Fall is here and I know for many of you the vegetable gardening season is over. But since our winter’s are generally mild, I usually plant something for fall. Extending the growing season with row covers, cold frames or a greenhouse is a great way to continue to get fresh, homegrown vegetables.
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I basically pulled out all my summer vegetables a few weeks ago and planted seedlings that I got at a local store called Farmer D Organics and some are from Lowe’s. I also planted some kale, lettuce and swiss chard seeds.
We do get cold temperatures (Thursday is our first predicted frost of the year) and we do get some snow (but not until Jan/Feb/March). As you can see, my hoops are up for my row covers that will protect my plants from the frost.
What am I growing this year?
Kohlrabi.
Broccoli, lettuce and onions in one raised bed. Cool season plants companion planted.
Oh yeah….the curtain rod hose guides I never showed you.
Kale. We love Kale! I’m growing Toscano, Winterbor and Locanoto (also known as dinosaur Kale). I’ve had Winterbor grow well into the summer before.
I’m also growing Chinese Cabbage with onions and Swiss Chard. Another cool season companion mix.
There’s a Black Cherry Heirloom tomato that self seeded itself against one of the arbors that’s been giving me some late season tomatoes. I’m wrapping it up and trying to see how long it can keep it going!
This garden is kind of bittersweet for me as it will probably be my last garden I plant here. We’ll be putting our house on the market spring of next year as long as nothing drastic happens to the economy in the mean time! Housing prices are finally back up in our neighborhood so we’ll be gettin while the gettin’s good!
A winter garden? how nice! We’re getting a good frost here tonight.
Love the blue curtain rod holders that you used!!!
Good luck with the sale of your home – I remember when you were going to sell before.
Yes, well let’s hope that the housing market here doesn’t tank like it did the last time we wanted to sell.
We had a frost last night. The grass looked like it had snow on it this morning. I think we’re in for an early winter!
I am so interested in this Fall garden of yours; looking forward to seeing it grow. Were the hoops and other season-extended things hard to put together?
LOVE your hose guides!
Good luck with your sale!
No they are not hard to put together. You can buy hoops if you don’t want to make your own. We used pvc pipes and rebar to hold them to the ground. The cloths that I use to cover the hoops are row covers which you can buy online from several places.
Thanks! We hope the housing market continues to stay the same or get better so we can sell next spring. We’ve been wanting to sell since 2008 but the Great Recession put a kibosh on that!
Oh how fun to be able to do a garden this late in the season. Here (SE WI) we’ve already had several frosts and the last few nights, definitely what we call “hard” frosts, where the temps got down to around 20 degrees F overnight. Way too early! It’s not normal for it to be this cold around here this time of year, that’s at least another month to six weeks away. Sadly, Mother Nature no longer agrees. It’s been changing more and more over the past 5 years especially, more wild swings in the weather than ever before. It’s definitely climate change. I don’t know if it’s global warming or global freezing, I only know I’ve seen it happening literally right before my eyes. Not a thing I can do about that, of course, but try to get my yard clean-up done earlier! I am also wishing for one of our 2-week long Indian summers, that by definition can only occur after a hard frost. Will we get one this year? I’m sure not ready for highs in the low 40s and lows in the 20’s and my winter coat, hat and gloves right now! That’s just not normal!
Maybe it’s because I was born and raised in SE WI, not sure. My family has not gone into planting most of the edibles in your cool/cold weather garden. I sure wish you luck with your tomato plant. As a rogue seedling, I think it has to be pretty darn tough! You GO, tomato plant, rock our world! Cover it at night, uncover it during the day, see how many tomatoes you can pluck off before it succumbs to the low overnight temps and lack of enough hours of light. Oh, give it plenty of water too. I have never had fried green tomatoes, but I understand they are delicious. Ditto green tomato relish (if you put up preserves). This year, I’m trying to keep alive some lovely pink geraniums as long as I can. Which reminds me, need to cover them tonight.
Weather is cyclical. The planet has frozen completely over and thawed itself out twice, according to scientists, so there are obviously patterns that play out over decades, hundreds, thousands, and millions of years; well past human memory.
You’re very wise to extend the season especially since you live in a temperate climate (I can’t believe that you expect frost Thursday eve…we just got our first frost three days ago and have had none since.) Those tomatoes are great…got to love a sweet volunteer. Hope that they do very well.
A fall and winter garden would be so lovely! I struggled desperately with my summer garden that I didn’t even consider it.
Now I wish I had.
I love your garden set-up. It’s perfect for a family.
Love having a garden in the cold weather! Like a breath of sunshine! Have a blessed day dear Manuela, BIG HUGS!
Great thinking on planting a fall garden. Love all that you do….Thanks for posting.
Thank you so much Josephine!
Your winter garden looks wonderful! The veggies that you are growing are the things that could be grown in the northern part of Canada. It brings back memories.
I hope you are able to have a garden wherever you end up buying after your house sells.
cindy
Thanks Cindy! You can be sure I wouldn’t buy a house that didn’t have some kind of gardening space!
I’m still ripening tomatoes despite frosts and snow–they are living under an extra sheet (so fancy). And I don’t so much extend my harvest as give it an early start by planting lettuce and snap peas in the autumn, then they grow beneath a lovely cover of snow and my harvest starts in March (Feb. if I’m lucky).
Fingers crossed that your home sale rewards you generously! You’ve waited long enough for it.
I just read this in my bloglovin feed…
I am not quite sure how I missed it…but was shocked to see that you’re considering a move and putting your house up.
On the other hand… it’s all kind of exciting too I’m sure. The garden looks great for a fall garden.
I took a walk around ours today…it is very minimal. I had wanted to plant more…but the grasshoppers hung on longer than expected. I was just telling the Honey…I need to buy 2 more plastic sheets for the cold frames… I think I got the idea for bent tubing from you a few years back. I love that idea the most for fall gardening. We used the conduit fasteners on the frame walls and put the tubing inside there and drape the plastic…it works so well!
I’ll be covering my tomotoes tomorrow night for sure!
Pat
Hi Pat,
Oh, the plan was to only live here about 4 or 5 years and that’s stretched into over 10! So I’ve been ready to go for a long long time. I’ve just tried to make the best of the situation but I’m at the end of my bloom where you’re planted juice and we are leaving one way or the other. We may have to rent this house out if we can’t get what we want now but so be it.
We got down into the 20’s last night and supposedly tonight too. I did cover my one remaining tomato plant but I doubt it helped with temps that low!