Just Grow Something | The "Why" Behind the "How" of Gardening Karin Velez

Obviously, we grow our vegetable gardens so we can harvest most of the plants to eat. Yes, some of them are pretty flowers and foliage that are a feast for the eyes, but mainly we just want to eat, right? I generally subscribe to the idea that no parts of the plants we grow should be wasted. If it’s not something we’re going to eat, that green matter needs to go into the compost pile so it can go back into the soil and grow more yummy veggies for my plate.

Turns out I’ve been doing the eating part all wrong. Many of the vegetables and some of the fruits and flowers offer more edible parts beyond the commonly harvested portion than I ever realized. And this is actually pretty important when we think about the number of people who go without nutritious food every day. The more of each of these plants we can eat, the better our nutrition is and the better able we are to truly nourish our friends and family with the food we’re growing.

Today on Just Grow Something we're jumping into some of the overlooked edibles in our gardens, the parts of the plants we didn’t know we can eat. Let’s dig in!


Episode Resources:

Try Magic Mind and get 50% off a subscription for a limited time with code JustGrow20

7 Ways to Eat Zucchini Greens - Our Permaculture Life

Zucchini, You Can Eat the Stems, Too. – Lower Valley Assembly


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Garlic needs specific conditions to grow and, often times, gardeners in warmer climates have a hard time meeting those conditions. Let's talk about some tips and tricks to making sure the conditions are right for growing garlic in your garden and one way to cheat the system!



Reference episode:
Ep. 67 - When and How to Plant Your Garlic, Plus Tips for Warmer Climates

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This week, let’s take a different approach and talk about things to plant now and through the late fall to get a jump on the spring harvest or even harvest in the summer.

The timing of these plantings is going to vary by the region you garden in but the concepts are the same. Plant something now and let it get well-rooted, allow it to go dormant, then as the daylength increases in the spring watch it bounce back up with growth as soon as the conditions are right with no effort on our part in the spring.

This does a couple of things for us: allows us to put our early spring gardening hours elsewhere, often toward crops that need a little extra effort anyway, and gives us an even earlier harvest than we would typically see if we usually need to wait for the ground to thaw or warm up before working in our garden beds. Many of these things are particularly important for those of us in temperate or cold-weather climates but gardeners in warmer zones can take advantage of this, too, depending on the crop.

On today’s episode of Just Grow Something we’ll talk garlic, onions, root veggies, sprouting broccoli or broccoli raab, cold-hardy greens, and more that you can set and forget for a harvest next year. Let’s dig in!


Resources and References:

Ep. 40 - Growing Garlic

Ep. 67 - When and How to Plant Your Garlic, Plus Tips for Warmer Climates

Ep. 114 - Planting Onions to Overwinter

Ep. 133 - Growing Onions

Ep. 118 - Cover Crops in the Home Garden

Untreated Onion Sets | Sprout Mountain Farms

Soil Temparature Maps | GreenCast

Taylor Soil Thermometer

Truly Garden Cover Crop Seed Mix



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If you live in an area that sees hard freezes in winter and sometimes extremely low temperatures, then you might think there isn’t anything you can grow for harvest in the winter. Not so! Even if you live in areas where the ground is routinely frozen solid for months on end, you can keep some crops in the ground and, with some effort, harvest some of those during at least the early parts of winter before bringing the final harvest indoors.

If you live in an area where you can grow food year-round you might not be aware of what crops are best for you to grow in your climate at the coldest and darkest time of the year.

There are two main factors that go into what you can grow in your garden through the winter: your weather conditions and your number of daylight hours.

Today on Just Grow Something we’re going to talk about crops that are contenders for being planted in the fall, harvested in the winter, whether you’re in a warmer area with plenty of daylight, or don’t have much daylight and it gets super cold. Let’s dig in!

Episode Resources and References:

USDA Plant Hardiness Zone Map

Sunset and sunrise times for any location - Free calendars and calculator (sunrise-sunset.org)

Storing the Most Popular Types of Fall Garden Crops: No Freezing, No Canning, No Dehydrating Required - Ep. 162

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We've talked about transplanting fall crops in the late summer heat, but what about sowing those seeds directly into the garden? Soil temperature is a real concern here, so today we'll spend a few minutes reviewing the optimal germination temperature for direct-sown fall garden crops and a few tricks for reducing the soil temperature more quickly.

Resources:

Taylor Precision Products Standard Grade Thermometer

Soil Temperature and Seed Germination (psu.edu)
Ep. 142 - Planting by Soil Temperature vs Air Temperature: When's the best time to plant?




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Late summer and all through fall are the times many gardeners are harvesting crops they want to keep for the long-term to use throughout the winter. How do we harvest and store these vegetables to be sure they retain their flavor, texture, and nutrient value? Today we'll discuss basic cold storage of the most popular types of fall garden crop: no refrigeration, no freezing, no canning, no dehydrating. Just what you can rig up in your basement, a closet, a garage or, if you’re lucky, a root cellar. Each category of crop has its own preference for long-term storage conditions and it’s well worth making sure you have these areas figured out and set up ahead of time so you can keep the bounty going for as long as you can. Let's dig in!



References and Resources:


Ep. 42 - Just Grow Carrots
Ep. 48 - We Got the Beet!
Ep. 94 - Growing Sweet Potatoes
Ep. 52 - Cabbage
Ep. 34 - Garden Talk Tuesday: Winter Squash
Ep. 133 - Growing Onions

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