Top Crops to Plant for a Fall Garden

 

If you are fortune to have a long enough season you can grow 3 seasons of veggies:  spring, summer, and fall.  The idea of a fall garden is often overlooked.  The fall garden gives you a season of cool season crops with many added benefits.  Weed, pest, and disease pressure are much less in the fall.  The weather is  perfect for gardening.  Cool season crops that mature on cool fall evenings and nights taste so much better than those that mature in early summer.  The cooler weather sweetens up crops you may not normally enjoy.

So what are the tops crops to consider for the fall garden?

Root crops are a staple for fall gardens.  When properly stored they can be enjoyed throughout the winter months.  Root crops you can plant late July and early August include carrots, beets, parsnips, turnips, rutabagas, radishes and kohlrabi. 

Greens do fantastic in the fall.  These include lettuce, Swiss chard, kale and spinach but don't forget about other greens such as mustards, chijimisai, tatsoi, poc choi, Chinese cabbage, collards, arugula  and corn salad.

With spinach and asian greens you want to wait for the soil to cool down so that the seeds will germinate.  You can plant faster germinating and maturing greens directly in the garden or start them indoors.

Brassicaes taste so much better when grown in the fall.  This family includes cabbage, broccoli, and cauliflower.  I start these indoors at the end of July or beginning of August.

Aliums such as green onions also do well in fall. There are fall planted leeks to try also.

Late summer is also the time to order your garlic which is planted in the fall.  Ordering early online ensures you get the varieties you want.

Planting the Fall Garden

Root crops need to direct seeded into the garden.  Other crops can be started indoors and transplanted out when the weather cools and summer crops have been harvested or removed.

In the planting holes of transplants, add  a tablespoon of dry organic fertilizer and some compost. Water the hole and let it soak in then plant the transplant.