by Linda Carloni, Master Gardener and ABG Board Member
As the summer vegetables finish, it’s time to think about your garden next season. Many gardeners plant cool season veggies in late summer or early fall and harvest in late fall, winter or even next spring. If you do replace your summer veggies with a fall or winter crop, be sure to enrich the shared soil first with compost and/or fertilizer. Resources on fall/winter vegetable growing:
- Cool Season Vegetable Growing
- What to Plant When in Alameda County
- No Till Growing for Fall Crops
- Broccoli and Bok Choy
- Plant Onions in September
- Perennial Vegetables
- Winter Gardening
The cooler season is also a great time to give yourself and your soil a rest. While you rest, cover crops, soil amendments and mulch can protect and improve your soil. Cover crops protect your soil against blowing or washing away, help maintain the soil microbiome that benefits what you’ll plant next, and give you lots of organic materials to compost in your pile or dig into the soil. Some even break up cloddy soil.
Cover Crop Resources:
If you’d prefer not to plant at all this fall, no problem! There are still good ways you can give your soil a boost while it’s resting.
Compost, Manure and Mulch Resources:
- Build compost. Late summer and fall are great times to add materials to your box or pile, or to start composting. The old veggie plants you’re taking out and the leaves that fall will provide lots of materials for compost so long as they are not diseased or full of pests. Resource on why and how to compost.
- Dig in compost or manure and cover to let the nutrients release slowly. Letting your garden sit fallow for the cool season gives an opportunity for those fertilizers/amendments to break down so they can be available for your spring plants. Here’s an excellent way to use manure over the winter. Compost is also great to dig into the soil before a winter rest. If you want the compost to help improve the soil structure (lighten clay, improve the water and nutrient holding capacity of sandy soil, etc), apply 2 to 4 inches over the soil. and dig it into the top six inches.
- Mulch, mulch, mulch! Mulches – materials placed on the soil – do a lot. Mulch can prevent the soil from blowing or washing away, conserve moisture, moderate soil temperature, keep down weeds, improve soil structure and fertility and much more. Mulches can be organic (you can even use compost as a mulch), inorganic or synthetic. Go here to learn all you need to know about applying mulch. Here’s hoping you enjoy the rest of your summer harvest, and find ways to grow more crops or help your soil over the winter.