How to Extend the Fall Growing Season
Last updated September 7, 2023
Veggies such as salad greens, broccoli and potatoes keep their good looks and flavors longer if properly protected from harsh weather conditions. This can be easily accomplished by using row covers and cold frames in your garden. In fact, these tools will add more than a month to the fall growing season by reducing wind and frost damage.
Row covers allow air, water and light to pass through. They’re easy to install, provide excellent coverage and dry quickly. Plus, hungry deer and other pests seldom bother veggies hidden from view under row covers or in cold frames. Read on to learn more about extending the season in fall.
Table of Contents
Protect Plants with Row Covers and More
Cold Frames Protect Plants
Protect Plants with Row Covers and More
Protecting plants with a row cover is easy. Begin by creating a garden tunnel with a row cover to extend the season for fall crops like turnips, radishes, bok choy and other Asian greens. Nighttime temperatures stay a few degrees warmer under row cover tunnels, which also protect plants from wind and predators.
Cover plantings of root vegetables such as carrots or parsnips with black plastic bags stuffed with leaves. This keeps the bed warm until you’re ready to harvest.
Choose collard and kale plants to nurture through winter, and surround them with wire cages wrapped in a row cover or another garden fabric. Small tomato cages installed around plants and then covered with sheer curtains work well for this, and ensure the plants’ survival through the worst winter weather.
Water plantings regularly to help hardy vegetables survive the first cold snaps. Moist soil retains warmth better than dry soil.
Cold Frames Protect Plants
Use a cold frame to protect low-growing lettuce and spinach when hard freezes become frequent. The same cold frame you use in spring to harden off seedlings can be used to protect these and other hardy vegetables from cold, ice and deer all winter long.
Store cabbage and Brussels sprouts in a cool basement or outbuilding with their roots still intact. Dig several plants and place them in a bucket or tub. Cover the roots with loose soil or mulch. Move to a protected, unheated space like a garage or unheated basement, and keep the roots lightly moist. You can harvest heads as needed for more than a month.
Extend the life of your garden and keep deep and other pests away by using row covers and cold frames. The Home Depot
has all the materials you need to protect your garden. You can also use The Home Depot Mobile App to have online orders delivered when and where you need them.
