Winter Gardening Ideas

Brrrr! Grab those last green tomatoes, eggplants or peppers if you got ‘em. Tonight we’ll experience our first real frost, but that doesn’t mean an end to the garden. Here are some ideas to keep your garden growing year round.

Plant cold-tolerant plants - With planning, you can eat out of the garden all winter long. Collards can take 20 degree temps, and our elders will tell you a frost will make them sweeter. Turnips and mustard, too, don’t mind a little cold. Kale, kohlrabi, broccoli, leeks, cauliflower, cabbage, lettuce, and spinach are also great winter plants. Beet greens and chard are a little less cold hardy, but will come back after a frost. 

To get these plants growing for winter harvest, you need to start them in August and September, but we’ll have another planting window start to open at the end of January for lettuce, sugar snap peas, spinach and more.

Grow in warmer spots - A microclimate is a fancy garden word for a place in your yard that is a little warmer or colder than others. If you have a brick or cinder block house or garage, it’s going to absorb heat during the day. Plant next to a sun-soaked wall, and it will keep your plants a few degrees warmer than other areas.

Cover in the cold - A frost blanket or spun fabric row cover won’t save the tomatoes, but it will keep the extreme cold from burning your less cold tolerant plants. The advantage of the row cover is that they let in light so you can leave them on, but in a pinch, you can use a sheet. Just remember to take it off during the day.

Mulch (straw, pine straw, finished compost) can also help protect plants, too

Cover crop - Winter is a great time to feed your soil. Oats, winter wheat, and some clovers will grow all winter, keep your soil from washing or blowing away, and feed your soil organic matter (rotted plants) and nitrogen. 

Cold is good! While we sometimes envy climates that grow pineapple, avocado or papayas, freezing temperatures help us get rid of pesky garden pests. (We’re really hoping this frost knocks back the flea beetles that are eating our mustard!) Weeds (and vegetables, too) grow more slowly, too. 

Enjoy the winter, and let us know how your garden is growing or what your plans are for next year.