Grow Through Winter

Many kitchen gardens sit empty from October to April. They don’t have to: kale, spinach, carrots, leeks and salad greens hold through cold weather if they go in on time and get the right cover. In four evening sessions, Hannah Reyes helps you plan and plant a cool-season garden for your USDA zone, one you can harvest from November to March.

The first session sets your dates and checks your site. A bed in full sun in June can sit in shade all December. And once days are shorter than 10 hours, growth nearly stops, so crops need to be close to full size by then. The second session covers the crops and varieties that stand the cold. The third covers protection: row cover, which buys roughly 4–8°F depending on its weight, a cold frame, and a low tunnel on half-inch PVC hoops, with build lists for both. The last covers winter harvests and next year’s sowing calendar.

What you harvest this winter depends on where you garden. In mild-winter areas such as most of California, the low desert and the Gulf Coast, October is planting time and the beds produce all winter. In colder zones a mid-October start is late for a full winter harvest: expect salad greens under cover and spinach that overwinters for an early spring picking, and use the class to plan next August’s sowings. In zones 3 and 4 you’ll need at least a cold frame.