Garden Clean-up, Fall Spinach & Lettuce

It’s important to clean up the garden in the fall. After the first hard frost, most plants will wilt and start to decompose. Getting them out of the vegetable patch and into the compost pile keeps the space clean and helps rid the area of unwanted bugs. Wearing gloves, pull all the plants out by their roots. Use a bucket to transport them to the compost. Any remaining weeds and leaves can also be removed at this time.

East of the Mississippi River, lime should be added to every bed. Our soils tend to get acidic so this helps them stay viable and hospitable to crops. A dusting is plenty.

If you plan to plant carrots next spring, it’s a good idea to manure their bed this fall. If you wait until the spring to add this amendment, carrots are likely to split and fork. This makes them impossible to keep in the root cellar.

Spinach that was planted in August is doing quite well now. You can actually keep it going for many more weeks by covering it with some kind of ribs and plastic. The ribs keep the plastic off of the spinach itself.

Lettuce that was planted in August is also doing well at the present. Again, you want to cover it to keep it going as long as possible.

Both of these crops will rest under the snow all winter long. They will resurface in the spring.

I will be sure to let you know when to plant them next summer!

---