Fall is in the air! You might not equate fall with gardening, but this is a great time of year to be a gardener. I often get comments and questions from non-native Texans about how hard it is to garden in Texas. They complain about our rocky soil, heat, lack of rain (or too much!), and many other things. Those are all valid complaints, but where else can you garden through the fall and into winter? This native Texan is proud of our long gardening season!
Fall gardening is all about plants in the brassica family, often called cole crops. These are cool season crops that can be grown successfully in home gardens all over Texas. Cole crops include broccoli, cabbage, cauliflower, Brussels sprouts, kohlrabi, collards, mustards, kale, turnip, rutabaga, and radish. During the fall, you can also plant lettuce, spinach, beets, carrots, swiss chard, cilantro, garlic, and shallots.
Most fall crops can be planted from seed, but cauliflower, broccoli, and Brussels sprouts do better from transplants. Plant your fall garden in full sunlight and find a location with good drainage. Fall crops also do well in container gardens but be sure to find a container with good drainage. You can incorporate compost or fertilizer into your soil as you prepare the garden bed or containers. Apply more as the plants grow during the season.
Proper watering is an important part of gardening, even during the fall and winter. Most crops need one or two inches of water applied once a week. Determine when to water by checking the soil. If the soil surface is dry, scratch down to a depth of one inch to see if the soil is moist. If it is dry at 1 inch, water thoroughly. Drop irrigation is best because it waters directly into the soil at a slow rate so the water saturates the soil.
Lettuces, greens, spinach, cilantro are a lot of fun to harvest because you just cut off the greens and the plant continues to make more! Crops that form a head like broccoli and cauliflower are ready to harvest when the head gets firm and compact.
Last week, the Master Gardener volunteers and I planted a lettuce variety trial in our demonstration garden at the Extension Office. Be sure to watch for more information about the results from the trial. We will let you know the best lettuces to plant in Williamson County!
This article was first published in the Williamson County Sun newspaper.
