground thaws. In my area the thaw comes in mid March.

Asparagus
Beets
Broccoli
Brussels Sprouts

Cabbage
Carrots
Cauliflower
Celery
Endive

Garlic
Kale
Kohlrabi
Leek
Lettuce

Mustard
Okra
Onions
Parsnip
Peas

Swiss Chard
Turnip 

Permaculture vs. Gardening

I think we all know what gardening is, but to many permaculture is a new term. Permaculture is a combination of the two words: permanent and agriculture. It was coined in the 70s by Bill Mollison and David Holmgren for a system of farming they were developing. This system mimics processes and patterns in nature in the attempt to create more food and cut down on work in the long term.


Permaculture is mostly interested in the design process, but it also contains a loose group of techniques that is easiest described as, 'Best management practices for sustainable food growth'. 


I don't know when permaculture moved to the quarter acre lot, but it is a natural fit with farming's little sister, the garden. Permaculture matches well with today's interest in organic eating and gardening, preserving natural resources, and self sufficiency.


Here is a list of topics and practices that are common to permaculturists:

• Sheet mulching
• Forest gardening
• Garden animals
• Nitrogen fixing plantings 
• Community involvement
• Aquaculture
• Resource management
• Natural design and patterns
• The influence of structures and gardens on each other

You will notice that 'community involvement' is not an idea you readily relate to farming and gardening. The sustainability Mollison and Holmgren were looking for stretches beyond the farm. For many, permaculture now means 'permanent culture'. For them permaculture is searching for a better way to live in the world.


At its base, permaculture is just a collection of good tools to make my garden better. I will always call myself a gardener first, because it is an old word that everyone understands. It is a way of life that that extends back to the beginning of history. But even with that history, it never hurts to reach out and choose a new tool or two. So I guess I am a permaculturist as well.

Growing Nutritious Food

The western world is becoming more and more conscious of what it eats, finally. But we are struggling with deciding what is really healthy. While the long held definition of a nutrient is that the nutrient is required by the body for basic life, is good for some things, it is a far cry from a comprehensive definition of what is healthy.

Scientists are now looking at many naturally occurring chemicals and the affect they have on our bodies and trying to decide what is really important. Given the size of the task, it will be decades before we have a good foundation for what we really need in our food. Maybe centuries.

But if you turn away from the more complex science, the answers become clear. Healthy food will be food that is raised healthy. That should make sense even to a non-farmer or gardener.

Here are some of the more important factors:

Plant Nutrients 
Make sure the plants have balanced nutrients. This includes all the micro and macro nutrients. Most of the nutrients are more likely to be deficient, but two are more likely to be in excess: nitrogen and water. Yes water. Watch how much nitrogen and water you use.

Sunlight 
Sunlight is the basic energy for plants. You can have everything else in abundance, but the plant won't live if it doesn't get light. Most common food plants grow best with full sun, but only a few are damaged by too much sun. Do your research and adjust accordingly.

Color 
Typically plants with more color have higher levels of nutrients and beneficial phytochemicals. Choose species and varieties with higher intensity of color in the part that you eat. A good example is zucchini versus butternut. The butternut comes out way ahead for nutrition.

Organic Content of Soil 
This is another way of saying carbon in the soil. While there are many ways to get organics in the soil, including adding charcoal, the best ways are to add compost and plant based mulches. Soils with high amounts of organics grow better for a number of reasons, enough that I’ll have to cover that in a later post.

You will eat better if you grow your own food and will have better food if you plan ahead with these factors in mind.