Cool-weather vegetable crops are a gardener’s best friend, although a lot of individuals are still unfamiliar with them. Many of the vegetables grown in summer gardens really perform better in cooler weather once the average temperature is 50 to 70 degrees Fahrenheit; mild frost can actually enhance a few cool-season crops.
Cool-Season Vegetables
Although most men and women have a tendency to plant their vegetable gardens within mid-spring to get a summer crop, some frequent salad vegetables are quickly destroyed by the warmth of the summer. Cool-weather vegetables contain salad greens, peas and root vegetables. Lettuces, radishes, carrots, rutabaga, beets, turnips and cabbages work well for your cool-weather vegetable garden.
Fall and Winter Harvest
For many, cool-season vegetable gardens are intended for a fall or winter crop. Gentle young seeds or plants are planted in the garden during mid- and late summer and are ready for harvest in fall. When planting cool-season crops during the hottest part of the summer, protect the crops with floating row covers to colour them and shield them from the warmth.
Spring Harvest
Planting cool-season vegetables in late winter will allow you to have a bountiful harvest in mid-spring, right around the time you’d plant a normal vegetable garden. Plant your vegetable transplants or seeds so they’ll reach maturity before daytime highs hit around 60 F. Spring harvest presents a single obstacle: The soil temperature still has to be warm enough for germination. Due to this, you might need to start seeds indoors or use some type of insulation around the plants to keep the temperature of the ground raised marginally.
Benefits
Many of the vegetables that prefer cooler weather will grow in the warmth of summer, but badly. Lettuces, for instance, grow fine during the summer heat, but the heat also makes them bolt to seed more quickly and also the leaves turn bitter. Cooler weather also has more rainfall, fewer insects and fewer grasses.