Reflecting back on the 2021 edible garden, planning for the 2022 garden

Sunday, January 9, 2022

I am late in reflecting back on the 2021 garden.  Ideally, I would have done this in October while the garden season was fresh in my mind.  But, better late than never!  I always try to take a look at my garden successes and not so great things to make improvements for the next season.  I like to capture what varieties did well, what I planted too much or too little of, including the specific names before I forget.  I am forever trying to make the garden more productive and enjoyable.  I also like to make notes of what I want to learn more about over the winter.   

Here are my reflections on this year's garden............

Overall

In general, the garden did well in the spring, was very slow to start producing summer veggies, and my fall and winter seed starting was not stellar.  We actually had a real spring for the second year in a row.  Usually, the season changes from winter to summer like a flick of a switch.  This year, we had a couple of months of actual cool temperatures before the 80's kicked in making it a banner greens season.  

This year, I was gardening exclusively in the back ornamental bed because we are having an addition put on the house.  This garden is in mostly shade so it was interesting to see how well sun loving crops would do.  It is likely one of the reasons my summer veggies were slow to get going. 

I had wondered if you could garden in the shade and get enough to eat fresh and put away for fall and winter.  The answer was "Yes".  I'd say the  

There were high points and not so great turn outs for the season.  Just your typical edible garden season!  

The good

  The cultivated dandelions, figs, strawberries, raspberries, tarragon, sage, bay laurel, lettuce, Chinese Hilton cabbage, sorrel, eggplant, peppers, Egyptian walking onions, Genovese basil and celery including the new pink variety did well.   Greens were the standouts in the spring and New Zealand spinach, Red Malabar spinach, and eggplant in the summer.  Butter King and Bronze Beauty were stand outs in the lettuce category.

I planted Hilton, a Chinese cabbage, for a second year in the garden.  It has large leaves that you can use in place of bread or tortillas and it is sweet enough to use in place of lettuce in salads all summer long.  

I had many eggplants that showed up that I did not plant and vining squash and cucumber for a second year in a row.  I pulled the vines in the garden bed and transplanted the volunteer eggplants to pots.  Definitely had a bumper crop of eggplant this year!  I made baba ghanoush, a dip kinda of like humus, and froze it to preserve the extras.

The Ancho pepper plants and sweet pepper plant from saved seed both did fairly well in pots.  I was able to make a pint of chili powder to use for cooking over the winter and many pints of frozen peppers to use in salsa for game days.  The chili powder was much milder than in the past.  Likely the effect of being in a shadier, cooler spot than years past.

The okay

Green beans and cucumbers did okay.  I went with Blauhilde purple pole beans that are resistant to fungal disease this year.  I also tried a couple of Kentucky heirlooms.  The Purple Podded did well, the heirlooms produced very little.  I had enough to put up several quarts of frozen beans.

One cucumber vine is all I need to have enough for snacking and to make pickles.  I'll stick with one vine from here out.

I learned that hickory trees have the same effect on vegetables as walnut trees do.  Their roots exude a substance that kills other plants.  Guess what I have shading my back yard ornamental garden?  Yep, you got it, hickory trees.  

The bad

The garlic and tomatoes did not do well this year.  I didn't even get enough garlic to pickle this year.  Almost none of the cloves I planted came back in the spring and the cloves that did did not grow very big.  There are a few things working against the garlic-shade, hickory trees and voles.  

I only had one tomato plant that was in the garden bed produce well and it was a Chocolate Pear tomato.  It was also the one that got the most sun.  I replanted tomatoes that I purchased at Lowes into pots around the 4th of July.  They did okay on the northwest side of the house, but this location is not the best for summer, sun loving vegetables to thrive.  I got plenty of tomatoes to put up around 60 quarts of frozen tomatoes to use in recipes and make the rest into sauce next fall.

The squash plants in the garden bed got disease from squash bugs.  I didn't keep a close enough eye out for them and treat for them in time.  There were volunteer squash that showed up in the garden bed that we transplanted to potato boxes.  We did get several winter squash fruits from them.  They shredded like spaghetti squash so I will use them in place of pasta this winter.

I didn't have the best luck in starting lettuce and spinach in pots this summer and fall.  I think the slugs got them.  They would sprout and then something would come and eat them to the ground.  I had a few lettuce I was able to transplant into the pots that I'm covering in the portable greenhouse to keep the salads going into spring.

Next year's garden

We are hoping to finish our addition before summer this year.  We will be putting our mixed edible and ornamental garden bed back on the south and west sides of the house which gets much better sun and is well away from any hickory trees!  We saved the garden topsoil so we could put the organic rich soil back so we are not starting from zero.  Fingers crossed!

Here is my garden plan for next year:

Blauhilde pole snap beans and Christmas speckles lima beans around one trellis

Red Burgundy and Heavy Hitter okra

5 tomato plants-large paste (Italian Pear), slicers(Cherokee Purple and an orange/yellow), a small fruit (Chocolate Pear) and a storage tomato (Yellow Keeper)

3 eggplant-Casper, Rosa, and a green variety

1 pickling cucumber

1 summer squash-Trombetta since it is resistant to vine borer

1 winter squash-Spaghetti

Perennial onions-potato onion type

Potatoes in the potato boxes

Snow peas in pots with peppers and eggplants

Dragon Tail radish in pot

Hilton Chinese cabbage (1)

New Zealand and Malabar spinach in pot (1 each)

Lettuce (Royal Oakleaf, Grand Rapids, Butter King, Bronze Beauty, Celtic, Forellenschluss, Giant Blue Feather) and spinach in pots

Greens that stay sweet in summer-Orach, Amaranth, Chard-Perpetual Spinach and Fordhook, Chinese Multicolor Spinach, Purple Stardust Iceplant, Komatsuna

Herbs-Dill, Basil (Nunum, Genovese, Cardinal), Cilantro, Lion's Ear, Rosemary

Sweet and hot peppers-check at end of winter to see if I need any

No cantaloupe, watermelon, beets, heading cabbage or broccoli

Flowers-zinnias, alyssum, marigolds, Cock's Comb, peach hollyhocks, Pride of Madeira, blue morning glory

I have to be stern with myself about what I will not plant.  This past year, I planted much less than usual and had plenty for fresh eating and preserving.  My eyes are always bigger than my space or need!

Black eyed peas for prosperity and luck in the New Year

Black eyed peas and collard greens

Saturday, January 1, 2022

It is a Southern tradition to have black-eyed peas to usher in the New Year. My grandmother was originally from the hills of Tennessee and moved to southeast Missouri as a young girl.  Everyone I know that grew up in southeast Missouri has 'em on New Year's Day.  

History of black-eyed peas

Black-eyed peas were first domesticated in West Africa and widely grown in Asia.  The "good luck" traditions of eating black-eyed peas for the New Year go as far back as Babylonian times (2500 years ago).  The tradition then was to have bottle gourd, leeks, black-eyed peas, beets, spinach, and dates as they were all symbols of good luck.

This Jewish tradition was brought to the southern US in the 1700’s.  Today, the good luck Southern meal includes peas for prosperity, mustard greens for money, and pork for moving forward.  Cornbread is also part of the meal, but just for its sweet goodness.

George Washington Carver encouraged the planting of black-eyed peas because they fertilized the soil, are nutritious and very affordable.  Black-eyes peas are chock full of nutrition.  They contain protein, calcium, vitamin A, folate, magnesium, iron, phosphorous, manganese, and lots of fiber.  black eyed peas nutritional info

Recipe for your good luck peas

To cook black-eyed peas, I add some ham and diced onion and simmer in chicken broth.  I simmer until tender.  You can add vinegar or some hot peppers for a different taste.  If using your own homegrown beans, here are tips for using dried beans Use dry beans instead of canned

Growing your own "peas"

Black-eyed peas are a subspecies of the cowpea and is also known by the name of goat pea.  They are not actually a pea at all, but a bean.  Black-eyed peas are a warm season crop that is not susceptible to pests or disease.  Beans should be planted after all danger of frost has passed and the soil is warm.  They are very drought tolerant so little watering is needed.  I start my beans indoors in April and set out around Memorial Day.  They are easily grown directly in the garden.  Just plant seeds after the soil is warm.  Growing beans

If using just for fertilizing the garden soil, legumes (peas and beans) should be cut before they start producing pods as the production of the seed pods use up a lot of the nitrogen fixed in the roots.  Even if growing to eat, leave the roots when removing the vines at the end of the season.  Those nodules you see on the roots are stored nitrogen.  To increase the nitrogen in the roots, an inoculant of rhizobial bacteria should be coated on the seed at planting.  You can mix a little syrup (1-10) with water to dampen the seed before dusting with the inoculant.  This will greatly increase your harvest.

A side benefit of growing black-eyed peas is that the flowers produce copious amounts of nectar for pollinators, like bees.  Be sure to not use any pesticides on your black-eyed peas as they will kill the bees, too.  Natural, organic pest strategies and how to make your own bug sprays

For fresh peas, you harvest the beans when the peas have just begun to swell in the pod and are 2-3" long.  After harvesting, simply shell the peas into a freezer bag (don’t forget to label with type and date).  By harvesting the fresh peas, it will encourage more pods to be formed, giving you a larger harvest.

For dried beans, wait until the pods have dried completely on the plant.  Pick the pods and shell.  I use a quart jar to store my dried beans until needed.  When ready to use, rinse the beans then boil on low until tender with 4 cups of water to 1 cup of beans.  The time needed will depend on the age of the dried bean.  The older the bean, typically the longer it takes.  You can also soak over night to reduce cooking time.

For more on growing beans, Legumes-peas for spring, beans for summer.  For more on growing collards, Collards and kale in your garden.  For preserving, Freezing the extras for winter

Try some good luck food for your New Year's!

December 2021 Edible Garden Planner

Early December garden; chard in the foreground, herbs in the background

Saturday, December 4, 2021

December is usually a time of digging in and staying warm.  When winter arrives, it may appear that everything is dead outside, but there is still life in the garden.  In the beds, kale, cabbage, salad burnet, sorrel, rosemary, oregano, garlic, onions, lettuce, leeks, chard, dill, celery, sage, carrots, broccoli, spinach are all still green in December.

Winter edible garden

This fall has been above average for temperatures and below normal for rainfall.  I was watering the beds to end of November.  Just brought all my overwintering tropicals, pepper plants, bay tree, moringa tree, rosemary, aloe vera and citrus trees a little over a week ago.  The pepper plant will continue to produce for a few more weeks.  It will keep its leaves and start producing again in February.  My kumquat tree is loaded with fruits.  Kumquats produce nearly year round.  

Outdoors, fresh herbs, onions, kale and broccoli are just steps away from the back door, the portable green houses are packed with greens.  

Most Mediterranean herbs are perennials so you get to enjoy them practically year round.  You can also grow many herbs indoors as well like chives, oregano, rosemary, parsley, chervil, and basil.  Rosemary, basil and bay are good ones to dig up and bring indoors to guarantee survival through the winter.  Just place your potted herbs in a sunny window.  I keep my bay and rosemary in pots and bring into the garage for the winter.  I am trying to root cuttings of my garden basil inside as well.  My bay trees is over 7 feet tall after 5 years in a pot.  

Growing herbs indoors for winter

If you are using a greenhouse or row cover, your kale, celery, mustard, lettuce, chard, spinach, cabbage, broccoli, Brussel sprouts, sprouting broccoli will be happy under cover all winter.  They will not grow much until sunlight gets back to 10 hours per day in late January, but you can still harvest from them right now.  Be sure on sunny, warm days to pop the top on your covers or you will scorch your greens.  It can get 50 degrees warmer inside a greenhouse on a sunny day than the actual temperature outside.  Do check to make sure your pots in the greenhouse have enough moisture.  Open when it is warm to check, water and harvest.  

Homegrown, organic salads in a Midwest winter

Cultivated dandelion in a pot

All cold crops are at their sweetest during the cold weather.  Frost brings out the sugars in cold crops.  Hardy greens like chard, kale, spinach, mustard greens, cultivated dandelion greens, and collard greens make great salads and are tasty steamed or braised.  You can still sow seeds in December to get a head start on the spring garden.  What to plant in the December edible garden

Make sure if you have any potted veggies to put them on the ground if they are on coasters.  The ideal location is in full sun and a sheltered area on the south side of the house to extend their growing time.  Placing straw bales around them or mounding mulch provides extra protection.  Moving them up against the wall on the south side does double duty-southern exposure gets the most sun and warmth and the wall radiates its warmth.  Pots left exposed on all sides will be zone colder than the ones planted in the ground.  If you are in Zone 7, be sure that plants left in pots are hardy to at least Zone 6 if you want them to come back in the spring.  If they are not, put under cover, mulch around them or bring into the garage or basement for the winter.

Extend the season with protection for plants

Veggies like your favorite tomato, pepper, eggplant, or celery that you potted and moved indoors will continue to produce indoors if provided warmth and enough sunlight.  My Chiptelin and cayenne pepper are ones I bring in every year.   We place them in the sunniest spot in the garage or basement and supplement with 4 foot fluorescent grow lights.  

Your indoor and outdoor plants will still need to be fertilized at about half the rate as during the growing season.  A liquid fertilizer every two weeks would be plenty.

Be sure to spray your edible garden beds with deer repellant, sooner rather than later.  The deer and rabbits will be getting hungry and your edible garden will look like a feast to them!  If you keep them from getting into the garden the first time, it is much easier to deter them after the fact.

Chives in front, sage and rosemary in back

The Fresh Produce Buying Local Option

You can check on line to see if you have a farmers market in your area.  Many have farmers markets year round where you can get fresh produce, canned, baked goods, eggs and meats locally grown.  Many that aren't open regularly will have hours before Christmas so you can get fresh, local ingredients for your holiday meal.  A great place for finding what is near you is the on-line resource www.localharvest.org

CSA

CSA stands for Community Supported Agriculture.  It is where you invest in a local farmer in January when they have to purchase their seeds and supplies for the upcoming gardening season.  You then get a weekly share of the farmers harvest typically from May through October.  There are even some winter CSA's now!

Before I started our own edible garden, we joined a CSA.  It was great.  We got lots of super fresh produce, our weekly grocery bill was significantly reduced as our meals were planned around the vegetables, and it was an adventure getting to try new recipes with veggies we had never ate before.  
Eat well, be healthy

A CSA shows you what grows well in your area.  You can find out the varieties you like and when they come into season.  You can even save the seeds from the varieties that you want to grow in your future garden if you partner with an organic CSA that grows open pollinated and heirloom vegetables and fruits.
What do the terms GMO, natural, heirloom, organic, hybrid really mean?

To advertise as “organic” you have to be certified.  Many farmers cannot afford to do this.  Some farmers participate in the "Certified Naturally Grown" program.  This is less expensive than USDA organic, but also relies on inspections by other CNG farmers, non-CNG farmers, extension agents, master gardeners and customers instead of USDA certified agents.  If you are interested in produce grown without pesticides, herbicides or other chemicals, ask the farmer if she uses organic practices.  Go visit them to see the garden for yourself before you commit.  You can also check out reviews on line. 

Where to find a CSA?  Again, a great resource is the web site at www.localharvest,org 

Many sell out by January so don’t delay if you want to join!

Preserving the harvest

It is easy to store winter squash in your pantry to pull out anytime.  We have eaten butternut squash from the garden all the way into June of the following year.  21 no tech storage crops

If you put your garlic in the pantry this summer and some has dried out, make garlic powder.  Just process the dried garlic in a coffee or spice grinder.  Now you have great flavor to add to burgers, sauces or steaks.  Quick tip-make dried garlic into garlic powder   

I take the herbs I had drying in paper bags and remove all leafs.  I store my herbs in quart canning jars.  I mix them all together for a homemade “Herbes de Provence”.  Make your own "Herbes de Provence"  I use it on everything!  It is great in sauces, on meats, in dressings.  

Tarragon, thyme, sage, rosemary and chives

If you threw your extra tomatoes into the freezer and are now thinking it would be nice to have tomato sauce, canning tomato sauce is simple and easy to do.  I can all of last year's tomatoes every fall.  I use Weck’s canning jars and regular canning jars with antique glass lids (for antique glass lids you also need the extra tall antique rings).  Both are all glass so no worries about what is lining the lid.  The Weck's jars are a really pretty tulip shape.  Easy, low tox canning of summer's bounty

All you need to can tomato sauce is a large pot, canning jars, a funnel, and canning tongs.  A pressure canner is not needed for acidic foods like tomatoes, pickles, jam.  Always follow the recipe as written to insure food safety.  If the food is not acidic enough, it can allow botulism to grow.

I throw the entire tomato (de-stemmed) into the food processor.  Most recipes say to remove the peel and seeds so you don’t have a bitter taste, but I have not noticed any issue with bitterness.

Here is the recipe from Ball’s “Complete Book of Home Preserving” for tomato paste:

9 cups of pureed tomatoes, 1½ cups of chopped sweet bell peppers, 2 bay leaves, 1 teas salt, 1 clove of garlic.

I put it all into a large pot and let simmer until it is the consistency and taste I like, about 2.5 hours.  Remove the bay leaves and garlic.  Boil the jars, lids, and seals as the sauce is close to done.

Add 3 teas of lemon juice to each hot pint jar, fill with the hot tomato sauce to within ½ inch of the top, and seal the lid, following the instructions for the type of jar you are using.  Place all the filled jars in a large pot, insuring they are fully covered with water.  Bring to a boil and process for 45 minutes.  Be sure that the pot is at a steady boil for the entire 45 minutes.  Remove from canner.  Let cool for 24 hours.  Remove the ring and test the seal after the jar is completely cool by gently lifting the jar by the lid.  It should not lift off.  If you are using the antique glass lids, my experience is to just leave the rings on until you are ready to open the jar.  That’s it!  

Other high acid foods you can using a water bath are jams, jellies, condiments, salsas, pickles, and relishes.  I pickle my garlic harvest so I have garlic whenever I need it.  Have garlic any time you need it, just pickle some!  Consult with a canning book for more tips and always follow the recipe exactly as written to insure the right acidity for safe canning.

Winter is time to savor the fresh herbs from the garden along with what you have preserved, browsing for canning ideas, and planning next year's garden.  A potential Christmas meal using what is growing in the garden in December, Jazz up the Christmas feast with herbs from the garden

I have used Christmas break in the past as the time to finalize my garden plan for the spring.  I look back on my notes from last year's edible garden and this year's seed catalogs to decide what new varieties to add to my standbys.  Here is my last year's reflections and plans.

Reflecting back on the 2020 edible garden; planning for 2021

For tips on choosing seed catalogs:   New seed catalogs are here!

Year round fruit from a small space garden

Tigger melon

Sunday, November 21, 2021

I was recently asked if you can get fruit in a small space garden.  You can and if you are up for freezing, water bath canning and/or drying, you can have fruit from your garden year round.  I will share just a few options that I employ in our small space garden.  There are an infinite number of other options out there.

Spring

For spring,  strawberries and kumquats are ready for eating fresh.  Early cherry trees can bear fruit as early as June.

I have kumquats from a small tree I grow in a pot and early strawberries.  In the Midwest, we do have to bring most citrus indoors each winter to an unheated garage or inside the house.  Both have worked for me.  Kumquats fruit basically year round.  They are not a real sweet fruit.  It is their rind that is sweet and the pulp that is tart.  You eat the entire small fruit.  A great way to get your daily vitamin C!

I am growing 2 more citrus varieties that are hardy to my zone, a lemon and grapefruit tasting types.  They are still small so I am not sure how their fruits will taste and how hardy they will prove to be in the garden.  I have them in pots right now that I will overwinter again indoors.  Next year, I will transplant into the garden.  Since they are citrus, I will plant close to a wall with southern exposure.  This is the warmest spot in the garden.

You can grow many different varieties of strawberries to extend the harvest from late spring through fall.  They are perennials and hardy in the Midwest.  I plant them in between where I will have summer veggies and close to the front of my flower/edible garden bed.  

Strawberries ripening

 Summer

Summer and fall are prime fruit season.  You have many options for small space gardens.  Strawberries will continue to produce.  Raspberries, blueberries and blackberries will all fruit during the summer.  Like strawberries, different varieties can fruit at different times over the summer.  You can plant early, mid and late fruiting varieties to extend the season.  

Melons are typically ready starting in July and continue through until the first frost.  Try smaller fruits like Tigger Melon if you want something for a couple of people for each fruit.  If you are planting to train the vine up a trellis, look for shorter vine lengths or pinch it off when it reaches the top of your trellis.  You can also let them ramble between taller plants as well.  They do a great job of shading out weeds!

I just planted blackberry bushes this year so mine should start fruiting next year.  There are thorny and thornless varieties.  I am trying both.  I do go pick wild blackberries each summer as well.  

I had planted an everbearing raspberry last year.  It fruited from late spring all the way through fall.  Here in Kentucky, we have a new pest fruit fly that they are encouraging us to plant varieties that fruit early in the season. It is the Spotted Wing Drosophila (SWD), Drosophila suzuki.  It is only 1/10" long and has red eyes.  If you have late fruiting plants, harvesting frequently will keep them in check.  I like to take a walk around my garden every day.  It is relaxing and fun to see how things are growing, seeing any issues arising, and, best of all, pick what we are going to eat for dinner!

The berries are easy to freeze.  I just put any I don't eat into a quart freezer bag.  When full, I move to our deep freeze.  Be sure to label with the variety and date.

Berries can also be dried or canned.  Here is a blog on drying veggies.  Same procedure applies to drying fruits.  Dehydrate or sun dry your extra veggies

If you are one that likes to add sugar to your fruits, you can employ water bath canning to preserve the extras, too.  Be sure to follow the recipe exactly.  The pH has to be acidic enough to insure your canned goods stay safe to eat.  If you are concerned about BPA used in canning lids, here is a blog on other options in canning jars  Easy, low tox canning of summer's bounty  

For me, my go-to method is freezing and drying.  The advantage of both canning and drying is you don't have to use up valuable freezer space if you don't have a deep freeze.

Fall

Summer and fall are prime fruit season  Fall fruits include late or everbearing raspberries, kumquats, figs, apples and pears.  

Depending on the variety, pears and apple season is from August to as late as November in our area.  The great thing about apples as there are many varieties that store for months in a cool spot over the winter that will keep you in fruit until spring.  Some apple varieties stored just in the basement can last over a year.  Each apple should be wrapped in newspaper and stored in a cardboard box.  Good storage apples include Arkansas Black, Newton Pippin, and Winesap.  There are many more.  Stark Brothers is a reputable nursery to mail order fruit and nut trees from.  

I am going to plant Arkansas Black because it has very good disease tolerance in our area.  I am going to prune it so it stays small and easy to pick.  How to prune fruit trees for small spaces   You can use this method for any fruit tree.

If you are a big apple lover, you can plant a few different types of trees to be able to eat fresh apples for months.  Also choosing ones that store well can keep you in apples until harvest begins again next summer.

Pears are a little different than most other fruit trees.  They do not ripen until after they are picked.  You tell if they are ready by lifting the fruit sideways and if the stem easily comes off the tree, they are ready to be picked.  I have a neighbor that has a few pear trees.  He is happy to bring me many 5 gallon buckets of fruits.  I wait until they ripen (they will have some give when pressed and a sweet aroma when ripe), slice them in have, cut out the core, sprinkle with cinnamon, and bake on a cookie sheet.  I'll then set them in the freezer until frozen and put into gallon freezer bags.  This way you can pull out individual half pears to eat whenever you want.

Baking brings out the sweetness in the pear.  I simply heat up and top with whipped cream for dessert or use frozen with milk in a blender to make a quick cinnamon pear shake.  What can be easier?

You can also slice and dry your pears and apples or can them.  If canning, follow the recipe exactly.  I like drying; they make good snacks as is or are easy to plump back up in water to use in recipes.

The last fruit that ripens in my garden are Chicago figs.  This year, my fig tree begin ripening in October and continue all the way through until a hard freeze.  I dry my extra figs.  It concentrates the sugars and makes a great snack all winter long.  You can also make fig preserves.  Be sure to follow the recipe exactly; pH is critical for safe and tasty results.

Ripe Chicago figs

Pawpaw and persimmon trees are another fall fruit tree.  Pawpaw typically bear starting in August into October while persimmon ripens starting in September and go into October.  They are both native fruit tree and can be found growing in the woods.  Pawpaw have a banana mango taste.  Persimmon have a sweet honey like flavor.  Drying is a good option for preserving the extras.

Winter

Fruits eaten in the winter are either those that you have stored, preserved or tropicals you grow indoors.  You can get storage apple varieties that will last a year or more in a cool area of your home.  The dried, canned and frozen fruits you preserved will be at your fingertips until spring arrives and strawberries begin again.

If you want fresh fruits, there are miniature indoor tropical fruits that will bear during the winter months like kumquats, mandarins, grapefruit and oranges.  They do require lots of direct sunlight to fruit indoors or a helping grow light.

What to plant in the November edible garden

Portable row cover 

Sunday, November 7, 2021

You can still plant for the edible garden in November.  Plant seeds of cold loving crops and they will get a head start in spring.  Cover can be used for all the harvestable edibles to extend the harvest all the way through to spring.  

What is a four season garden?
You can garden year round in small space
Planning for a four season garden

This month you can sow more greens, carrots, beets and herbs in the greenhouse.  You can also transplant perennial veggies, fruits, and herbs as well as flowers, trees and shrubs.  Don't forget garlic if you haven't already planted yours, you still have time!   Midwest Perennial Vegetable Garden

Here are the crops you can start in the November Midwest edible garden:

November seeds outdoors
Austrian winter peas

Fava beans

Garlic

Rutabaga

Lettuce-winter hardy varieties

Snow peas

Spring bulbs

November seeds under cover

Arugula

Broccoli and Sprouting Broccoli

Celery
Corn salad

Endive
Escarole

Frisee

Lettuce, Winter Hardy types

Mustard and Mustard Greens

Parsley and Parsley Root

Radicchio

Rutabaga

Scallions

Sorrel
Spinach

Swiss Chard

November transplants
Asparagus

Cabbage, Oxheart

Winter and Perennial Onions

Trees and bushes

Transplants for winter and overwintering

Portable greenhouse

Look for cold hardy varieties when planting for winter harvests.  You will be surprised to harvest all through the winter months things like greens, onions, Austrian peas, carrots, and cabbage.  You can also extend the harvest by looking for the same crop with different days to harvest timing so that they mature at different times and those that are advertised as winter hardy.  

 Fall planted crops take longer to come to harvest than they do in the spring.  Rule of thumb is to add 2 weeks.  It's because the days are getting shorter rather than longer and the temperatures are falling.  Planting in November, it may actually be spring before they sprout.  

Covering plants when there is a cold snap in the fall will keep them warmer and growing quicker.  I cover my edibles with the portable greenhouse or row coverings once daily highs are no longer getting into the 50's and night time temperatures are dipping down into the 20's.  You can use cover to extend the harvest all the way to next spring.  Extend the season with protection for plants  Homegrown, organic salads in a Midwest winter

November 2021 Edible Garden Planner

Late November edible garden

Monday, November 1, 2021

November is a beautiful time of year as Mother Nature is getting prepared for the cold, wintry days ahead.  Late fall chores should include cleaning up your garden beds, reflecting on the gardening season completed, and preparing for the first freeze.

Garden bed clean up

To prepare your garden for its winter nap, remove gardening debris from your beds.  For any diseased vegetation, be sure to throw these away and not compost.  You don't want to propagate and spread any diseases to other parts of the garden.  A really hot compost pile will kill them but it isn't worth the risk going into winter.  I keep the seed heads on the flowers in the garden for food for the birds over the winter. 

This is a good time to decide if you would like to make your own compost.  Compost is referred to by gardeners as “black gold.”  It provides nutrients, beneficial microbes, fertilizer and overall improves your soil’s condition.  Composting is possible in small spaces or even indoors  Outdoor compost piles go slowly in the fall and winter, but speed up as temps rise in the spring.

I have used an electric composter called NatureMill that we kept in the garage by the door.  It was easy to keep an odor free bucket made just for this purpose in the kitchen to collect fruit and vegetable scraps and empty weekly into the composter.  The small indoor buckets are called compost keepers or bins and come in a variety of decorative styles.  

You need greens and browns to keep the compost odor free and "cooking".  Wood pellets, chopped up leaves, or shredded paper work well as "browns" with the "greens" of kitchen scraps.  You get finished compost in a couple of weeks with an electric composter.  An outdoor tumbler takes a few weeks in warm weather.  I emptied one side of my outdoor bin to have plenty of room over the winter for kitchen scraps.  You can store the compost you are making in a trash bag to use when preparing your spring beds and to revitalize potting soils.  Re-energize your potting soil!  It is great for flowers and vegetables.

I have been using an outdoor, tumbler type composter for the last few years.  I first had an insulated, metal one by Jora.  It ended up rusting.  I now use a plastic tumbler.  I bought a grill cover to put over it to keep the compost from getting drenched with each rain.  You could also keep under an eave.  It works year round but much better in the summer.  It is critical to keep the greens and browns in the right ratio to keep the compost cooking in the winter.   Here are some tips if your composter/compost pile starts having issues  Troubleshooting your compost pile

After your garden clean up, look to give your garden a nutritional boost for the winter months.  Doing a nice layer of compost and organic fertilizer, topped with mulch, will allow the nutrients to seep into the garden soil, ready to give your spring plants a boost.  The mulch will keep the soil more temperate during the winter months for your winter edibles and keep weed seeds from sprouting.  Organic fertilizers take a long time to release their nutrients.  Using in the fall will give the spring garden a running start.  It is best to get a soil test done to make sure you are keeping the nutrients in the right balance.  The next step in garden production and your nutrition-soil minerals

Reflection on the past garden season

While the past gardening season is still fresh in your mind, now is a great time to jot down some notes on what went well, what didn’t, and what you would like to research over the winter.  Make a list of the varieties that did great that you want to replant, which plants you want to be sure to have more, or less, of next year.  Also make note of how many plants make sense to plant for next year.  Here are my reflections this fall for the edible garden.   Reflecting back on the 2020 edible garden; planning for 2021

Keep track of what you eat over the winter to give you a good idea of what and how much to plant come spring.  How much to plant?  Use this winter to figure out what to grow in the spring!

Even if you have a small area, you can grow most of what you eat.  How to decide what to plant for small spaces?

Fall is a fabulous time to make new garden beds.  It is super easy, too.  Just use a hose to outline your new bed, fertilize, put down a layer of cardboard (earthworms love cardboard!), a layer of compost, and cover with mulch.  By spring, the new garden bed will be ready for planting.  Easy ways to make a new vegetable garden bed

Gardening after the first frost

For northern Kentucky, the average first frost date is mid-October.  We have not had a frost or freeze yet, but they are calling for our first frost this week.  It is below normal highs for this time of year.  When the lows start getting 28 degrees F or below, this is a killing frost for the summer veggies.  Be sure to harvest the remaining tomatoes, peppers, and squash before the first hard freeze.

Green tomatoes and peppers can be brought indoors to ripen.  Green peppers are great as they are.  You can let tomatoes turn red or eat as green tomatoes.  I remember my grandmother making fried green tomatoes every fall.  A late fall tradition-fried green tomatoes!  Many make them into relish, too.

There are many edible crops that can still be planted in November.  You really can eat fresh out of the garden year round even if you live in Zone 3.  Greens, herbs, onions, broccoli, fruit bushes and trees and perennial flowers are a few of the crops that can be planted this month.  For more on planting in November,  What to plant in the November edible garden  

You can cover your veggies with a portable green house or row cover to extend the season for many cool season crops.  For cold climates, using cover is the key.  Frost forecasted? Here’s your to-do list  With a portable green house, we have kept lettuce, kale, mustard greens, sorrel, and celery all the way through winter.  You can garden year round in small space

I still need to transplant my September lettuce starts into the portable greenhouse pots.  Having cover will help them grow and protect them through the winter.  It is late to start seed but will give a boost for spring harvests.  I will move my pots of greens under the portable greenhouse.  I'll use gallon jugs of water inside the portable greenhouse to keep the temperature more moderate.

If you are using pots, putting the pots on the south side, in a sunny local and close to the house will keep them from getting frost bit into November or even December for cold season crops.  It seems to extend the season for 2-4 weeks.  Prepare for hard freeze

You can also cut a piece off your herbs, put them in a pot, and bring indoors on a sunny window to have fresh herbs readily available.  Basil is an easy one to restart indoors.  Chives, thyme, rosemary, savory, tarragon, salad burnet, and oregano can also be harvested into December from the outdoor garden.  Growing herbs indoors for winter

Surprisingly, we found that peppers and some eggplants are great candidates from bringing in for the winter.  Our Jalapenos and Cayennes continued to fruit for weeks indoors and when put back out in the spring, we had peppers a month earlier than when using new plants.  Tomatoes are also contenders for overwintering indoors.  All are tender perennials and need direct sun to do well indoors.  I bring in only the ones that did really well that I want to get a head start on next season and not all do well.  To give them the best chance, make sure they get full sun.

Be sure to use insecticidal soap on any plants you intend to bring indoors a couple weeks prior so you don’t bring in unintended guests.  Just remember that insecticides kill the good bugs like bees as well as the bad bugs so be careful when you spray.  Natural, organic pest strategies and how to make your own bug sprays

I keep my plants out as long as possible to minimize their stay indoors.  There is nothing like sunshine and fresh air for a plant.  For the last 3 winters, I overwintered all my tropicals and edibles in the unheated garage with a hanging fluorescent light fixture with daylight bulbs.  They all did well except for the eggplants.  Eggplants are spotty, but worth the try if you had a great one.  Be sure to save seed so you can keep the plants going that do well in your garden and are disease free. Seed saving-fun, easy and a cost saver    You can save seeds even from heirlooms you buy in the store to try in your garden.  I have a few that have become standbys in our garden that came from the grocery store and farmers market.

Late November potted lettuce

For the herbs you cut back earlier in the season to dry, November is a great time to now strip the stems of the harvested leaves, dry and put into jars for winter cooking.  You can make your own “Herbes De Provence”.  Thyme, oregano, rosemary, savory, basil, tarragon and lavender are common herbs used in this famous French seasoning.  I mix them up in about equal amounts and store in a sealed Mason jar.  It is great to add to just about anything-sauces, chicken, fish, potatoes, garlic bread.  Makes wonderful Christmas presents, too.  Make your own "Herbes de Provence".

For those that keep on going into the winter, I would prune back the plants by about two thirds and strip the leaves from the cut stems.  Do so when there are warm temps forecasted for a few days to allow the plants cut ends to heal.  Otherwise a cold snap can kill the plant.

Use your herbs for your Thanksgiving meal Use your own herbs for your Thanksgiving dinner  More than likely you will have some edibles still growing in the garden.  Take a look and plan your meal around them.  Some winter hardy edibles include kale, broccoli, cabbage, chives, sage, thyme, corn salad, sorrel, cultivated dandelions, plantain greens, celery, mustards, even some hardy lettuces.