GROWING TIPS FOR THE SPRING SALAD GARDEN
THE SPRING SALAD GARDEN, Spinach, Swiss chard, and crisp lettuce are easy spring greens to grow. When to plant and soil temperature are the keys to spring gardening. Greens – arugula, beets, cabbages, cabbages, kale, and lettuce – staples crops for early spring because they germinate at cool temperatures.
Greens will take longer to grow in early spring than late spring or fall because the soil is still fresh, but it’s easy to harvest salad greens before other seeds dig into the ground.
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Here are six tips for spring salad growing:
Tip One:
Check the seed packets to determine the germination soil temperature range of the seeds you want to sow. Use a soil thermometer to check the soil’s temperature in your garden. Take the soil temperature 3 or 4 inches and do it 3 or 4 days in a row to ensure you have a consistent reading. If you don’t have a soil thermometer, sow seeds when the soil is ready to work – not frozen, not too wet, it should form a dough in your closed hand, and the dough should come off easily when your hand is opened.
Tip Two:
Heat the soil before planting your vegetables. If the soil does not freeze deep where you live, you can sow seeds in early spring under row covers or plastic tunnels. If the ground freezes deep where you live, start sowing spring seeds in cold frames. (Sow in cool frames as soon as the soil is warm enough.) Grow vegetables in raised beds. Soil temperature in raised beds will be approximately 5 degrees warmer than adjacent soil. For an early start in the garden, mulch or plastic sheeting over the seedbeds at least a week before sowing the seed – the black plastic sheeting will heat the soil to 5 ° F. The clear plastic tarp will heat the floor to 8 ° -14 ° F;
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Third tip:
Know the average date of the last frost in your area (you can find it online or ask at a nearby garden center), then count back 8 weeks and mark your calendar. This is when you should start sowing seeds indoors. Green seedlings can be transplanted into the garden 4-5 weeks before the last expected frost (or earlier if you protect them with row covers or plastic tunnels). Before placing indoor started seedlings outdoors, harden them by gradually introducing them to outside temperatures over several hours over several days. Once the outside soil temperature matches the soil’s germination temperature found in the seed packets, you can direct the seeds to the garden—direct seeding every two to three weeks for a continuous crop of vegetables throughout the spring. Beginning to sow seeds indoors will allow you to begin your harvesting program in two to three weeks.
Tip Four:
If you fear a short spring, meaning that day and night temperatures will rise rapidly, where you live, plant only varieties of greens that are resistant to bolts, that is, plants with a tolerance to warmer climates. . Greens often run amok (send out seed stalks) when daytime temperatures reach 70ºF. If you expect temperatures to be cool and then hot and then cool again, choose bolt resistant varieties that can grow in warmer climates. The seed packets will tell you if the variety you are choosing can tolerate warm temperatures and is bolt resistant.
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Tip Five:
Protect spring greens with row covers, bells, or cold frames. The protection will allow greens to grow stress-fre, without responding to stress caused by erratic temperatures, wind, heavy rain, frost, or other weather. Putting the protection in place will only take a few minutes, but it will take the strain off your plants for a long time. If you cover the plants, be sure to monitor their water needs – the soil can dry out undercover – and the temperature; ventilate or open its cover when the ambient temperature rises. Do not allow the temperature undercover to exceed 70 ° F when growing vegetables. When temperatures stabilize later in the spring, crop protection can be removed.
Tip Six:
Harvest your veggies when they taste best. Taste your veggies in different sizes to determine which size is the tastiest for you. When the green leaves reach 2 to 4 inches in height, you can harvest individual leaves. When they are about 6 inches tall, you can harvest the entire plant. You can harvest cut green leaves again by gently grasping the individual leaves and using a sharp knife to cut all the leaves except ½-1 inch of the leaves just above the crown of the plant. As long as you don’t damage the crown, new leaves will grow to replace the ones you harvest. THE SPRING SALAD GARDEN, You should get two to five crops of vegetables using the cut and pre-harvest method.