Column: Planting vegetable seed in the fall

If you are one of those vegetable gardeners who is not quite ready to say goodbye to the 2022 growing season, there is one fall project that you may want to try. Many gardeners know that fall is the time to plant garlic cloves on the Prairies. Cloves are planted about five centimetres deep just before freeze-up. To ensure that cloves survive the cold winter temperatures, mulching the planted cloves with grass clippings, straw or leaves is recommended however, I have managed to get garlic to survive the Prairie winter without mulching.

Fall seeding other vegetables is not a common practice on the Prairies but one that is worth trying. Not all vegetables can be seeded in the garden before winter but there are a few vegetable crops that can be fall sown with success.

Most vegetable gardeners love to get an early start on the growing season. One of the best ways to take advantage of moisture from the spring melt and showers is to have those seeds in the ground before the moisture appears. Because fall seeded vegetable crops will emerge early in spring, crops that will be killed or permanently damaged by spring frosts should be avoided.

Soil preparation is just as important before fall planting as it is in the spring. To prepare the seed bed, use a mulching mower to mulch any of this year’s left over disease-free vegetation in the garden patch. If mulching is not an option, remove plant debris and place it in your compost bin. Any diseased plant material should be buried or discarded in the trash. Add well composted manure or compost to your garden; especially to the area that will be fall seeded. Work this compost into your fall garden area with a rototiller or by turning over the soil with a spade. Or, if your compost is seven to 10 centimetres deep and level, seed directly into the compost without working it in: it might be considered a form of no-till gardening. One of the benefits of turning over or tilling the entire garden area in the fall is that it can help bring overwintering soil pests to the soil surface where they will hopefully freeze or desiccate over the winter months. Lightly raking the freshly tilled area to be seeded provides a level surface. As with any seeding operation, it is important to have good soil to seed contact for maximum, uniform germination.

Dry soil is preferred for fall seeding since moisture will encourage seed rot and seed germination in fall. Avoid fall seeding any warm season crop crops like corn, beans, cucumbers, pumpkins or squash. Seeds of warm season crops do not tolerate cold soil conditions.

In general, cool season crops tolerate cooler temperatures during germination, growth and storage. Despite their propensity to cooler temperatures, not all cool season crops can be successfully fall seeded on the Prairies. Crops that are worth trying to fall seed include; onions, radish, broccoli, cabbage, kohlrabi, beets, spinach and kale. A general rule of thumb for fall vegetable seeding is to seed deeper and denser than in spring. Increase all depths and densities by 25-50%. Following are some general guidelines: onions, radish, beets, kohlrabi and spinach (1 cm deep, 1cm between seeds), broccoli and cabbage (one cm deep, 15 cm b/w), kale (one cm deep, 1.5 cm b/w). Do not water your rows after fall seeding.

While I wouldn’t plan to seed all my kohlrabi or onions in the fall, it is a good way to get a jump on the growing season in spring for some early harvested vegetables. Good luck with your fall planting.

This column is provided courtesy of the Saskatchewan Perennial Society (SPS; saskperennial@hotmail.com ). Check out our website (www.saskperennial.ca) or Facebook page (www.facebook.com/saskperennial).