Extension Master GardenerSM Volunteers of Buncombe County

cool season vegetables

Cool Season Veggies: Growing Greens—Simple as Child’s Play!

Sprinkle lettuce seeds on soil, cover with soil, water, and in about 45 days you will be picking lettuce! Growing cool season greens is so simple that kids in early childhood programs often plant and grow them!

Greens_Billtacular_CC BY-NC-ND 2.0_Flickr
Arugala and mixed lettuces at Rutgers Student Sustainable Farm

What to plant
In addition to lettuce, consider planting arugula, collard greens, kale, mustard greens, spinach, or Swiss chard, depending on your family’s preferences. All greens are nutritious and fast-growing. Check the seed packet or transplant tag for planting depth, spacing, and time to harvest specifics.

When to plant
North Carolina is blessed with three growing seasons—spring, summer, and fall—so gardeners can enjoy vegetable crops nearly year-round. Cool season crops prefer the spring and fall when temperatures are below 70 degrees. These crops can take light frosts, and some will even tolerate temperatures in the upper teens. Sow seeds directly into the ground or start with transplants from early March to early April and again in July or August, depending on the particular plants. (See online planting calendar listed below for specifics).

Growing Vegetables at Childcare Centers_photo by NC State Extension
Planting veggie seeds, easy and fun for children

Where to plant
Greens like full sun—6 to 8 hours of direct sun a day. Your plants will also do better in a weed-free environment.

Soil & fertilizers
Leafy greens thrive in a variety of soils—you can also grow them in containers. They prefer well-drained soil, rich in organic matter that is slightly acidic—a pH of 6.0 to 6.5—although spinach prefers a pH of 6.5 to 6.8.

It’s best to do a soil test before you start to see if you need to lime your garden and for specific fertilizer recommendations. Soil test kits can be picked up at the NC State Extension, Buncombe County, 49 Mount Carmel Road, Asheville, NC.

For average soil, work 3 pounds of 10-10-10 per 100 square feet into the soil before planting. Or you can side-dress plants after they start to grow (apply fertilizer about 4 inches from stems on both side of the plants) using 3 ounces of 10-10-10 per 100 row feet.

Maintaining your greens
If you are starting with seeds, keep them continuously moist until they sprout. After your seeds emerge, your garden will prosper if it gets at least one inch of water a week. Veggies grown in containers tend to dry out faster than garden soil and need to be monitored daily during dry, warm, or windy conditions. Thin your seedlings as they grow to provide the recommended space between plants. Base additional side-dressing with fertilizer on how the crop looks. Does it have good color and strong growth?

Managing insects
Green leafy veggies are subject to attack by aphids, and those in the Brassicaceae family—arugula, collards, kale, and mustard—will attract cabbage worms and cabbage loopers.

Follow an Integrated Pest Management (IPM) approach to reduce insect damage:

  • Look at your plants regularly.
  • Identify any pests.
  • Decide if the degree of damage requires action.
  • If so, consider a combination of treatments: mechanical (picking or washing off insects), cultural (keeping your plants healthy, rotating crops using trap crops to attract insects), biologic (using predator insects or parasites to control harmful insects), and chemical (use of insecticides).
  • Evaluate your success!

Best leafy green varieties for Western North Carolina

Lettuce
Head: Strains of Ithaca, Salinas, Pennlake
Romaine: Romulus, Signal, Medallion
Green Leaf: Salad Bowl, Slobolt, Royal Green, Green Vision, Grand Rapids
Red Leaf: Royal Red, Red Sails, Ruby
Butterhead (loose head): Butter-crunch, Nancy (a.k.a. Boston head), Esmeralda, Ermosa
Kale
Winterbor, Toscano, Improved Dwarf Siberian, Red Russian, Redbor
Spinach
Chesapeake, Hybrid #7, Tyee, Melody, Old Dominion
Collard greens
Vates, Morris, Georgia Southern, Blue Max, Heavi Crop
Swiss chard
Bright Lights, Ruby Red/Rhubarb Chard

Article written by Kay Green, Extension Master GardenerSM Volunteer.

Learn more
Western North Carolina Planting Calendar
by NC State Extension

NC State Vegetable Gardening Resources
by Dr. Lucy Bradley, Extension Urban Horticulture Specialist, NSCU
Provides links to Extension vegetable publications.

Vegetable Varieties for Gardeners
by Cornell University
Rates and reviews hundreds of varieties.

Edible Alliums: Chives, Garlic, Onions, and Shallots for Fall Planting

Flowering onion.
Flowering onion.

Think fall is only a time for harvesting? Meet the Allium family! Plant chives, garlic, bunching onions, and shallots beginning in September and October for eating next year.

You can grow most alliums from seeds or small transplants, but fall is the ideal time for planting allium bulbs—also called sets—and to make divisions of clump-forming alliums from your garden or a friend’s. 

The basics—a sunny spot and fertile soil
Alliums require a sunny garden spot with good drainage. If you haven’t tested your soil in the last three years to adjust soil nutrients and pH—the soil acidity—do it now! Kits for sending your samples in for free testing are available at the Extension Office and Extension Master Gardener Volunteer information tables and plant clinics. 

Bulbs—source varieties best for growing in WNC
It is easy to plant garlic, elephant garlic, bunching onion, and shallot bulbs. These look just like what you’d buy for cooking, but think twice before planting store-bought produce. Bulbs sold in supermarkets are often varieties that grow best in other areas or are treated to delay sprouting.

Buy bulb varieties suited to Western North Carolina from nurseries or seed companies, or from a local farmer. You can ensure you’ve planted varieties you’ll enjoy by sampling bulbs at a local farmer’s market.

Harvested garlic.
Harvested garlic.

Garlic (Allium sativum) comes in softneck and hardneck types. Extension Horticulture Specialist Jeanine Davis notes that the garlic bulbs usually sold in supermarkets are softneck varieties. She recommends California Early, many Italian cultivars, and New York White Neck softneck varieties for North Carolina. Davis cautions that hardneck varieties tend to be trickier to grow, but NC commercial growers do well with German Extra Hardy, Chesnok Red, Music, and Spanish Roja. Elephant garlic is actually a leek (Allium ampeloprasum), but you plant and grow it just like true garlic. Always separate garlic bulbs into cloves before planting.

Onion bulb.
Onion bulb.

Bunching onions (Allium cepa var cepa and Allium fistulosum) and shallot bulbs (Allium cepa var. aggregatum) are planted whole. Extension Horticulture Specialist Douglas Sanders recommends Ebenezer, Silverskin, or Yellow Globe Danvers varieties for bunching onions grown from sets. Unlike garlic, you may find your sets grow quickly enough that you can harvest “green” onions later in the fall.

 

Planting
Plant your garlic cloves and bunching onion and shallot sets no more than a couple of inches deep and 3 to 5 inches apart. If you plant in rows, allow at least a foot between rows. Keep well-watered.

Flowering chives.
Flowering chives.

Divisions
Although you can grow chives from purchased plants or seeds, these plants benefit from division, so if you have a planting or can get a friend to share, you can increase your harvest next spring by digging and separating a chive clump into two or more plants. There is no need to separate the individual bulblets, just cut back the green tops to a couple of inches, dig, pull apart, and replant in a sunny, well-drained spot with the nutrients and lime recommended in your soil test.

The most common garden chives, (Allium schoenoprasum) have pretty, edible purple flowers in spring. You can tell them from garlic chives (Allium tuberosum) by their flowers—garlic chives have white flowers—as well as the fact that “regular” chives have round, hollow green leaves, while garlic chives have flat, solid leaves. The long life and attractiveness of these flowering alliums makes them suitable for ornamental gardens and might tempt you to look for Allium family members grown exclusively for their flowers. Fall is the time to plant these, too!

Walking onion.
Walking onion.

The “Walking” onion (Allium cepa proliferum group) is another Allium family member that benefits from division. In this case, in addition to digging, separating, and replanting individual bulbs, you can break apart the mature seed heads, which are also forming new bulbs! As the pollinated flowers form seeds that swell into bulbs, the tiny new bulbs sprout and the weight begins to bend the flower stalk. These heads will eventually reach the ground. Thus, the onions “walk” into a neighboring section of the garden. You can control where the new onions grow by cutting off the flower stalks once the bulbs begin to form and replanting. 

Visit the websites below for more information about growing alliums:

Article written by Debbie Green, Extension Master Gardener Volunteer.

Photos: Flowering onion by Phillip Merritt, Flickr.com; Harvested garlic by Tony Austin, Flickr.com; Onion bulb by Laura Leonard Fitch, Flickr.com; Flowering chives by NCSU; Walking onion by Anderwood, Garden.org.

Cold Frames, Row Covers and Cool Season Vegetables

As the evenings cool and the chance of frost increases, having vegetables growing in cold frames or under row covers will prolong their productivity. A cold frame is essentially a bottomless box made of wood, brick, or concrete block sides with a removable or hinged top of glass or thick clear plastic sheeting. Some are elaborate while others are made from repurposed materials such as old windows and scrap wood. Row covers sit over a single vegetable row and are made with a hoop frame that is covered with clear polyethylene or spunbonded polyester or polypropylene. Medium weight plastics or polyester work best as anything thinner doesn’t offer frost protection, and anything heavier blocks too much sunlight.

hoop_house-285x252722-1

 

 

 

 

 

The purpose of both cold frames and row covers is to warm the soil and trap warm air at night. Positioning a cold frame so that it faces south on a hillside will keep the soil warmer in the fall and warm quicker in the spring. Remember that if your land slopes, that cold air settles in the lowest areas on calm nights and can create frost pockets. Cold frames and row covers will also lessen the effect of chilling wind.

The tops of the crops should not touch the top of the cold frame or the plastic of the row cover. If they touch, the frost will damage those areas. Although it might be cold at night, the top of the cold frame and the plastic of the row cover should be removed on warm days; otherwise, your plants will overheat and die. A thermometer inside your frame or cover will help you stay aware of temperature changes.

If starting your vegetables from seed, some fall vegetable seed will not germinate if the soil is too warm and might do better started inside. With spring gardens, the converse is true, the soil is often too cool, and the seeds do better begun inside giving them a head start on the season. Remember to harden the seedlings off when transplanting them outside.

Enjoy this fall vegetable season in the garden and later, in your kitchen.

Season Extension: Introduction and Basic Principles:

http://www.growingsmallfarms.ces.ncsu.edu

http://www.content.ces.ncsu.edu/growing-a-fall-vegetable-garden

http://www.content.ces.ncsu.edu/home-vegetable-gardening.pdf

 

 

 

 

Contact Us

Buncombe County Extension Office
49 Mount Carmel Road
Asheville, NC 28806
Helpline 828-255-5522

Events

Keep up with our events by subscribing to the blog or checking our Events Calendar.

Explore the Archives

Back to Top