The Fall Crop
"To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day..."
Macbeth Act v. Sc.5.
Here it is, July, and, yes, you have allowed autumn to slip up on you unawares again! Go on, get out the magnifying-glass and read those instructions on the back of your seed packets. "Ready for harvest in ninety days. Sow fall crop mid-summer." I thought Alice’s White Rabbit put it well: "I’m late! I’m late, for a very important date!" Rabbits are very sensitive to gardening issues. There, through the heat-shimmer, is that stretch of weedy, hard-baked earth in which the catalog companies fondly imagine you sowing cabbage, cauliflower, turnips, kale, radishes, lettuce, spinach, collards, bok choy, tatsoi and pepper cress. Are they out of their minds? Think how much more diligent than we our ancestors must have been...or how much more desperate.
So, just sprinkle the little seeds in such rows as you can scratch in the dry earth, water, and stand back. Like lightening, the sun will re-bake the clay, forming a hard crust, such as only a germinating coconut might penetrate. Or set out a nice, little, seedling cabbage, if you can find one, and watch the summer sun demonstrate just what global warming is all about. There are, however, tricks, which may help you to get the small plants through the heat and drought of summer in robust condition, so that when the great dews of early fall renew the landscape’s vigor, they are ready to swell into active growth.
Start your seedlings indoors, even those row-crops, lettuce, kale and so on, which you might well think of direct-seeding in the cool moisture of spring. Find yourself one of those plastic garden trays with a clear dome cover and use it as a miniature greenhouse in which to get your seedlings up and running. It’s needful to maintain moisture while the seed sprouts and the small plant gets some roots out, with which it may take up water on its own, eventually. The blast-furnace sun of mid-summer, disturbed at intervals by fire-hose downpours from angry clouds, suits some plants well–dandelions, thistles, crab-grass–but not those we like best. Yet, you may have trouble purchasing seed-starting materials. One of the really bad things about the suburbanization of horticultural supply stores is that all planting activity has been relegated to spring, suitable or not. Time was, you could expect to see small vegetable plants ready for setting-out in mid-summer. But no longer, not in most areas. Garden shops are staffed by summering English majors, who will only look at you funny, if you prattle on about planting a fall crop; they may suggest that you come back in the fall. Don’t let them grind you down. Lacking official equipment, take any little plastic flat or flower pot you can lay hands on and be sure to wash it –cleanliness does count (for extra points, soak it in a ten percent bleach solution). Fill it with sterile seed-starting mix, if you can find it, failing which, peat moss or ground sphagnum moss will do nicely. No dirt! Soak the mix with water before planting your seed. And finally, slip the container into a clear, plastic bag, which you seal tightly. A couple of labels will prop the plastic away from the surface of the soil, giving some growing space to the seedlings. Another novel use for labels is to hold the name of the critter you planted, and perhaps the date of sowing. When the plants have their first true leaves, gradually open the bag, letting some air get in to reduce the humidity. Open and remove the bag in stages, over a week’s time.
Of course, it is a bit much to think of planting and transplanting every leaf and root you hope to eat. Some things just have to go directly in the ground. You know all about working the soil well because lumps in the earth increase the surface area exposed to air and wick your ground dry at an alarming rate.
Shade is a great thing, if you’re a little plant. A park ranger in Arizona told me that every one of the great saguaro cacti, to be seen flourishing in the desert heat, got its start in the shelter of some stone. I have read about gardeners, who would stick an old cedar shingle in the earth to the south side of each seedling plant. But I never met any gardener with the fortune in cedar shakes this would require. If you are not so blessed, try running your rows east-west and prop a long board on the south side. This is not going to work if you are planting the south forty, understood. The heat of the sun will create a hard crust on the earth, which you might very carefully break up by tapping it with some tool, say a dental pick. Or give your lettuce some help in breaking through by interspersing radish seed along the row. You can’t keep a good radish down: it doesn’t pay to try. And you eat the radishes before the other crop is ready. Another way of keeping soil cool, moist and soft is to cover it with mulch. Be pretty sparing with the stuff directly over seed rows, a bit thicker–say, two or three inches--off to the sides. Mulch is the ultimate resource, maintaining stable temperature in the root zone, retaining moisture, softening the soil, increasing soil life, adding nutrients, discouraging weeds and promoting structure. Good mulch can re-grow hair. If you’ve got it, or can get it, use it. Wood chips, grass clippings, old leaves, shredded documents from work, bedding straw–anything. For those who lack this resource, a multiple subscription to Blue Moon would be one desirable answer. Contact the editor for bulk rates.
The moon shines hot
first katydid cries
– plant fall crops
appeared July, 2001
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day..."
Macbeth Act v. Sc.5.
Here it is, July, and, yes, you have allowed autumn to slip up on you unawares again! Go on, get out the magnifying-glass and read those instructions on the back of your seed packets. "Ready for harvest in ninety days. Sow fall crop mid-summer." I thought Alice’s White Rabbit put it well: "I’m late! I’m late, for a very important date!" Rabbits are very sensitive to gardening issues. There, through the heat-shimmer, is that stretch of weedy, hard-baked earth in which the catalog companies fondly imagine you sowing cabbage, cauliflower, turnips, kale, radishes, lettuce, spinach, collards, bok choy, tatsoi and pepper cress. Are they out of their minds? Think how much more diligent than we our ancestors must have been...or how much more desperate.
So, just sprinkle the little seeds in such rows as you can scratch in the dry earth, water, and stand back. Like lightening, the sun will re-bake the clay, forming a hard crust, such as only a germinating coconut might penetrate. Or set out a nice, little, seedling cabbage, if you can find one, and watch the summer sun demonstrate just what global warming is all about. There are, however, tricks, which may help you to get the small plants through the heat and drought of summer in robust condition, so that when the great dews of early fall renew the landscape’s vigor, they are ready to swell into active growth.
Start your seedlings indoors, even those row-crops, lettuce, kale and so on, which you might well think of direct-seeding in the cool moisture of spring. Find yourself one of those plastic garden trays with a clear dome cover and use it as a miniature greenhouse in which to get your seedlings up and running. It’s needful to maintain moisture while the seed sprouts and the small plant gets some roots out, with which it may take up water on its own, eventually. The blast-furnace sun of mid-summer, disturbed at intervals by fire-hose downpours from angry clouds, suits some plants well–dandelions, thistles, crab-grass–but not those we like best. Yet, you may have trouble purchasing seed-starting materials. One of the really bad things about the suburbanization of horticultural supply stores is that all planting activity has been relegated to spring, suitable or not. Time was, you could expect to see small vegetable plants ready for setting-out in mid-summer. But no longer, not in most areas. Garden shops are staffed by summering English majors, who will only look at you funny, if you prattle on about planting a fall crop; they may suggest that you come back in the fall. Don’t let them grind you down. Lacking official equipment, take any little plastic flat or flower pot you can lay hands on and be sure to wash it –cleanliness does count (for extra points, soak it in a ten percent bleach solution). Fill it with sterile seed-starting mix, if you can find it, failing which, peat moss or ground sphagnum moss will do nicely. No dirt! Soak the mix with water before planting your seed. And finally, slip the container into a clear, plastic bag, which you seal tightly. A couple of labels will prop the plastic away from the surface of the soil, giving some growing space to the seedlings. Another novel use for labels is to hold the name of the critter you planted, and perhaps the date of sowing. When the plants have their first true leaves, gradually open the bag, letting some air get in to reduce the humidity. Open and remove the bag in stages, over a week’s time.
Of course, it is a bit much to think of planting and transplanting every leaf and root you hope to eat. Some things just have to go directly in the ground. You know all about working the soil well because lumps in the earth increase the surface area exposed to air and wick your ground dry at an alarming rate.
Shade is a great thing, if you’re a little plant. A park ranger in Arizona told me that every one of the great saguaro cacti, to be seen flourishing in the desert heat, got its start in the shelter of some stone. I have read about gardeners, who would stick an old cedar shingle in the earth to the south side of each seedling plant. But I never met any gardener with the fortune in cedar shakes this would require. If you are not so blessed, try running your rows east-west and prop a long board on the south side. This is not going to work if you are planting the south forty, understood. The heat of the sun will create a hard crust on the earth, which you might very carefully break up by tapping it with some tool, say a dental pick. Or give your lettuce some help in breaking through by interspersing radish seed along the row. You can’t keep a good radish down: it doesn’t pay to try. And you eat the radishes before the other crop is ready. Another way of keeping soil cool, moist and soft is to cover it with mulch. Be pretty sparing with the stuff directly over seed rows, a bit thicker–say, two or three inches--off to the sides. Mulch is the ultimate resource, maintaining stable temperature in the root zone, retaining moisture, softening the soil, increasing soil life, adding nutrients, discouraging weeds and promoting structure. Good mulch can re-grow hair. If you’ve got it, or can get it, use it. Wood chips, grass clippings, old leaves, shredded documents from work, bedding straw–anything. For those who lack this resource, a multiple subscription to Blue Moon would be one desirable answer. Contact the editor for bulk rates.
The moon shines hot
first katydid cries
– plant fall crops
appeared July, 2001