How are you preparing for fall 2015? What are you planning to order/What have you ordered?

I haven't seen a thread specifically regarding this topic.  We all live in different areas, so we are all planning differently.

So, what are you doing to prepare for fall planting?  Aside from the obvious of maybe reading or re-reading ANSFG and the SFGAB, are there any books you are reading to prepare?  Do you have some definite "must haves" for your fall garden?

I've got some garlic on order.  I've purchased Inchellium Red and Early Italian.  Also, I've been reading a book that I bought on a "splurge."  It called The Complete Book of Garlic, A Guide For Serious Gardeners, Growers, and Serious Cooks, by Ted Jordan Meredith.  Wow, it's extremely comprehensive and I'm really enjoying it.  It's rich with illustrations and photos.

I also bought the newest Month-by-Month Gardening for Georgia, by Walter Reeves and Erica Glasener.   I borrowed the older version from our Public Library, but it was becoming a donation arrangement...  I'm not the best at returning library books .  I've finally begun to read it.

As far as my must haves:

Red Russian Kale (of all the varieties I've tried, this is our family favorite - plus I saved seeds this year!!)
Rainbow Carrots and Danvers Carrots
Yugoslavian Red Butterhead Lettuce
Marvel of the Seasons Lettuce
Farmers Blend Mesclun Lettuce and some other microgreens
Kalettes
Orion Fennel
Cilantro

Those last two will be isolated because of their invasiveness.

So far, that's all for me.

Kale, parsnips, and peas for me. I will also plant some more marigolds!

I wouldn't mind planting some spinach and lettuce, but almost all of my space is already taken up with summer crops; so much so that my planting of cooler-season crops will be sporadic and probably significantly less than I like(who could have too many sweet peas?).

Re the garlic book, I read some of that, I think as a sample from Amazon, and it was a great read. I've got too much to read already on my list, or I'd be happy to go through that book cover to cover.

Let see... I'm anxiously awaiting my fall seeds I ordered last week. I'm got two kinds of peas, carrots, kale, lettuce, and spinach. Not to mention the few seeds I have left from the spring garden. Its still way to hot to plant here though. I'm thinking about planting my seeds outside in their spots in about a month.

All three seasons are starting to overlap in my garden and space is at a minimum. I think this is a first. I actually thought about building another box today after saying every year I will not build another box. Also I keep waiting for the peas to finish and every time I go out there, which is at least 5 to 10 times a day, there seems to be more sugar snap peas and snow peas ready for me to eat or bring in. It's non stop. Usually they are pulled out by now and new things put in those spaces.

Anyway, for fall I have started these seeds and now have the seedlings ready to go in as soon as I harvest the garlic and onions - Marvel of the Four Seasons lettuce ( was able to plant half of them today), Little Caesar lettuce, Ripbor kale, lots of Marigolds - and I'll be starting Jericho and Black Seeded Simpson lettuces this weekend. Last weekend I direct seeded corn, daikon, carrots, beets, kale, collards, broccoli, bush beans in succession plantings every couple weeks, winter squash and zucchini. All of these except the corn are up now and will go on through fall.

Oh, and one of my other addictions, everytime I find a healthy sucker on a tomato plant I stick it in the MM and it grows. I have little tomato plants everywhere. It's crazy! Good thing I have a long fall.

CC

I have one empty pet pool that I'm reserving for fall salad plants, and a single 5-gal bucket that I've not yet decided what to put in it.  Other than that, I'm doing a lot of reading still so I'll be better prepared for next year.

No planting until October for winter / spring crops for me.  Definite winter plantings will be kale, Swiss chard, bok choy, onions, garlic, snow peas, maybe cabbage again.

BeckySue, Winter reading and browsing this Forum and links is a good thing for first year gardeners.

I am planting some lettuces, spinach, radishes, carrots, and some green onions. As for other preparataion, I am readin here, and I bought the All New 2nd Ed that I am also digesting.  In addition, I need to add MM to my boxes, since they are really deep (re-purposed window boxes) I filled them about half way with raked out leaves from my perennial bed, topped leaves with some blood & bone meal, then topped that with the MM.  Now, I assume due to some break-down of the leaves, my mix level has significantly deflated.  So that will happen before I put them to bed for the Winter.  

Do you guys mulch your beds for the Winter?  We do have winter here...just wondering?

Not unless I"m growing onions. But it would be smart if I did. My region is drier lately than it used to be, but still, we're known for having heavy spring and fall rains, which can wash away a lot of nutrients in the soil. It would probably be smarter in the long run to mulch heavily or grow cover crops during the winter or simply cover with plastic.

Scorpio Rising wrote:

Do you guys mulch your beds for the Winter?  We do have winter here...just wondering?

I usually leave on whatever leaves and pine needles fall onto the beds but that's it.  Altho last fall I cleaned them off and spread seaweed all over the beds.  I think I may do that again because I'm having a stellar year this year.

CC

I try to mulch all beds after the fall crops come out but don't always get around to it.  I tried growing a cover crop last year and I think it was successful but there is really no way to tell.  I did get a lot of green material for my compost pile so it was worth it to me.

I prepped 3 of the 4 beds, weeded them out and added lots of Black Kow. Will be adding irrigation also. The soaker hoses from two years ago started to split apart. One bed still has some asparagus beans growing so it will get taking care of later. Our tomato season will kick off soon so I need to get some starters going. Ordered some new tomato varieties from U of Fla. Hoping they are winners. Also have Mortgage Lifters.
http://hos.ufl.edu/kleeweb/newcultivars.html

TC - Report back on the taste and productivity of the Garden Treasure variety.  Looks promising.  The write up did not mention whether it has any particular disease resistance though.

Hey everybody,
I am going to plant cabbage, collards, spinach, pak choi, lettuce, sweet peas, pole beans, bush beans, carrots, and maybe try the zucchini again after the squash borer disaster here.  Went to a canning class today(pressure canning) so now I am super excited.

have a great evening

Scorpio, I don't think mulching the boxes is necessary, unless you have a winter crop and you want some extra freeze protection around the roots. Some of my beds are put to sleep for the winter. Just cleaned and covered with a plastic roof. If there is rain, I take the roofs off a bit, then cover again. But, I don't have snow, and only a couple hard freezes.

Hokie, Sounds like you are off and running. The canning class was a good idea.

My wife takes over all the fall and winter gardening, as I am on the road a lot during the NFL season and have a little thing called "The PiRate Ratings" to keep updated, which takes up about 25 hours per week.

She will plant a small greens garden using both raised bed squares and all the containers.  The containers can be moved inside if we get a hard freeze, and we have enough thermal blankets to cover the raised beds.

The last several winters, many of our herbs have survived the season, so we continue to harvest sage, thyme, chives, oregano, and lemon balm.  The lemon balm has to be contained, so it does not become invasive.

Braveheart romaine
Cabbage
Peas
Onions
Spinach
Tomatoes

Late September early October to directly sow is my game plan.

yolos wrote:TC - Report back on the taste and productivity of the Garden Treasure variety.  Looks promising.  The write up did not mention whether it has any particular disease resistance though.

+1. I also was looking for information regarding disease resistance.  It does sound promising (given its origen).