What are you growing?

Are you able to grow a winter garden? If so, what are you growing? I'm just being nosey, lol.

Here in SD I am buried in snow, and until a few weeks ago the only thing I was growing was impatient! Then I gave in to the urge and planted one inside planter with Basil, Spinach, and Lettuce. Then I just couldn't quit, so I planted an old waste can (about 10" diameter) with Marigold seeds, and then after making fried rice one night I saved the root ends of the green onions and stuck them into the Marigold pot - they have already grown about 3 inches! All the other seeds are up and growing as well. I know, this is not what you thought you would hear about, but it is a Winter Garden for the truly addicted!

GG

Growing impatient, LOL!! Thanks for the belly laugh, GG.

I'm glad you've got a few things growing inside during those harsh winters. I used to be in the AF in South Dakota. Those winters are not nice at all!

"growing impatient" ain't that the truth?!
Last winter was my first attempt at winter gardening and I successfully grew broccoli, parsley, spinach and of course my onions and garlic. This year I just stuck w/ lots of carrots and some spinach since I didn't get my plastic covering on soon enough to salvage anything else. I think I will actually plan out and give winter gardening an real dedicated attempt w/ lettuce, kale, spinach, carrots broccoli, cabbage, onions and garlic next year. Our winters are pretty mild (normally), so it shouldn't be a big feat for my area.

My garden is currently dormant.

growing impatients!
I went to the feed/farm store on Mon. There were 2 guys in buying beet seed. Wolf Moon is what the weather man called it, but the farmers down here called it the beet moon.They were taking their beet seed home to plant.
We have had very little winter this yr, so I expect it to come in Feb. In the garden I have garlic, onions of course. My english, snap, and snow peas are up, strawberries are blooming, a few berries on. Lettuce, beets, turnips, leeks, spinach, carrots, kale, chard,, broccoli, cauliflower, collards, cabbage, mustard greens, radishes. I don't have but a couple squares of each, except for the peas,(24 ft, double rows) strawberries, and 24 sq of garlic and onions. Irish potatoes-24 sq. ft. I forgot I also have a 4 x 8 of asparagus, which is not up except for a couple babies. I also have a couple sq of eygptian onions, which never died down this yr.
I have sw. and hot peppers and tomato seed planted in the house. I just put my sw. potatoes in to make slips yesterday.
I have put my shallots in a pot, but no sprouts, I dug them up today and they have short little roots!
It sounds like a lot, but it's really not.
Jo

Wow Jo! That does sound like a lot. How many SFG's do you have? They all sound very exciting. I wanted to do asparagus but I read that it takes 2 years and I wasnt sure I wanted that long of a commitment Have you grown that before?

I believe I have 552 sq. plus 2 x 2 x 5 tall and 2 x 3 x 3 potato boxes plus 2 3 x 6 4 tiers (6 in tall) strawberry beds. The area is full of boxes so no more! It is sort of crowded, but it works.
The first yr. (this will be my 3rd) we moved the asparagus from the row garden to a 4 x 8 bed, very gently. They love the mm, but, it has to be left alone, not moved. Here in SC, if the asparagus is healthy and old enough, we cut the fronds in Aug./Sept. and get a 2nd cutting in the fall.
Jo

Love hearing about your winter garden, what's your lowest temps for the winter there in SC?

We're having a very cold winter here - 6 weeks to go to our usual last frost date.

I have 3, 4x4 table tops and a 5 x 10 foot, 12" deep bed that I have only planted a corner of right now. In them I have many varieties of lettuce, including romaine, cabbages, spinach, onions, peas, beets, broccoli, cauliflower, celery and maybe one or two things I've forgotten.

I have other seedlings planted but they're not up yet. I have them in 4 inch peat pots that I am bringing in at night. In them I have several varieties of squash, cukes, tomatoes, cantalope, and some more broccoli and cauliflower.

Most yrs. we get at least a few days of single digits and last yr it snowed 3 times, melted as soon as it fell. This yr it got down to 25, but it goes down after midnight and temp comes up quick in the morning.
It was 80 yesterday. I went to Summerville yesterday and the tulip trees and azaelas are blooming, very pretty.
I store my sweet potatoes on the porch, covered under and over with just a tarp. I have 1 bell pepper plant that I dug from garden in the fall, and it is still alive on the porch. They are supposed to be a perennial in some areas, I just wanted to see if I could do it.
Winter cold and snow is the reason I don't live in Okla. any more.
Jo

JackieB999 wrote:........ I wanted to do asparagus but I read that it takes 2 years and I wasnt sure I wanted that long of a commitment .........

If you love asparagus, just do it, take it from me - the QUEEN of PROCRASTINATION! Asparagus is not a 2-year only crop, it is a perennial which comes back year after year, you just have to let it get its roots established for about 2 years before you start harvesting a great deal. Once you get your asparagus bed established it will keep going for 15-20 years. If I had put in my asparagus bed when I originally planned, I would have been eating well from it for the last 10 years! As it is, this year is the first year I can expect a good crop, altho' I did graze a bit last season!


GG

LOL GG! The thing is, I'm doing container planting with the SFG method. This is because I live in subdivision that doesn't allow traditional gardening. We have to have permission to plant things in the ground. I guess their fear is that people wont take care of the food and/or it attracts critters. So... containers it is. Oh how I wish I could go crazy in my yard. I may even get a dwarf potted lemon tree this year. Do you think asparagus would do ok in a big bucket?

And Littlejo... way to go girl!

JackieB999 wrote:LOL GG! The thing is, I'm doing container planting with the SFG method. This is because I live in subdivision that doesn't allow traditional gardening. We have to have permission to plant things in the ground. I guess their fear is that people wont take care of the food and/or it attracts critters. So... containers it is. Oh how I wish I could go crazy in my yard. I may even get a dwarf potted lemon tree this year. Do you think asparagus would do ok in a big bucket?

And Littlejo... way to go girl!

Well, technically speaking, nothing is grown in the ground in all new square foot gardening. You could also do table tops...

I just got back from lunch break and shutting down my SFG til spring. I had windows over my boxes up until yesterday, and decided this morning not to put them back on as the food stock was so low. So today I pulled the last of the beet greens, carrots, swiss chard, kale, broccoli leaves, celery, and some kind of lettuce and I'm eating it right now in a salad, along with a few pine needles...phtewee.

There are still some kohlrabi, kale, walking onions and garlic hanging out out there, but they aren't covered.

Seedlings growing indoors are broccoli, onions, cabbage & potatoes so far. I'm planting spinach seeds and...hmm...something else I forget, this weekend.

Growing in a little dish of water are stumps of celery and onion.

OH, and I'm forcing some tulips indoors. They usually in bloom in March.

CC

FWIW: I'm in zone 7b/8a. Here are some pictures I took of the garden today.


Bed #1, 4'x12', Lettuce, leeks, beets, spinach, kale, little finger carrots, parsley


Bed #2, 4'x12', Swiss chard, celery, broccoli, cauliflower, kohlrabi, pak choi, carrots


Bed #3, 4'x8', Garlic, onions, broccoli


Bed #4, 4'x6', Carrots, radishes and peas - plus one volunteer onion


Bed #5, 2'x8', Peas, spinach, radishes

I also have a few cabbage in MM in containers.

The green netting is to keep the neighbor's cats out. I cover all beds with frost blanket when the temperature reaches 40 deg f, and use a second 6-mil plastic layer when the temperature reaches freezing as it will tonight.

So beautiful, Gloria. Thanks for posting those. Makes me drool.

CC

Me too, CC.

Gloria... that's a whole lotta big, beautiful gardening going on right there! Amen sister!

Thanks Jackie and CC, I appreciate it.
We decided last year that we were going to garden all year round and so far it's been good. I just have to be vigilant about putting the covers on and off.

That is an excellent garden Gloria. Pretty. Great set up.

I am experimenting with growing potoatoes during the winter. We don't get a deep freeze normally and they can be mulched but I didn't mulch them. I knew they would grow slower due to cold weather but they also like cool temps so.... I put them in the raised beds back in Nov. I dug one up a couple weeks ago and it had thumb size tators growing.

other than that...carrots, leeks, onions, and garlic growing. Rosemary is a hedge now and I want to dig it up. It covers a 3x3 area. Since it does grow like a hedge and ever green, I thought about using it in the landscaping instead of in the sfg.

have lots of seedlings that need to be transplanted today. Broccoli, Broc Raab, purple broccolini, broccoli romanesco, purple cauliflower, white cauliflower, dutch cabbage and OS cross cabbage. Have some mammoth snow pea seed to sow along with purple podded snow and blue podded snow.
Growing some extra early tomato plants and trying my hand at grafting some.

Gloria,
There is something about sitting here in snowy cold Ohio looking at your garden, just spectacular, Thank You!!
Reality check now I look at my frozen boxes resting out there and all the new seed packets just waiting....

So sorry Llama I'm not sure if I could have waited all winter if I lived in a cold place. Once I read the book and knew this was my mission, I wanted to grow something!!

Carolyn... that sounds like a lot of different varieties... how many boxes do you have? Or did you answer that already? LOL, I'm still on my first cup of coffee.

I have potatoes (obviously from my 10 posts about them!), some carrots, onions, garlic, broccoli, cauliflower, arugula, red leaf lettuce, raddishes, cabbage, strawberries, basil, rosemary, cilantro, culantro and a seedling tray with tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, cukes, acorn squash and oregano. I'm in Florida so I can start the summer crops. Well, I read that I can do that lol. We'll see.

That lettuce looks ready to eat.
I don't like bread or lunch meat.
But I love to fry me a tator, a chicken finger, and slice a tomato and roll it all in a couple of big lettuce leaves.

me = how many beds? too many to count. Some are old sfg version and some are new version. Some are old version with new version on top but eventually it all gets mixed with some type of sub soil below. About 874sfg squares all together all different sizes::: 4x4, 3x10s, 3x70s, 2x8 table top gardens.......Plus a big garden (28x90) for intensive gardening .(3x80 beds of traditional soil) which I have plans to turn the garden into sfg.....but that's gonna take a few years. No way i can afford to do it all at once. One day at a time.

Yesterday I peeked under the covers of my single 4' x 4' to inspect things. Ended up pulling three small, sweet carrots.

Three or four lettuce plants, still small, look as if they'll survive the winter. Ditto the square of spinach and the beets. The broccoli plant remains questionable, although I think it does have a chance. The onions and garlic are doing well.

Surprise! The Asian greens I cut back after they swooned during our -3 temps earlier this winter are coming back!

Indoors, I've started basil, cilantro, and dill seeds. I'm chomping at the bit for planting time; our earliest crops sometimes can go in around March (asparagus, potatoes, etc.).

I'm shedding tears of joy over those beautiful pictures! Thanks for giving us polar bears a glimpse! Woke up to 3in of powdered snow and 7*F...which is about the worst we'll get in KY....so I guess I can't complain too much after living several years in MI.
Those pics give me some nice inspiration for future winter gardening. I love the use of the PVC grid and hoops....looks way more organized than my setup. Do you use the PVC grids as your watering system too? I'm looking to do something like that and hook up to my rain barrel system...wondering if it's a better option than fussing w/ piecing together soaker hosing to go to different boxes (not to mention, having a lasting grid!).

Carolyn... I started eating the lettuce - tyvm for suggesting it.

I'm so sorry for all the winter birds who are dreaming of a spring garden... it will come!

I planted another 36 cell seed tray on Saturday because I got my heat mat and grow light and I wanted to try them out. Plus, I think my other seedlings were on the leggy side. The new batch is starting to sprout already, so amazing. I hade cukes come up in 2 days. About 10 cells have come up now.