The Fall Garden: Less Weeds, Less Work

I feel sorry for all the folks who didn’t grow a fall garden this year.

Fall and winter are the best times to grow a garden in Texas. Of course, we can only grow crops that can survive cold weather. So that limits the selection. Leafy greens comprise a large portion of our garden this time of year – brassicas like cabbage, kale, mustard greens, bok choy and the various other asian greens. We also grow lots of the vegetable brassicas like broccoli and cauliflower.

Several of our broccoli plants are ready to harvest the main heads this week. Some of them are starting to form some side heads, also. If you grow broccoli, dont pull up the plant once you harvest the head. It will continue to grow smaller side heads from the main stem.

Lettuce also grows well through our relatively mild winters. In my experience, lettuce hates two things: hot weather and competition from weeds. Weeds are not as much of a problem this time of year when most of our weeds have died or gone dormant. Hot weather causes lettuce to bolt and form a seed head. Once this happens, the leaves turn bitter and the plant soon dies. This time of year, lettuce plants will grow for a long time before going to seed. Instead of harvesting a whole head of lettuce, you can cut a few leaves at a time from several plants and extend your harvest.

Swiss chard and beets, which are related to each other, also survive most winters in this part of Texas. We planted some golden beets a few weeks ago and they are beginning to emerge. Swiss chard and beets grow easily from seed, but they do take a while to germinate in cold weather.

Spinach also grows well here during the fall and winter. Most folks plant spinach in the early spring, but it grows better if planted during the fall. Like lettuce, warm weather triggers spinach to form a seed head and die. This is much less likely to happen during the fall and winter. Spinach plants will produce leaves for months in cool weather.

I’ve grown carrots at all times of the year, but they grow the best during the cool season. It’s nearly impossible to transplant carrots, so they must be grow from seed. The seed is tiny and will not germinate if planted too deeply. It germinates very slowly, especially in cool weather. I’ve seen carrots take up to 30 days to germinate. During the spring and summer, it seems like I spend all of my free time weeding the carrot bed. They’re much easier to grow this time of year when there is less weed pressure.

Pests are also less of an issue this time of year, with one exception. I’m starting to get a few fuzzy caterpillars on the brassicas. So far, I’ve been able to control them with hand-picking. If they become more of a problem, I will spray them with the organic pesticide BT (short for Bacillus thuringiensis, a bacteria that sickens and kills caterpillars, yet is harmless to most other lifeforms).

Are you growing a fall garden? I’d love to hear about it. Email me at andy@fayettecountyrecord. com.