It’s been a couple of weeks since we recorded the video for this, and since then, the beans have expired and we have begun harvesting the beets, turnips, and some greens. This was a weird year for many people and our summer garden was a little blah, as well. But our fall garden looks great so far!
What we planted in the fall garden
For the most part, I planted seeds we had leftover from spring. These include:
- Beurre de rocquencourt and purple teepee bush snap beans
- Kyoto red, Amarillo, Danvers 126, and Cosmic purple carrots
- Detroit dark red and Cylindra beets
- Golden ball turnips
- Bloomsdale long standing spinach
- Green full heart mache
- Blue curled Scotch kale
- Rainbow Swiss chard
- He Shi Ko buncing onions
- Red giant mustard
- Little gem lettuce and Freckles romaine
- Mammoth red rock, Copenhagen market, and Hilton napa cabbages
- Waltham 29 broccoli
- Sugar snap and Wando garden peas
- French breakfast and Easter basket radishes
- Dill, parsley
In addition, I bought a couple of varieties that I’ve been wanting to try for the fall garden:
- Scarlet Nantes carrots
- Half long Guernsey parsnips
How is production?
Except for the help the cats gave trying to push the little sprouts back into the ground by rolling on them, everything is doing pretty well! I managed to get 3 lbs of beans harvested before the cold finally got to the plants. We started harvesting turnips and beets and we’re storing some in buckets for future use. I think the carrots will be ready for harvest soon, some of which will be stored, as well. The leafy greens are really doing amazingly well! The cabbages, parsnips, peas, herbs, and radishes are coming along slowly, but we’re hopeful.
Extending the fall garden season
In the video, you will see our setup for extending the garden season into early winter. Using short pieces of rebar and PEX pipe, we created hoops over the beds. We will add additional support by attaching a piece of the PEX across the top of the hoops like a spine, using rubberized zip ties so they won’t slip. This spine also helps to keep the hoops from spreading apart when a hard rain or snow comes, which could cause the plastic to droop right down onto the veggies, bringing the cold with it. Then, over the hoops and spine, we drape 6-mil clear construction plastic, secured using whatever we have on hand — boards, rocks — to close any gaps that might let in the frosty air and to keep the plastic from blowing away.
The rubberized zip ties are an upgrade from last year, otherwise, it’s the same system. We didn’t have an overly harsh winter last year, but we were out in the snow harvesting cabbage. However, we will see how it works for whatever winter brings us this year.
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