Thise grow tunnels look pretty sweet. Too late for this year, maybe I will spring for one for the Spring. I do have some floating row covers, but at this point I feel all they will do is block the sun a little.

We'll see next year maybe I will try more transplanting. This year what is done is done...

We do low tunnels too. I am planning on over 500 feet of low tunnels to extend the season. I have 360 feet of low tunnel carrots and another 140 (or more) of baby greens. I do two beds in each low tunnel.

Here is one of my low tunnels from last year. I had agribond 19 on it and then in November, I pulled a 10 foot wide piece of plastic over the whole thing and buried the edges.

Inside

I also did spinach in a low tunnel in the spring. Planted in March and it was up in a week and we were picking spinach in April-June. Best of all, the spinach came up and canopied and I didn't have to weed it until May.

I lucked into nice healthy broccoli seedlings when we stayed in northern Maine coast over 4th of July weekend. At home, veggie 6-packs by then are too big and sad. I'm guessing the nursery is busy in late June/early July when the summer people are just starting to arrive. Here in NH we had one early head about 2 weeks ago and will have another head this week.

I planted bush green beans outside on 8/07, They are currently producing but I put Agribon over them in late September. Usually we get a light frost by 9/18 but this year had warmer than usual weather. Without hoops, the top leaves got browned.

Lettuce was seed in large plastic flower pots on 7/27 and later transplanted inside high tunnel. This year I remembered to water. Beets, spinach and carrots were direct sown in the high tunnel on 7/24 and are looking pretty good. Oasis turnip also seeded on 7/24 is full size. It's very similar to the popular small white summer turnips.

I am growing in an open field so have a sun advantage. You should know that crops in a high tunnel go dormant starting in mid-November because there's not enough sun around here. According to Eliot Coleman, that's less than 10 hours of sun each day. Growth slows down. Three hours of sun at this point, I don't think is enough. You need to seed in time for plants to be 75% mature by mid-November according to Johnny's.

I'm getting such good performance on tomatoes and peppers in the high tunnel during summer, I now have the problem of space not freeing up in time to plant fall/winter crops in the high tunnel. Sides are rolled up, doors are open and it gets very hot on sunny days.

jrslick, you are definitely the envy of this thread.

Peter, it sounds like your hours of sun may well be the issue. Are you shaded by trees and are the trees deciduous? If so, I'd say try spinach! Coleman gives the planting dates for spinach as up to Oct 15 (zone 5) and it needs no cover at all. (though you can lay Christmas tree branches over it for the coldest months) Tyee works really well for me. He gives the eating dates as Dec 1 until spring. And overwintered spinach that comes alive in spring is a truly wondrous thing.

glib, thank you for the recommendation on the onions. This year will be an adventure of feeling "onion poor" and seeing what I can do to survive without buying any.

Yes, there are trees... but unless you live in the middle of a large field I imagine most would have similar issues.... the sun stays much lower in the sky. The sunny spot I have is probably the envy of the neighborhood ;)

I definitely think next year I will try spinach.

What kind of onions are grown for overwintering? Don't they bolt in the Spring, and need sufficient day length to bulb?

My planted a whole high tunnel to this variety, 900 square feet, 4 beds with 6 rows each. It is just coming up. If it is as good as it was last year, I am going to have spinach running out my ears!

I've been a fan of Tyee which survived a practically snowless winter in NH with no cover at all and started re-growing in the spring for an early crop. I'll have to add Carmel to my 2016 shopping list. I bought some $1 seed packets at Common Ground Fair from Johnny's booth but the spinach is Woodpecker. They didn't have a lot of $1 seed packets this year but was fun getting what I got. Woodpecker appears to be a better choice for spring/summer, slow to bolt.

Peter, at our last house my garden benefit from leafless trees one year. It was gypsy moths that ate all the leaves one summer. It would be interesting to see how much sun you have after the winter Persephone dormancy period before the leaves start providing shade. I'd bet on spinach. Before the high tunnel, if I could get spinach planted by first week of April, I would get a good crop. Somewhere I read that it is day length sensitive and starts to bolt when it gets too much sun.

Thats the problem with spinach in the spring, it bolts so easily, last time I tried to grow it I got barely any spinach because it was bolting at the end of May.

Thanks to all who added to this thread. It's great to have all these techniques and crop ideas. One all-season crop that I harvest through the fall, overwinter in the garden, and finish harvesting in early spring (could harvest all winter if I had a cover that would stand up to several feet of snow) is leeks. I don't know if you are only interested in second plantings or in having something to eat from the garden in fall. I mulch well with 6"-8" of wood shavings, but any fluffy mulch would work.

I tried planting a fall garden this year. The plants grew nicely and would have been pretty productive but since I was busy canning, I didn't have time for enough weeding. Insects and weeds took over. I will try again next year. The cabbage was especially good.

Wow, those are some impressive pics. I would love to do one of those hoop arrangements but I think the neighbors would freak and call the town on me. I have cabbages, mustard, celery, swiss chard all doing well for me so far. The spinach is meh and the broccoli, cauliflower, and brussel sprouts look like they will be ready next fall with how slow they have taken to grow.

I make four or five low tunnels every winter, in view of the street, and no one complains. They are like Jay's low tunnels, I weigh the sides down with bricks. They have overwintering onions, collard and sometimes kale for winter consumption. The garlic is planted outside the tunnels of course. The cardoon I collect during Thanksgiving and store in my garage, together with all the roots (Chioggia, red beets, turnip, carrots and daikon). Everything else (lacinato, bekana, chard, radicchio and chicory) I eat until it lasts, which is sometime between Thanksgiving and Christmas.

Peter: Try different varieties of spinach. Some are slower bolting than others. I grew Crocodile this spring. Planted in March and put under a low tunnel. It was in production until early June.

Jim: when did you plant broccoli? In past years I have had to have it planted by the first week in August or it just didn't produce.

Jay

Have you tried Early Dividend F1 Broccoli? It is my favorite with consistent 8" or better heads, holds well and produces a good amount of side shoots. At 45 days DTM I have been able to plant it as late as the first week in September and it still formed heads before the end of October even with the waning sun. My last transplanting (5 week old starts) this year was August 23 and the biggest heads are about 6" already. Seeds are available at a few places online and Planters Seed and Spice in Kansas City always has it in packets by February if you get out this way.

Jrslick, NICE !

Glib wrote: > I make four or five low tunnels every
winter, in view of the street, and no one complains.

I made the small greenhouse bellow, on THE SIDE of my
house – so not in the front – and the village sent me a letter. Obviously, I
took down the thing.

My tomatoes, loved the gizmo.

I also made this 1 ft. high frame / support for my cucumbers, IN FRONT of my house, but that was not a problem for the village.

LoneJack: I have not tried Early Dividend. I am probably not going to grow broccoli anymore. It just isn't that popular at the markets for me. I may have some for personal use, but once again, I didn't sell much this year and we ate our fill. I think I will just increase production of cucumbers as I can never have enough of them.

I have had a bountiful fall broccoli crop over the last weeks. The cauliflower is now heading up...huge plants. The red butterhead lettuce [Skyphos] does so well. Spinach is large now. Fall carrots are doing great. I admit to really healthy soil and that helps too.

Except for the carrrots, I start them early in pots...larger than the 72 cell trays...but I just raise a home garden.

My peas had a flower! I will definitely be getting peas :)

I wish I could remember when I planted them.... I think it was sometime in the August 7th - August 15th range. They are the only thing looking really vigorous in the garden at this point. Already 4-5 feet high. They were planted where inoculated peas grew in the Spring. They are Sugar Snaps. I wish I planted more.

I find that the spring Sugar snaps are more reliable than the fall ones.

The peppers are still looking great. I love my Biscayne and Ace peppers. I will be eating fresh garden peppers (red ripe ones) for weeks after the last frost.

Forecast for 28F on Sunday night. Should I harvest my small lettuce and beets? Cover? I know from experience that's no sweat for the carrots, and cole crops. The carrots last year survived until any carrots were frozen in the ground. I have some Harvestguards. Its hard to believe it will really be that cold.

Lettuce takes 28 and much less, or at least most lettuces do. I am harvesting beets tomorrow night (we are going to have 3 nights below), but only because I prize the leaves which die promptly. The roots are unaffected by 28.

Spend some time this winter with Eliot Coleman's books on winter harvesting. You'll learn a great deal. If he can get crops in Maine, you can where you live. I read his books several years ago, and my gardens are full of fall crops. I'll cover everything with row covers, pack hay around the beets and carrots, and leave them in the ground until it's just getting too cold. Then they store in the bins in the bottom of the fridge. Cold hardy lettuces should last well into December if properly protected.

With row cover, my bush beans are still ok so we had fresh beans for dinner this week. A friend gave me a garden journal but any notebook would be good to keep notes of what you plant and when. This is a reminder to help me next year when I'm debating when to plant the last crop of bush beans. Last year I had a green salad in December from the high tunnel. I try to keep notes but I've already forgotten to note the first frost we had this year. It was later than usual.

Sounds interesting, thanks laceyvail. Unfortunately another disadvantage I have is that I live in a wooded area and don't have a spot with good sun in September-October. But I may pick up that book and check it out.

I have been following this thread with a lot of interest. This was our first year with a real garden and had a lot of success all summer. We planted more chard, bush beans, lettuce and spinach for a fall crop and as Peter says, it is growing SLOWLY. Our first crop of swish chard is still producing like a champ though. We too have a low temperature of 28 predicted over the weekend. I am guessing that will kill the chard? Should we pick all that is left tonight? What about the bush beans and peppers? We are still getting some sweet and hot peppers. We have a couple eggplants that still look alright too - last night we had eggplant parmesan with garden eggplants and garden lettuce/carrots/peppers for a salad.

db - the cold is no problem for the chard. The peppers, beans and eggplants should be picked before the chance of frost, the plants will be killed and the fruit may be damaged if left outside. If you have any carrots left they will also be fine.

I have seen lettuce described as only tolerating light frost, but I guess like the carrots this info just isn't true. I was amazed last year the carrots had no problems with temps in the teens, the chard got a little scary looking by then, it didn't really look appetizing. But in the upper 20s no problem.

Great information, Peter. Looks like we will be picking our bean, pepper, and eggplant plants clean. We do have some carrots in the ground still and are just picking them as we want to eat them. I will let them stay in the ground along with the chard, lettuce, and spinach. I was amazed by our swiss chard this year. It produced so well and so continuously. We just returned from a two week vacation and had expected to find everything looking sad or dead. We picked all the chard leaves right before we left and when we got back on Tuesday the chard was looking great again. We have been eating it all week. Next year, I think I will try collards for a fall green.

Peter, it depends on the lettuce variety. The ones with "winter" in their name are definitely more cold tolerant. Your seed catalog should give information about this. I use Fedco and Johnny's for recommendations. Last year I had greens for salad in mid-December.

The short days with not enough sun start in November and go into early February in New England. Different timing the further south you go but with less than 10 hours of sun, plants pretty much go dormant. Eliot Coleman books are well worth reading. I'm just astounded that my inlaws didn't plant until Memorial Day weekend and finished up the garden around labor day. They lost a couple of months growing time.

The lettuce I planted were heat tolerant, which is important in my climate, as here at the South end of North we get both extremes in temperatures, and the lettuce planted in August had to endure temps in the 90's.

The Sparx Romaine is noted as both heat and cold tolerant. The Muir green leaf lettuce isn't.

Should be Broccoli and Cauliflowers covered for 29F?

Tigrikt - I had no problems with those temps either last Fall or this Spring (broccoli and cabbage not cauliflower). Hey do you still have zucchini? I'm sad to say goodbye to mine.

Thx.

Pulled zuks out about a week ago. Plenty of frozen chips though.

jrslick, I was speaking of cold tolerance not heat tolerance. It was the best in the summer, harvested all July and August! I hope it turns out to have nice cold tolerance as well.

It did well for me last winter, but I didn't plant lots of it as I ran out of seed. To keep a continuity of product, I grow the Summer Crisp varieties year around. I have been happy with all of their performances. I think in general the greens varieties aren't as good. I am super happy with Magenta and Cherokee. Teide and Mottistone do well but they are smaller heads.

As a general rule, lettuce can only go through so many freeze and thaw cycles before it just gives up. I usually have really good lettuce until Christmas. Then the quality goes down. I only sell head lettuce, I know baby lettuce does better in the cold, but the labor involved isn't worth it and baby salad mixes don't sell as well.

This year I am not planting 4 planting of winter lettuce, only 3. The last planting never grew enough and I didn't harvest much. I am going to sow a cold hardy winter mix (something I came up with) for fresh greens in the late January- early March time frame. I plant red russian and siberian kale, tendergreen mustard, arugula, tatsoi, haikuri turnips, mizuna, tokyo bekana and vitamin green. I plant small planting (15-20 bed feet) of each one and then harvest and make a mix. The mix is mainly what ever is growing the best. The turnip greens are usually the largest portion of the mix. It is a pretty good seller because I don't have lettuce. I may try some baby lettuce in the mix this year just to see how it works.

Last year's winter lettuce under row cover in the high tunnel

My chard, mustard, celery, cabbages are all doing well. The peas took off and we have taken in a couple bowls full of them already, too. What I can not get to do much of anything is the okra, kale, brussel sprouts, and cauliflower that I started from seed.

Okra? My okra is toast... I never get good okra for some reason. Okra is heat loving and does not tolerate frost.

My peas are doing well, covered with flowers. I hope the freeze doesn't prevent pod formation.

local NH grower is offering pea tendrils at todays market. I never though they had much taste but congrats to having good peas this time of year.

Jim, maybe your seed isn't any good. I have grown several varieties and let some go to seed. I now have some kale that looks like it might be perennial. Tasted good (I think it was Red Russian) in yesterday's soup. I did not plant Lacinato again but wish I had because I liked it best because of the crinkly leaves.

The only thing I got that is doing well. They are forming lots of sprouts! Hopefully nothing eats them... lots of hungry animals right now. Row cover maybe? They were started in July as transplants so thats why they are doing well I guess. Hoping to have nice sprouts for Thanksgiving.

These have grown about a quarter inch in the last month :(

Oh well, some baby greens are better than nothing.

Peas are flowering but many leaves were damaged by the freeze.

That's all I got. Everything else is being hauled to the compost today.

Surprise... baby cabbage side shoot on Spring planted cabbage! Nice for a meal! :)

Summer direct sow broccoli too small to produce. Last time I try that.

Going to try to overwinter this!

The frost here decimated my garden. Hundreds of green tomatoes in dark with apples hoping they ripen. Leafy greens, celery, sprouts, and cabbages doing well. Weird, my peas made it through the frost. It was 28° last weekend, too. Everything else is gone, I brought in the containers of hot peppers and they are still growing, flowering and putting out pods.

Hate the season is over.

Peter, if you cover that lettuce for the winter, instead of eating it now, you will have regular size lettuce one month ahead of the competition in April. I used to do that (with cold weather lettuces) but now I am all chicory, which I can eat in Fall and spring.

Really? Can I use a floating row cover, or something more elaborate with hoops?

there is nothing elaborate about my hoops. 10' of 1/2 pvc cut in half stuck in ground over row about 3' apart and covered with frost cover or plastic. pvc about $2 for a 10' length. and you can keep using them for years

Ok I will stop at Home Depot and pick something up. I am sure they will get future use anyway.

I use the 10 ft PVC too, ends cut to make a blade,plus clamps, but burying the plastic edges works too. do not forget one watering in midwinter (I carry 5 gallon buckets from the house) it gets real dry under plastic. three reasons to put up hoops when the soil is soggy: bed will stay moist much longer, better thermal ballast, and you can push the hoops in the soil. right now we are bone dry and I am doing nothing except eating.

On 4th of July weekend we were in coastal Maine not quite as far north as Acadia. I bought two six packs of broccoli (different varieties) that were great looking. I think the nursery timed things for summer residents who were just starting their gardens whereas at home in NH, anything is 6-packs were a month too old. One six pack did a great job producing beautiful heads of broccoli by early October but I was away when they should have been cut. I still cut two heads that weren't too bad but the other two had already started flowering. The other 6-pack didn't do anything, just grew a little. I think I planted too close to some vegetables that were already doing well and getting mature and didn't water enough. The good broccoli got a lot of water because the row was next to a late planting of bush beans that got special attention. We had beans until the frost got the plants last week (low 20s) although Agribon had protected them when it wasn't quite as cold.

glib, if you ever get the chance, I have a yard hydrant inside my high tunnel with a connection to an outside spigot so I can water both high tunnel plants and outside beds. The driveway is next to the house and the vegetable garden about 25 yards away. Fortunately, my husband had the ability to dig a trench to lay the water line. The yard hydrant can be used in winter since water stays below frost level until you open the pump.

We were lucky to escape hard frost. I have nice fall greens and roots. All of them were sawn in late August. I did not really care for them much because we had so many other things to do. But they grew anyway. Book choi, kale, Daikon rutabaga and some unknown varieties in fall greens mix. The roots grow slowly, we ate several daikons and rutabagas, but I think that they should be planted earlier.

I also have self sown red mustard and forgotten onions, which started to grow. Broccoli is still growing too.