Many people become confused as to when is best to start a vegetable garden, but following guidelines on seed packets or frost dates listed for your zone can make things easy.
Dates set on these calendars can often come too early for tilling the soil and planting tender crops, making successful vegetable cultivation impossible without dry, workable soil.
Spring
There is no better time to plant a vegetable garden than spring. With warm temperatures and easy-to-work soil conditions, planting your garden quickly is possible. Root vegetables like carrots and beets as well as leafy crops like lettuce, spinach, and kale thrive during this season.
Plant seeds with the fastest seed-to-food timeline, like peas. Since they grow so rapidly, you could be snacking on fresh peas within two or three weeks of sowing them in the ground – or make multiple plantings over spring and summer for continuous fresh produce!
Before digging in, amend the soil. Begin with a soil test to ascertain how much fertiliser or manure should be added to your garden and help retain moisture for successful crop production. For raised beds, top off these beds with soil-based compost, council green waste and topsoil for maximum success.
Make sure the soil is not too wet, as too much moisture can hinder root development and lead to rot. If necessary, work your garden when wet with stepping stones or boards so as not to compact the soil and potentially harm seeds and seedlings.
Late spring weather provides the ideal conditions for planting vegetables that prefer cool to warm temperatures, such as onions and scallions, which will tolerate cold conditions before flourishing once temperatures heat up in summer.
Cool-season vegetables that have edible roots, stems or leaves (such as cabbage and broccoli) as well as legumes such as beans should also be planted now – they require temperatures above 50 degrees to flourish properly; to do this safely they must be planted after their average last frost date, which generally occurs two weeks post warm spring rains.
Summer
Once the last frost date has passed, it is time to plant warm-season veggies such as tomatoes, peppers, squash and beans that enjoy sunshine. Now is also an ideal time to sow seeds for lettuce, spinach and other cool-season crops which suit spring weather better.
A soil thermometer is an invaluable tool to help you determine whether the weather is suitable for planting. You also should keep track of how long vegetables take to mature; keeping track will allow you to plan how many plantings and harvests can fit within one growing season.
Gardeners can begin sowing hardy frost-tolerant annual seeds outdoors during March and April, such as broccoli, cauliflower, kale, collards, carrots, peas and parsnips. Winter greens may also be planted early indoors within a cold frame or on sunny windowsills from February onwards to give their growth an early boost before being planted outside.
As soon as temperatures warm in May, gardeners can sow half-hardy vegetable seeds such as peas and summer lettuce outdoors, while also sowing cucumbers and courgettes (zucchini). If sweet peppers are desired as an addition to their garden’s harvest, long day varieties should be selected according to climate requirements.
Bush and pole bean sowing outdoors in May can also be very successful due to the warmer temperatures allowing for fast germination and growth. You could try sowing different varieties regularly instead of waiting for one large crop to mature at a time.
Gardeners in June and July can sow seeds of hot-weather vegetables such as corn, okra, watermelons and peppers, along with sweet potatoes and pumpkins. It’s also a good opportunity to sow quick-growing plants like radishes and cilantro that have already reached maturity – this will fill any gaps left by earlier summer harvests that have reached their harvest point.
Fall
As tomatoes and peppers give way to kale and spinach, it’s time to plant fall vegetables. Fall planting can give an early jump on spring plantings; many cool-season veggies like lettuce mature more rapidly in cool conditions compared to their warmer cousins; plus it provides an opportunity to fill any empty garden beds after you harvest the last of summer crops and remove diseased ones from the plots.
Seed starting can take place indoors or outdoors in late summer and early autumn, depending on your climate and desired crops. Use high-quality seed starting mix for best results when starting indoors; when planting outside add mulch as this can conserve moisture while protecting roots against frosts that might occur early.
Kale is an excellent fall vegetable to plant in your garden, while other leafy greens such as lettuce and chard also work well. Brassicas like broccoli, cauliflower and brussels sprouts thrive in cooler temperatures of fall gardens – just remember they take longer to mature than fast-growing warm season varieties!
Carrots, parsley and chives make great candidates for fall gardens. Take an inventory of what vegetables you already have planted in your plot before planning where new plantings should go – space will still allow for fast-maturing crops like arugula and zucchini seed sowing, although you’ll need to scatter their seeds more closely than during warmer weather months.
Another key point to keep in mind when planning for fall gardening is that its shorter growing season means you may have less time to harvest your veggies before the first frost hits. To offset this issue, succession planting techniques and staggered harvests may be beneficial in prolonging harvest times as well as helping prevent wasteful planting of any leftover produce which hasn’t reached maturity yet – view this FREE Succession Sowing Guide for further details on this approach.
Winter
Late summer may find your garden looking less-than-stunning with tomatoes and zucchini beginning to ripen, yet now is an opportune time to think ahead about winter vegetable gardening plans. While this may be difficult when your hands are full with the current harvest, the effort will pay dividends when having fresh produce throughout fall and winter!
Many of the same vegetables you sow in autumn will continue to thrive into winter, including broccoli, kale, cabbage, carrots, and green onions. To achieve optimal results when planting these crops from seed indoors then transplanted outdoors at an appropriate time, beginning early can give seeds a head start while helping ensure maturity before frost arrives.
Onions are one of the easiest winter vegetables to cultivate. Direct sowing begins in February or you can start them undercover in a greenhouse or on a sunny window sill during January-February for maximum success; they’ll then be transplanted out when all danger of frost has passed in spring.
If you don’t want to start from seed, onion sets or small bulbs can be found at supermarkets. Or sow the hardier French variety from March-April; this can then be grown outdoors or under cover in greenhouse or polytunnel until late spring when they can be transplanted into your garden.
After choosing the appropriate plants, it is necessary to prepare the soil for winter crops by working in organic material such as bokashi compost, plant parts from your garden or manure into your planting beds to add humus and nutrients. Finally, arrange them so as to divert cold air away from where your vegetables will be grown.
Utilizing a calendar, mark the dates of expected first and last frosts, then work backward from these dates to calculate the best time and date to sow or plant out your vegetables. If starting from seed, be sure to read and adhere to all germination guidelines on your seed packet for optimal germination results.