Tag Archives: lettuce

My square foot winter garden is here

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snow covered winter gardenCan you believe there’s a garden back there? That’s thirteen inches of snow my low tunnel endured! Wow! We had more snow yesterday than we did all of last year. I had several low tunnel/winter gardening classes at my home this fall. Several of the participants doubted that the hoops would be strong enough to withstand a serious snow storm. I assured them that it would and here’s the proof that it does.

Often times in northern Utah after a snow storm we get very cold night temperatures with the clear skies. I like to keep the snow on the hoops as an insulator for a couple of days until it warms up a bit. To do that I use a broom to sweep the snow off the top. Another thing about the snow is that it seals the tunnel completely along the base of the garden. Thats perfect for me because I don’t bury any of my coverings. I keep the material taut and then weigh everything down with 5 gallon bucket filled with water-which are now ice. These are certainly heavy enough to hold things in place. And this winter we’ve had 2 days of 50 and 70 MPH winds.

Tomorrow I’ll broom a portion of the snow off and lift the top up to harvest enough salad greens to last us for a few days. It’s easy to do because the protective covers have been pulled tight along the length of the hoops. Lettuce, spinach, mizuna, and carrots will be the choice this week. Spinach, claytonia, and chard next week. A different lettuce, minutina, beet greens, and tokyo bekana the week after. I wish I could tell you how fun it is to eat seasonally like this.[ois skin=”1″]

More lettuce varieties for your square foot garden

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arctic king lettuceI’m always searching for lettuces that can make it through the winter and taste good. Because the leaves get a light frost, I don’t worry much about the taste-it’s always good this time of year.

I received an email today announcing that Cooks Garden will now be rolled in to the Burpee catalog after a couple of weeks. Burpee owns Cooks so it’s not that big of a deal. I just don’t know how they’ll separate the specialty seeds for kitchen cooks as they’ve always done. You might have to search both of them to find this particular lettuce. It’s called Arctic King. This is my second winter season growing it. The very cold night temperatures haven’t seemed to bother it a bit. There’s no leave damage and it’s gotten to about 75% of its normal size. Learn more about it here. Order some and give it a try. You won’t be disappointed. It’s too late to grow from seed this time of year, but this performed very well in the spring garden as well.[ois skin=”1″]

Holiday gift ideas for the gardener

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green ice lettuceHow about some suggestions for the upcoming holidays? Since my birthday follows so close to Christmas it’s a fun time of year. I spend a lot of time reading through the seed catalogs in order to find new things to try. And, I usually try a lot! The folks who do the marketing for these companies-they are very good. One gets the idea after reading any description of seed packet that all of them are equally great. I don’t think that’s the case.
One of my favorite things to receive from family or friends are gift certificates to seed companies I love to buy from. There are many to choose from, but I’ve become partial to those I’ve done business with.
The picture for this post is a lettuce variety called Green Ice from Burpee’s. You can read the specifics of this variety here(read reviews.)  I’ve grown this for two yeas and I continue to be very pleased with it’s ability to withstand the colder temperatures of the early spring and late fall. It’s a crispy type of lettuce that tastes very good. I like to harvest for our daily salads by snipping a few leaves of several lettuce types. That way, the head lasts us longer and it allows us to have a very different tasting salad every night.  Green Ice has come back twice after the first snip of it’s outer leaves.
As we move into the winter months I’ll be making more recommendations of the items I’ve had success with and which do well in our climate-zone 6B.  Many of these will be different lettuce varieties.  It’s my favorite crop, it’s easy to grow, it’s cheap, and it tastes so good when just harvested from the garden.  You’ll hate buying lettuce from the stores after you’ve tasted your own.

And, you don’t have to limit yourself to seeds.  What about a friend or family member who is planning to have their first garden next spring?  They will need more than just seeds.  Maybe an entire seed starting kit would be the perfect gift for them with all the supplies needed to get them off to a great start?

 

The best thing about buying from catalogs?  No question-the great variety.  And with the way square foot gardeners plant, only using 2 or 3 seeds per hole, your 700 seeds of lettuce are going to last you for a long time [ois skin=”1″]

Square foot garden-low tunnel class coming up

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square foot garden low tunnel for the winter monthsYou northern Utah gardeners-if you’re wanting to learn how to have a winter garden or one that gets going 6-8 weeks earlier in the spring, this class is for you. You bring the number of 1/2″ EMT pieces and I’ll bend them for you while you’re here.

These structures are rock solid, mobile, and are much less expensive than traditional greenhouses. You won’t have to worry about some of the problems with permanent greenhouses either-like excessive salt build up-because they’ll be taken down in the spring time. These are sun driven systems only. You won’t be needing any fancy heating or water systems.

If you are interested in attending please contact me. We will begin promptly at 10:00 A.M. and end at 10:30 A.M. No Utah time arrivals please!

Although you will see what my square foot gardens look like, there will be no SFG instruction at this class. Its specifically how to construct a low tunnel only. You can learn more about the class here.

Square foot garden for winter

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winter lettuce in the square foot gardenThis will be my second season growing this unbelievable lettuce for the winter.  It holds up well in the freeze/thaw cycles better than some of the others-as long as it doesn’t get too big.  In my experience the larger lettuce leaves turn into soup after 2 or 3 freeze and thaw cycles.  I think smaller lettuce leaves do much better than the larger ones in our zone(6B)during the winter months.

 

I’ve only got 3 more squares to plant for the winter, and those will be finished this week.  Everything else is the perfect size heading into mid-November.  There’s only about 3 more weeks of active growing before everything starts to slow down.  At that point even the smaller leaf crops almost hibernate until about the first of February, when they come back with a vengeance.  Either way, I like to get things going as fast as possible in late winter.  For those crops that are a little small right now-they will be the first up in the spring.  If you can plant in late-summer or early fall with the right crops you’ll be able to do the same thing in your square foot garden.  Or any garden for that matter.

 

For you visiting warm weather gardeners-you may not be interested in this variety of lettuce as its made to withstand more difficult weather-as the name implies.  You can learn more about this little lettuce gem here.  For you cold weather folks, you ought to consider this lettuce.  Sure, there’s other great tasting lettuces out there-and I do grow other varieties that I’ll share with you over time.  But you’ll not get a better performer than this for the winter garden.  If you’re too late to order and plant now, which you probably are, then keep it in mind for the late winter/early spring harvest.

 

Or even better, the holidays are around the corner.  My favorite gifts have always been certificates from the seed companies I advertise on my blog.  Why not take the stress out of the crazy holiday shopping season(unless you like that!)and buy your family/garden friends some seeds!  If you keep a close eye on my blog I’ll let you know when these companies are offering free shipping.  If you don’t want to wait for that you can buy anytime.  By the time you pay for a couple of seed packets and shipping, it will be about $12.  If you wait for free shipping, it might only be $7 for 2 packets.  That’s a pretty cheap gift-and one that will last for years!  Gardeners love to get great seeds.  And if one packet of lettuce can give you 500-750 heads, thats a pretty great gift[ois skin=”1″]