Question from the Northeast

[Anna]

I live in the Northeast and for the first time in my life am planning to grow a vegetable garden.

Note: I am no gardener so I have to do a lot of research, so here comes my naive question:

What does one who has maybe nine months of cool to cold weather do? By the time I get my boxes up and growing this spring, summer will fly into fall and it'll be cool again. What do northeast gardeners do to retain a year-round vegetable garden? Greenhouse??? What if you don't have a greenhouse?

[Summerthyme]

Anna... don't even TRY to have a "year round" garden. Not at first, anyway!!

First, learn how to grow veggies.Cornell cooperative extension (or your state's version, if you're not in NY) have GREAT tons of information on gardening. They also often have master gardeners who will happily answer your questions and may even come out to help you get started if you want/need that.

Once you've figured out the basics, then there's time to learn about season extenders, cold frames and other tricks to extend the season. Elliot Coleman has a couple of really good books out on "the Four Season Garden", but while they'll be interesting and certainly will probably give you ideas, it's not something I'd try the first year.

Many plants DO like cool... spinach, kale, swiss chard, almost all the "cole" crops (cabbage family), lettuce. Peas- I've planted fall crops of peas around the first of August and gotten fresh peas in October. So the season isn't quite as short as you think, even without lots of fancy greenhouses, or other structures.

But start with the basics.

Summerthyme

[Behind Enemy Lines]

I live in the Northeast and for the first time in my life am planning to grow a vegetable garden.

Note: I am no gardener so I have to do a lot of research, so here comes my naive question:

What does one who has maybe nine months of cool to cold weather do? By the time I get my boxes up and growing this spring, summer will fly into fall and it'll be cool again. What do northeast gardeners do to retain a year-round vegetable garden? Greenhouse??? What if you don't have a greenhouse?

You can find a lot of good information on the web such as when to set out plants in your area. I am in Virginia so within the next couple of weeks we will be starting a lot of seeds indoors in trays and hopefully in about 6 weeks after that we can transplant them outdoors.

[Anna]

Thanks Summerthyme and Behind Enemy Lines!

I am aware of the Cornell Cooperative Extension in my area and am sending some soil to them for analysis. Didn't know though that they could send a master gardener to help me out. Good info!

[Cascade Failure]

In reality MOST people will NEVER garden outdoors year round in the NE. As mentioned above early starts, cold frames etc... will extend the season but that's about it.

Also as mentioned earlier, SOME folks go the Elliot Coleman route. MOST choose to not put in that effort.

I choose to garden in the season provided and store foods for the winter/spring.

[Sunflower]

Hi Anna,

I live in northern New England at an elevation of about 1200'. Our winters are long and the growing season short and cool. I have had great success with Kale. It grows from very early spring from seedlings started indoors in March. I also direct sow it into the garden all season long. I harvested it well into November with a row cover and some plastic covering. I tried the Elliot method to try to make it over the winter, but it got too cold and they all died. I will not even try to extend past November this year. I had great success with the heat loving veggies like cucumbers, beans, tomatoes, but can't put them into the ground until very late may or June 1st. I used raised beds which heat up faster. Kale is extremely nutritious and is great sauteed with garlic, olive oil and mixed with cooked pasta or rice. I had about 25 plants that provided daily veggies for a family of 5. I was also able to blanch then freeze some as well. Spinach is a good veggie also, but will flower as the temps get warmer. For reliable and nutritious veggies I am counting on Kale and growing beans/corn/tomatoes/cucumbers/squash/zucchini during June-Sept. I also got a boatload of carrots and beet greens in my cold climate. Swiss chard grows here, but not as quickly as the Kale. Potatoes grew well also. A quick way to jump start your garden space is a method called "lasagna gardening". Just google it. It allows you to quickly make a raised bed garden that produces lots of veggies in the first season without a lot of effort or expense. I have used this method with great success and have built up the beds organically over the successive years.

[goatlady]

I don't think most folks realize that "year-round" gardening in northern climates REALLY mean getting enough plants just to maturity before the snow/cold hits and THEN being able to holod them at that point so you can harvest then as needed. Theplants will NOT grow in the winter weather but in many cases CAN BE protected and held and harvested. So you have to think LOTS more plants than you think cause the will NOT grow, only hold over until harvested.

[susie]

Maybe a good place to begin is to read Ruth Stout.

[Sunflower]

I don't think most folks realize that "year-round" gardening in northern climates REALLY mean getting enough plants just to maturity before the snow/cold hits and THEN being able to holod them at that point so you can harvest then as needed. Theplants will NOT grow in the winter weather but in many cases CAN BE protected and held and harvested. So you have to think LOTS more plants than you think cause the will NOT grow, only hold over until harvested.

I did exactly as Elliot Coleman instructed in his book. My Kale plants were fully mature. They survived until late November. No growth, just maintained for harvesting. Once the colder temps hit, they all died. I kept them covered, hoping they would somehow survive until spring. They are completely dead. I am going to keep them covered until November again this year, but will plan on canning extra veggies for the winter.

[Animal Lover]

One thing that seems to do well in our cold weather is garlic, it will keep in the ground year round with hay over it and my herbs often will keep on growing too. Especially parsley. I Wanted to do raised beds due to our age and health, but hubby won't let me. So this year, I am going to get bushel baskets, put them in my sunniest spots and try different kinds of veggies in them. We'll see how it goes. This will be my first year without a real garden. :-( AL

[goatlady]

And his disagreement with raised beds is...???

[Petedtom]

I live in the Northeast and for the first time in my life am planning to grow a vegetable garden.

Note: I am no gardener so I have to do a lot of research, so here comes my naive question:

What does one who has maybe nine months of cool to cold weather do? By the time I get my boxes up and growing this spring, summer will fly into fall and it'll be cool again. What do northeast gardeners do to retain a year-round vegetable garden? Greenhouse??? What if you don't have a greenhouse?
Hi Anna, Being as we are in the same area I thought I might interject. I have found for a longer growing season in our area that raised beds and cold frames work great. I am VERY lucky that by me our soil is a sandy loam but as you know that is not the case for better than 99% of our area. 2" of top soil on top of rock and clay is the norm LOL. The raised beds help with this problem. The cold frames allow us to grow and start much longer and earlier that we could otherwise.

[Sunflower]

I am in the mountains of the Northeast. I have 3 cold frames and currently have spinach growing quickly. I just planted some kale seeds in another cold frame. I like the cold frame better than a greenhouse because it gets windy here. Any heat loving plant you should start seedlings or buy seedlings and plant them june 1st.