It’s not too late to sow an edible garden that will bear through winter and/or set you up for an early spring harvest! In this class, we will cover cold-hardy veggie varieties and how to prepare your garden space to be fruitful through winter.

1. Fall Planting for
Your Winter Garden
Independence Gardens
Portland, OR
January 2012
© Independence Gardens LLC
Download the
handout that goes
along with this
slideshow!
http://bit.ly/yL0TxS
Tuesday, January 31, 2012

2. Winter gardening?
Sure! If you:
• Choose the right
varieties of the right
plants
• Plant them at the
right time in the
right location(s)
• And protect them
adequately
Fresh tomatoes are probably not on the menu
this winter...unless...our summer ‘maters don’t
ripen before then!
Tuesday, January 31, 2012

3. In winter, plants...
• Grow slower or not at all; many go dormant
through the cold months
• Can be harvested if they are full-grown before
winter sets in
• Need protection from the elements
• May die, or at least die back
Tuesday, January 31, 2012

4. • Find your first frost date
~Oct. 24, in Portland; this is conservative, and a
more experimental gardener might use Nov. 15
• Count backward an appropriate length of time!
– Varies by plant; general formula and example follow
When to plant
Tuesday, January 31, 2012

5. The Formula/Example: Radishes
# of days from seeding or transplanting outdoors
to harvest (find on seed packet)/28 days
# of days from seed to transplant (if you grow your
own transplants)/0
“Fall Factor” (~2 weeks—this accounts for slower
growth during cool, short autumn days)/14 days
# of days to count back from first frost date to
planting date/42 days (Sept. 12 - Oct. 4)
When to plant
+
+
=
Tuesday, January 31, 2012

6. Fall garden activities
September
• Sow seeds/transplanting starts
• Build season extenders
• Control pests (esp. slugs and snails)—if you do it now, you’ll
have fewer problems through the winter and into the spring
• Fertilize: top-dress with a little bit of compost or use a small
application of a complete fertilizer to restore nutrients to
depleted soils; don’t use too much nitrogen, because it will
stimulate excess growth of weak leaves
• Harvest frost-tender crops (tomatoes, summer squash, melons,
eggplants, cukes, peppers) and storing them—chart follows
Tuesday, January 31, 2012

7. Frost-tenderness
Tender Vegetables Semi-Hardy Vegetables Hardy Vegetables
(damaged by light frost) (tolerates light frost) (tolerates hard frost)
Beans Beets Broccoli
Cucumber Carrot Brussels Sprouts
Eggplant Cauliflower Cabbage
Muskmelon Celery Collards
New Zealand Spinach Chard Kale
Okra Chinese Cabbage Kohlrabi
Pepper Endive Mustard Greens
Pumpkin Lettuce Onion
Squash Parsnip Parsley
Sweet Corn Potato Peas
Sweet Potato Salsify Radish
Tomato Spinach
Watermelon Turnip
Tuesday, January 31, 2012

8. Fall garden activities
October
• Start to use your season extenders
• Cease and desist with fertilizers—too much nitrogen (N) will
make your plants grow new leaves, which will be susceptible to
freezing
November
• STOP WATERING, if you’ve been keeping it up; don’t resume
till February at the earliest—having less water in them will help
keep your crops from freezing
Tuesday, January 31, 2012

9. Planting calendar
• This chart shows what to
plant and when you can
expect to harvest it in Zone
8 (USDA)/6 (Sunset)
• The gray columns are
months in which we usually
don’t plant much, if
anything...but we can
continue to grow/harvest
Tuesday, January 31, 2012

10. Location
• Mobile: take your garden on the road or move it around as the sun
changes direction; grow herbs in containers
• Stationary: most gardens are; location ideally carefully considered
• Easily accessible: minimize the need for trekking through the rain
• South-facing: sun will be coming from further south in the winter
• NOT at bottom of slope: cold air flows downhill like cold water, so
it will frost first in the pools at the bottom
• Sheltered from the wind: air movement is more stressful to plants
than temperature fluctuations
• Good drainage: raised beds suggested
• Crop rotation: plant similar things in different beds
Tuesday, January 31, 2012

11. Protection
• Straw
• Leaves
• Buckets, bags, baskets, boxes,
milk jugs
• Cloches
• Cold frames
• Hotbeds
• Greenhouses
• Sunrooms
• Windowsills (with
supplemental light)
NOTE: You cannot and should not try to
recreate spring or summer during fall and winter,
but you can protect your plants from getting
beaten up, frozen, or blown to smithereens
Tuesday, January 31, 2012

12. Final notes
• If this is your first fall-winter garden, strive for but
don’t expect perfection
• Weather, scheduling, etc. are unpredictable, and
they may get in your garden’s way
• Unless the stakes are really high, any effort is a
good effort
• Keep track of what works and what doesn’t
• And do it again next year even better!
Tuesday, January 31, 2012

13. Questions?
Tuesday, January 31, 2012