When do you 'give up' on summer veg?

t-bird

13 years ago

Toms, peppers, cukes, etc.

Is it hours of light, temp, combo, or a particular date on the calendar?

when do you give up? do you use any protection? and what zone if it's not on your 'handle' :)

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Comments (14)

caroliniannjer
13 years ago
Speaking of back when I was in NJ, we gave up when the plants got diseased, bug-filled or frost-damaged

We're still figuring it out here
vikingkirken
13 years ago
Frost kill... I protect them for the first few early frosts, then give up. I like to pull everything out before it's miserably cold so I can get the garden cleaned up for the winter.
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Donna
13 years ago
As long as they are producing fruit, I continue to give the plants good care and let them stand. When I lived in Indiana, I would spend the day before frost was predicted, picking everything that was left. I would strip all the green tomatoes off and sort them. The ones that were "white" or "yellow" would ripen on the kitchen counter over the next week or two. The ones that were still extremely green would be ground up for green tomato relish along with the peppers and onions that were left. If you have an abundance of bell peppers, chop them, lay them on a cookie sheet and freeze a few hours before putting them into freezer bags. They are oh so convenient all year long.

P.S. I find that alot of plants will put on a new burst of fruit when the summer begins to cool if I will continue to water and fertilize. Granted, my season is longer than yours....
promethean_spark
13 years ago
It really depends on how much I need the space. I can garden year-round, so I generally remove the saddest summer stuff for fall crops, then after a killing frost I put out cover crops like fava beans.
pnbrown
13 years ago
The toms have next to no fruit left now, still a ways from frost. Peppers seem to go on a lot farther. Don't grow cukes most years.
forpityssake
13 years ago
I give up when the row cover just wasn't enough to stop the frost/freeze damage.

I'm one that gets my gardens lookin' like they're ready to plant ASAP after the first hard/killing frost/freeze. Then, come spring...it's good to go, almost.

In short...I like to get the gardens cleaned out while the ground is still workable & w/o it being too cold on the old bod. :)
ltilton
13 years ago
I clear out the garden in time to till in the fall leaves. By that time, there's usually nothing much left of the summer vegetables.
wordwiz
13 years ago
I "gave up" on my tomatoes a month ago, but didn't actually pull them until Thursday. We've had only about 1/4" of rain here (Cincinnati) since early August. I watered a couple of times, but then it turned so hot the fruit would not set/ripen.

Usually, I wait until the killing frost is predicted then pull up everything, though. That still gives me time to sow a winter cover crop.

Mike
midsummersgarden
13 years ago
I'd planned to leave in my tomatoes, but I wanted to clean things up today so I pulled out all the vines that had a lot of bugs or looked tired. A couple of vines that I have secured well in cages I left in. I cleared a large spot for some fall veggie starts I have going.

I'm feeling ambitious. I don't always do so well with fall veggies, but some are easy like turnips and cabbage.
nann0n
13 years ago
When it gets too hot to grow them. Around November. After that its too hot and wet to grow most things. March to April the season starts up again. "Summer veg" is grown in Autumn/Winter and maybe Spring here.
vgkg Z-7 Va
13 years ago
During a "normal" season I'd be picking green tomatoes just before first frost here (Oct 16th+) for a batch of Chow-chow. But this was not a normal season, with temps above 90-95F for much of the summer the tomatoes had poor pollenation, the drought didn't help either. I lost about 70% of the crop by Sept (even with watering) but some later planted plants will give me enough greenies for a modest amount of chow-chow.
Chow
franktank232
13 years ago
vgkg-

Exact opposite here. I had too much rain/too much cloudiness/warm nights. Had a good crop of tomatoes, but one crop..and then the plants just started dying from disease (too wet)... I think i'm going to stagger tomato plantings and shoot for more container (smaller) plants so i can have ripe tomatoes into Nov (with the help of a hoophouse)... I've been out of ripe tomatoes for a good month now and i've already had to buy them (shudders!).

Peppers are still loaded (by far the easiest thing to grow), and the eggplant are still flowering...
nygardener
13 years ago
When the plants start to die, the fruits will be damaged by frost, or I just want to clear and till the bed.

Some years, I've left the whole bed as is until spring, picking down the occasional kale leaf from under the snow.
Dan _Staley (5b Sunset 2B AHS 7)
13 years ago
Is it hours of light, temp, combo, or a particular date on the calendar?

when do you give up? do you use any protection? and what zone if it's not on your 'handle' :)

If you do strict calendar, you'll be sorry more often than not.

We will likely have frost tonight, I have several strategies to cover tender crops, and after that we'll have temps in the 70s F again, and I'll get at least two more weeks of production, maybe covering 1-2 more times the toms, peps, eggplant, squash, etc. Peas, lettuce, cabbage, spinach have another month.

Very, very easy to extend the season. Takes a little money and some thought.

Dan

When do you 'give up' on summer veg?

Comments (14)

caroliniannjer

vikingkirken

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Dan _Staley (5b Sunset 2B AHS 7)

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