Gardening Information

Big Ideas

• Harvest! Share your garden bounty with kids and school community. Continual harvesting signals plants to continue producing.

• Monitor for Pests and Diseases.

• Compost spent crops. Chop crops into smaller pieces and layer with straws and leaves to get a hot compost pile started. Let you crops feed next season's garden.

• Keep Weeding and Digging out Crawling Grasses.

• Save Seeds. Make your own oragami seed packets, use ball jars or coin envelops. Try to remove as much chaff (husk, stem, etc) as possible- involve the kids!! Label seeds with location collected from, species of plant and date collect. Store in a cool, dry place for best longevity.

• Clean orchard floors and compost spent fruit. This helps prevent diseases and keeps your fruit trees healthy.

• Seed. Time direct seeding of reseeding annuals and cover crops before rain events.

• Mulch bare areas with wood chips or straw before rains come.

• Reduce Watering as days become shorter and rains begin. Monitor your plants and check your soil as a guide.

• Timing is Everything for Edibles - for a winter garden plant in late summer or early fall.

• Plant Natives. Allow plants to grow roots before cold winter soil; Winter rains will help deep water (hopefully!) and establish.

Read More About Fall Garden Planting 

Big Ideas

• Reduce Watering. During this time of year you can significantly reduce or turn off irrigation. Your garden beds should all have individual on/off values so that you can keep watering beds that need it.

• Love your Soil. Don’t work (dig) wet soil. See Soil Moisture notes at bottom of this document.

• Keep your Soil Covered - Use straw mulch around slow growing annuals, cover empty beds with straw or sheet composting.  

• Be on Top of Weed Management. Continue to dig creeping grasses while the soil/paths are moist. Keep emerging weeds from going to seed by pulling or string trimming.

• Watch Weather Conditions. Add extra protection to sensitive plants during any forecast cold periods with nighttime temperatures below 32*F for an extended period of time.

• Vision and Plan. Winter is a wonderful time to dream about the next seasons garden to come. What new plants do you want to learn about? Where will familiar, beloved friends grow this coming year? Sketch designs, explore seed catalogs and make a plan for the coming year.

• Start Transplants. Clean containers and start plants in the greenhouse. Research how many days to transplant to determine best seeding days (for example, start lettuce 3-4 weeks before transplanting- so mid-February or later). Harden plants off by exposing them to outside temperatures for about a week before transplanting in the Spring.

• Prepare for Storms (see above).

Read more about Winter Garden Tasks and Care

Big Ideas

• Chop Cover Crops. You can chop directly into the bed, cover with compost and wait 3-4 weeks. When plant material is broken down, you will have nutrient rich bed to plant into -OR- Harvest out Cover Crop and compost for earlier planting. Find more information about these and lots of other strategies here: Choosing and Using Cover Crops in the Home Garden and Orchard  

• Bed Prep! First step to healthy, vibrant plants is a healthy living soil. Before planting, ensure your raised beds have been amended with compost and natural fertlizier (such as Dr Earth or E.B. Stone). Ideally, amendments are informed by previous conditions of the bed (did you grow heavy feeding crops? weeds? cover crops? etc.)

• Sowing Seeds and Transplanting. Game on in the garden during Spring! First months of Spring are dedicated to cooler loving crops such as radish, lettuce, snap peas, cilantro and other leafy greens. May usually brings nighttime temperatures in the 50s and warm day time temperatures, creating the idea conditions for warm weather crops such as tomatoes, basil, cucumbers, peppers, dahlias, corns, beans, squash, etc.  

  • Note: Corn, Squash, Beans can be planted a bit early than the Nightshade family plants (tomatoes, peppers...). However, since we are planting on a School Year Calendar- planting corn in May vs April is recommended.

• Irrigation and Watering. Test your irrigation system and check batteries. Regularly monitor and adjust irrigation for weather and plant needs. Transplants need more frequent shallow watering than more mature plants, which generally prefer every other day, deeper watering. Repair leaks and troubleshoot challenges.

• Thin Fruit. Thin small fruit to clusters of 2-3. If you leave fruit on the branch, you risk overloaded branches breaking and the fruits will be significantly smaller. You may also risk not getting fruit the next season from your exhausted fruit tree.

Big Ideas

• Continue Planting warm season crops through June for a Fall Harvest.

• Create a Summer Care Plan for your Garden. If you are not a summer school site, the garden team will help with summer care. Our gardeners will do site checks on non-summer school sites once a week. 

• Set up a watering schedule. Continue to check your irrigation weekly and adjust as needed for your condition (soil, plant size, hours of sunlight, temperatures, wind exposure, etc.)

• Support Continued Growth. Help your plants continue growing by deadheading flowers, harvesting produce, training and pruning, and observing for pests and other diseases. 

• Weed. Pull weeds before they go to seed. Keep an eye on creeping grasses that are growing towards or in your garden beds or compost piles.  

• Monitor for Pests and Diseases. If you catch things early, it is often easier to restore balance and support your plants.

• Summer Pruning Fruit Trees. Summer pruning de-invigorates the tree. You can use it to control growth and enhance fruit production by letting more light in through the tree canopy.

• Enjoy your Garden. Marvel at the visitors and helpers in your garden and enjoy the fruits of your collective hard work!

Read More About Summer Care and Tasks