Plans for Future Greens Production

14 years ago

I would like some help. I market garden and I have been very successful with many crops. I am wanting to expand my offerings. I want to grow more lettuce and other greens. I have grown greens and sold some mixes. I would like to know some good sources of information about this.

I am planning on using a 18-45 high tunnel to grow greens in this year. I am looking at my first market being around Mothers Day in early May. I would really like to have greens by then.

I want to grow spinach, lettuce and other common greens. Nothing to wild, my market won't support that. Beet greens are a hard sell in mixes. I have experience growing Summer Crisp (Batvarian Lettuce), spinach, black-seeded simpson, beet greens, buttercrunch and various salad mixes.

How should I grow? What varieties grow best? I would like some reds too. When should I start them? Should I direct seed or transplant. If transplant, what size should trays should I use. The questions could go on forever!

I will have 4, 3 foot beds that are 45 feet long. I will have drip irrigation, unless something else works better. I would like to harvest greens from May though the end of June and pick back up in late August-as late as I can go.

Any ideas, information or resources would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Jay

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Comments (5)

namfon
14 years ago
Hi Jay,

I want to qualify my comments with the disclaimer that I am no expert on Fall or overwinetering crops. I also do not have High Tunnels although I have seen your HTs and they look great, maybe someday .....

I plant Spinach and Onions for over winetring in Late September - Mid October. I am about the same zone as you and even uncovered I have had good growth starting up in March. ( we had the coldest winter I can recall last year with one day -10F )

Along with Spinach ( Tyee + 7 - Green ) and Bunching Onions
( Crimson Forest )
I like Deer Tounge, Asian Green + Winter Density ( esp ) for Lettuce.
I grow Mizuna which is a Japanese ( mild ) mustard green and it grows great in 30 - 50F weather, recovers well from light frosts too.
You did not mention Carrots, Raddishes, Parsnips or Root Parsley. The Japanese Raddishes ( Daikons ) grow well in fall. These would need to be started earlier I think, not so much for the cooler temps but you want to have good growth before the days start getting too short.

Finally I would recommend Elliot Coleman's book(s) Four-Season Harvest, if you don't already have it. That book is a great resource and motivator ( for me ) to get stuff started :-)

HTH
Nam
jrslick (North Central Kansas, Zone 5B)
Original Author
14 years ago
Nam:

I do have lots of radishes, beets, turnips, chard and I ran out of time to plant carrots. I am going to try to get some in this weekend. I have been planting the radishes every week. The first ones will be ready next week. I picked a few really small ones last night and they were good. I don't like the strong radish flavor, so I was pleasantly surprised. I also have several hundred broccoli and cauliflower plants that are growing like gangbusters in this cool weather. I also am planting some more broccoli in a small hoop building, as an experiment, to see how well it will do into the late fall and winter. I need to transplant the plants into larger pots and get them out in the next two weeks or less. I don't care for parsnips(don't shoot me). It is hard for me to sell things that I don't like to eat myself.

I am making plans for this stuff in the spring, maybe I was unclear about that. I will have to get that Four-Season harvest at the library. I have heard so much about it.
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joe-il
14 years ago
Hi Jay, just doing a quick google search and found this looks pretty detailed. If your putting tomatoes in @ April 1 or so then you should easily have greens by mothers day.

I do my greens in a raised bed (no h-tunnel , next year though ;)) I also mix in a lot of peat to make a good seed bed, no rows just a blanket of greens to crowd out weeds. But this is outside.

Here is a link that might be useful: high tunnel lettuce
sfallen2002
14 years ago
Second the referal to E Coleman. Get his Four Seasons Harvest, not the Winter Harvest Manual - there is more info and background in the former. The latter (for me) is a much lighter treatise (just my opinion). I also think you might benefit from his Organic Gardening book - tons of info for thr market gardener from a guy who has been there.
jrslick (North Central Kansas, Zone 5B)
Original Author
14 years ago
Thanks for the information. I will find that book and read it this fall/winter.

Jay

Plans for Future Greens Production

Comments (5)

namfon

jrslick (North Central Kansas, Zone 5B)
Original Author

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Plans for Future Greens Production

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namfon

jrslick (North Central Kansas, Zone 5B)Original Author

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jrslick (North Central Kansas, Zone 5B)Original Author

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jrslick (North Central Kansas, Zone 5B)
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jrslick (North Central Kansas, Zone 5B)
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