Cooking Greens to Harvest in Central Virginia in February

Harvest in Time! Lots of Bolting Greens in the Hoophouse!

Outdoors, we can still harvest collards, kale and spinach. This winter our chard has died. Remember that red chard is hardier than multi-colored and green chard is hardier still. To maximize your chance of keeping chard alive over the winter, use hoops and rowcovers (in zone 6-8) or, in colder zones, cut the tops off the plants (above the growing point) before it gets much below 15F (-9C), remove those leaves, then cover the bed with a mulch of thick straw, hay or tree leaves. Mulching doesn’t work in milder climates, especially those with back-and-forth temperatures) because new growth forces up out of the mulch and gets killed.

From the hoophouse we continue harvesting chard, Frills, kale, senposai, spinach, tat soi, turnip greens, and also yukina savoy (if we had it). We normally grow the Frills as salad crops, but once they get large and plentiful, we can cook some.

In the hoophouse, the extra warmth (sometimes!) combined with the reliably lengthening days causes some of the greens to start bolting. In January, I told you the order of bolting of our hoophouse greens. Our Koji has all bolted by February 1, and I pine for Yukina Savoy which usually lasts till early-mid March here, from our second winter sowing. We didn’t have any this winter.

We are keeping an eye on our turnip greens #1 (they will bolt in mid-February); tatsoi #2, spinach #1, and turnip greens #2 (usually bolt in early March). Our senposai and our turnips #3 usually don’t bolt till mid-March. Our Russian kales, chard, beet greens and January spinach sowings last till late April or even early May.

Cooking Greens to Sow in Central Virginia in February

Outdoors in mid-February, we sow spinach if our January transplant sowings failed. We presprout 4oz/bed spinach for 1 week before sowing. This rarely needs to happen, as we have a backup transplant sowing date to seed in flats in the greenhouse, if our first-line hoophouse sowing of transplants doesn’t come up well. This year, those look great!

In the greenhouse in early February, we sow: kale, cabbage, mustard, collards, senposai, broccoli #1, kohlrabi in open 3” (7.5 cm) flats.

In late February, we sow broccoli #2. This year we have reduced the size of our planting to make it more manageable.

In the hoophouse, December 15-February 15 is the slowest growing time. We do sow some salad crops, but not usually any cooking greens. if the January hoophouse sowings of kale and collards have come up well, we don’t need to sow those in the greenhouse this year.

We have a couple of unexpected gaps this year. We followed Radish #2.5 (an extra sowing we squeezed in on October 20) with Frills (frilly mustards) and we plan to follow some of our Koji #2 with a quick catch crop of Tokyo Bekana, marking five rows in the bed, but leaving the central row unsown. This will hopefully let us leave the greens growing after we transplant the warm weather crops down the centerline of the bed.

Cooking Greens to Transplant in Central Virginia in February

Outdoors, we transplant spinach from hoophouse [or flats] in early February

In the hoophouse, from January 25 to February 20 we fill gaps that occur in the beds with spinach wherever the gaps are, using the spinach Filler Greens which were sown October 24 and November 9 (spinach). We’re careful not to fill any places that will be sown in new crops in February, such as where we sow a row of early snap peas, or the salad crops I mentioned earlier.

From February 20, we only transplant spinach to fill gaps on the outer thirds of the beds, leaving the bed centers free for tomatoes, etc. in mid-March.

Other Cooking Greens Tasks in Central Virginia in February

In early February in the greenhouse we spot cabbage and kale. In late February, we spot senposai, cabbage #2 and collards. See the Special Topic below for more about the task we call ”spotting”. Other names for this task include “bumping up”and “pricking out.”

We really try to finish transplanting spinach outdoors, as our springs are short and quickly heat up, taking the spinach plants with them.

We weed our over-wintered spinach, kale and collards. Hoeing isn’t so effective in early spring, as the chickweed, henbit and dead nettle too readily re-root on damp soil. Hand-pulling weeds is slow, but more effective. Another approach is to hoe several times, choosing dry breezy sunny days.

During January we had two nights at 13F (-10.5C) and 12F (-11C). The Koji are looking quite damaged, beyond marketable but not beyond salvageable for home use. We grew too much of this, so we still have plenty to eat! The outdoor senposai is also damaged, but as this is a loose-leaf crop it could recover if it doesn’t get colder.

As I reported in January, we didn’t cover the spinach this winter, because of issues with rowcover fibers getting in the food. The plants are looking quite small, while those in the coldframes (with rowcover) are growing well. I have been expecting the growth of the uncovered spinach to be a lot slower, as spinach (like kale and lettuce) makes some growth whenever the temperature is 40°F (4.5°C) or more. 10°F (-12°C) could kill the large leaves and 5°F (-15°C) can kill spinach entirely. So far, temperatures haven’t get that cold this winter.

Special Cooking Greens Topic for February:

Planning our Field Planting Schedule.

In January we prepare our new Seedlings Schedule, then our complex Fall Brassica Spreadsheet and Map, Field Planting Schedule, Hoophouse Schedule for March to September crops (those are not cooking greens!), and then our Raised Bed Plan and our monthly Garden Calendar.

Field Planting Schedule:

We allow 6 hours. We bring the previous year’s greenhouse copy of the Seedlings Schedule, the shed copies (the copies we wrote notes on) of the previous year’s Field Planting Schedule and the shed and seed bucket copies of the Lettuce Log. We also bring the new (current year’s) Fall Brassica Schedule, Seedlings Schedule, Seed Order, Garden Plan, Rotation Plan, Maps, Succession Crop Plan, Sweet Corn Plan, Brassica Plan and Tomato Plan and any notes we made while doing the year’s planning so far.

1. We work in Excel, copying last year’s Schedule to a new Worksheet and modifying that.
2. We highlight and clear the contents of the“Location” column (Crop rotation in action!)
3. We check against last year’s Shed copy and Field Manual copy of the Field Schedule. As we go, we make a list of questions or points to fix later.
4. We check against the Seedlings Schedule for last year and the current year, for transplant date and varieties, row feet of the transplanted crops. (Leave the direct seeded crops varieties and row feet for step 6).
5. Next we highlight the data, sort alphabetically by Vegetable, Variety to make the next stages easier.
6. We check against the Seed Order (and Succession Plan as needed) for varieties and row feet of direct seeded crops.
7. We check against the Tomato Plan for main crop and late bed.
8. We check against the Garden Rotation Plan, Maps and Succession Crop Plan.
9. We fill gaps in the Location column, in In-row Spacing and Space Between Rows cols.
10. We check against Fall Brassica Schedule from the current or previous year, revising sowing dates, row feet, transplanting dates.
11. We check against the Lettuce Log.
12. We check against Hoophouse Schedule, for transplants in and out.
13. We clean up the Notes column keeping useful info, adding any new useful info, checking against running list of things to fix.
14. With all that done, we sort by Transplant date; then by Vegetable, then by Variety.
15. We tidy up the page layout and print a draft copy
16. We proofread and fix anything that didn’t make sense.