June 12, 2017

Why extend the growing season? The short answer would be “take a stroll down the local grocery store veggie isle”. 

We do have an abundant growing season. It is roughly 180 days long. Most years it is from the middle of April to November. Of course, this does not take into consideration those “sneaker freezes “at either end of this time line. For easy math, we will call it 180 days. There are all kinds of veggies you can grow with this growing season. This is twice as long as the growing season that I had in Central Oregon. In central Oregon, they also had sneaker cold fronts too. You always remember the worst years. The worst year the last freeze was July 4^th and the first freeze was August 15^th. It did finally settle down and we had (for central Oregon) “warm” weather with no more freezes until the middle of October. I think I had a couple Tomatoes that survived the “gauntlet”. It was a one shot growing season.

Comparing Central Oregon to Alpine is like apples and oranges. Up there once it got cold it stayed col, none of the sine curve weather that we experience down here.

Our springs can be quite unsettled with occasional freezes and then the prewet (May / June) season warm up with the chance of devastating hail. It is for this reason a number of folks start their gardens at the end of June to avoid all the “springy” nonsense. Starting a garden in July affords a decent growing season that can mature most long season veggies (veggies with 120 + maturity dates)

Soooo with such an abundant growing season why extend it. For me it is a real challenge to see how far I can push the envelope. This might be my biggest reason but there are others.

A constant supply of local in season veggies, having a well-established garden going into the hot dry months of May and June. Planting early also allows multiple crops of veggies that if grown elsewhere (like Central Oregon)there would be only one crop. An example is butternut squash. I seeded the beds in early February and my first harvest will start shortly, then it will have a second harvest a couple of months later. This year there very easily could be a third harvest. We will have to see how big the first 2 harvests are and if I have room for more squash. There is also another reason I like to push the seasons and it is because of root knot nematodes. They become active around 60 to 65 degrees. Most veggies if they are seedlings or germinated seeds can grow in soils that are 50 to 60 degrees. The exceptions are okra and sweet potatoes. Having well rooted plants before the nematodes become active: the plants are strong enough to fend off their attach or I can get at least one crop before the nematodes kill them.

These are but a few reasons to extend the season. It is a challenge that has great potential for great rewards. I have said it many times if you are not ready to lose everything only to start over from scratch then I would wait for the traditional growing season.