KateMany people think planting veggies is just for spring time. Not true! Many crops can be planted during the dog days of summer and harvested before the plants succumb to frosty temperatures in fall. Some plants even thrive in cooler weather, tolerate frost, and let you continue eating straight from your own patio. And who wouldn’t love having some homegrown kale to throw into a hot soup for those chilly nights? It’s easy to learn how to plant an amazing fall vegetable garden!
How To Plant An Amazing Fall Vegetable Garden
Pick Your Spot
Decide where you want your fall garden to go and how much space you have to plant in. We have a Kitchen Garden at the I dream of DIY house and I will plant many of my fall crops there with some going in containers. If you don’t have an in ground garden space, use those containers! The benefit of container gardening in the fall is you can bring certain plants inside when it gets too cold and your plant will keep providing nutritious deliciousness for you! See how I grow my own spinach indoors during the winter.
Make Room
Make space by clearing out weeds and any spent/dying/dead spring plants (peas, old lettuce, green beans that were annihilated by spider mites but you didn’t attempt to research it until it was too late…whoops!).
Classic spider mite damage on my poor green bean plants. Word to the wise: If you notice something is amiss in your garden, don’t ignore it like I did!
Do not leave diseased or pest infested garden debris in your garden or containers. Throw your yucky debris in the trash so you do not infect new crops. Many fungi and diseases can even lay dormant over the winter and come back with a vengeance once spring rolls around again. Best to avoid that heartache.
Choose the Right Crops
It probably seems weird to plan for a fall vegetable garden when it feels like 1,000 degrees outside but the best plants to choose are called cold-hardy crops.
Cold-hardy crops are simply plants that thrive in cooler weather and can tolerate some frost. Some of these plants will even survive through winter’s cold temperatures!
Some awesome plants to grow in a fall vegetable garden are:
- lettuces
- spinach
- cabbage
- broccoli
- carrots (carrots actually get sweeter after going through a frost. And since you can just leave them in the ground during the winter, I was still harvesting carrots from my garden in January!)
- beets
- kale
- chard
- turnips
- scallions
Don’t Go Overboard
There are a lot of cold hardy crops to choose from but start off by planting what you know you’ll eat. It would suck to tend to a garden full of food that you don’t like.
Seeds Are The Way To Go
For fall gardening, planting by seed is the cheapest and easiest way to go. You can buy seeds anytime of year online and you know you’ll grow a fresh, healthy little seedling. By midsummer, most local stores and nurseries are struggling to keep their leftover plants alive and it’s doubtful any cold-hardy crops will have survived the summer heat at the store. You don’t want to plant a sad, dried up little broccoli plant. It won’t survive and you’ll lament over your wasted money. Buy the cheap seed packet and start your own mini greenhouse.
If you want to pick out seeds in person at an actual physical store location, don’t wait until July because they are already sending them back to the nurseries. Then you’re screwed when you’ve already told your kids they could pick out new seeds but you just leave with sad little faces. Yeah, I did that. Again, whoops.
If you waited a little too long to decide to plant, that’s ok. There are a ton of awesome seed companies online!
Start Indoors
Start seeds indoors just like you would for the spring only this time, you’re trying to beat the heat instead of beating the cold. Not surprisingly, cool-hardy crops don’t like the heat….which is a problem when it is dry as a bone and 100 degrees outside. The best way to have a bunch of happy seedlings is to start them indoors.
Know Your Days to Maturity
Check the back of your seed packet to find maturity times (how long it takes to harvest). This date is really important because if you plant too late, your precious plant babies could be wiped out by frost before you get the chance to eat them. That sounds morbid, doesn’t it? But mmm, baby spinach is good!
Harden Off Your Seedlings
What is hardening off? It’s kinda like Bootcamp for Plants. Hardening off just means setting your seedlings outside for an increasing amount of time each day. This will help them adjust to their new sun, wind, and heat conditions. As my mom always said “Welcome to the real world!”
Check Out Your Local Extension Office
Local extension offices are amazing resources for every kind of gardener! They have tons of info on the best planting times, first frost dates, best plants for your areas, pest control, etc. Most offices post their information on their websites but they also welcome emails and questions from area residents. And it’s free!
This is a planting calendar from a local University Extention Office and it is so handy because the pros tell me when to plant for my specific area. So helpful!
So get out there, brave the heat, and get your fall vegetable garden started. You will be so happy when you are still munching on fresh veggies long after the summertime season has ended.
What vegetable will you try to grow?