I think you're getting into the ideas behind succession planting. Particularly the type of SP where you sow another group of seeds every couple of weeks to get a continuous supply of a certain crop. Lettuce in particular springs to mind! I agree with jwstell42 that as long as your days to maturity are less than your days to first frost, you should be fine. Down here I do worry about being "too late" with heat-sensitive crops like peas and broccoli. Up closer to you, my Mom worries about being "too late" with anything that needs a long season like winter squash. And to answer some of your questions, yes, they likely are selling short-season varieties. You can get them too, especially if you order seeds. I actually use a number of quick-maturing varities here because I do a different type of succession planting (small yard, long season) where I grow cool crops first, the pull them out and plant hot-season crops (and sometimes pull them out and do cool season crops again). I get my seeds for those from a company called Pinetree Seeds. I get a really late first frost down here and the only other thing that can have a "too late" effect on certain crops is the fact that the trees to the south of my yard are fully leafed until sometime in November, so there's a lot more shade in the garden than in spring. So even though the temps are good for things like tomatoes, they stop producing due to lack of light. So, too late? Who says? :) Cheers! Sunni

I agree that in the far north, it's important to get the garlic in the ground in the fall. In the spring, it's usually too muddy to get into the garden and plant. As early as I ever dare venture into the garden in the spring, my garlic is always well on its way. Ideally, it's best to plant 4 weeks or so before the ground starts to freeze. Obviously, it's difficult to know ahead of time just when that will be. In Vermont, I once planted on Thanksgiving Day -- much later than I had intended to. It snowed the very next day and that was the last I saw of my garden until spring. My garlic came up just fine that season, possibly slightly smaller bulbs than usual, but I got a perfectly acceptable crop.

This forum is primarily about sowing seeds in the winter and spring using Trudi's technique with containers, etc. I'm thinking you might want to ask this on the veggie or tomato forum?

I like the blueberries. I think I'll put them on the other property line. Doesn't entirely solve my current issue, but it still helps. They're typically 3-4 feet, and tolerate a higher Ph than other blueberries. I would still like to do a raised bed for them. I could have 4-6 feet with a raised bed. I rarely drink tea, to be honest. I think you may be correct about the Viburnums. Some seem like they are tasty, but from my little bit of digging, most of those don't appear to be evergreen, however, they do work in my zone. There is V. Pragense, but I am unable to find a definitive answer if they are human edible. Some said it was, most said it was not. And even the ones that said it was edible said it was not...that tasty. Some people claimed that not even birds or deer would eat some of the Viburnum berries. It seems the further away you get from "normal" plants, the harder it is to find solid answers. I like Unedo. I think I will make a place somewhere, probably near the hedge, but not a row of them, if that makes sense. I have looked at Elaeagnus Ebbingei quite a bit. It has it's own set of issues, though. It's invasive in some states. Although, I did not see it as being invasive in mine. Additionally, it doesn't appear to fruit reliably. There is also a fairly large seed inside of it. Fortunately, it's supposed to edible as well, from my understanding. I wonder if I could plant something like Ebbingei since it will still fruit and is evergreen, and then maybe plant something like huckleberry (vaccinium ovatum, similar to a blueberry?) supposed to evergreen, but quite small, or maybe sea buckthorn (not evergreen) in front of it. Sea and Huckle are supposed to be smaller than Ebbingei, so it would not shade, and both could get sun. I'm not sure if that would work or not.