How to Grow

Globe artichoke is a vegetable grown for its tender, edible flower buds. With their large, silvery-green leaves and thick stems topped with pinecone-like flower buds, artichoke plants add a strong architectural element to vegetable garden plantings. Thomas Jefferson reportedly raised … Continue reading →

Bitter melon is a beautiful plant with deeply lobed leaves and eye-catching fruit that shifts from green to yellow to orange as it ripens. The taste is an acquired one for most people. It’s more bitter than an unripe grapefruit … Continue reading →

Broccoli is a hardy vegetable that develops best during cool seasons of the year. Two crops per year (spring and fall) are possible in most parts of the country, especially with continuous improvement in fast maturity and heat tolerance that … Continue reading →

Brussels sprouts are a slow-growing, long-bearing crop that needs cool weather. The ideal climate is the “fog belt” of the Pacific Northwest, but they will grow in just about any part of the country. Plant in spring and mid- to … Continue reading →

Cabbage is a cool-season vegetable suited to both spring and fall. It belongs to the cole crop family (Brassica oleracea), which includes broccoli, Brussels sprouts, cauliflower, collards, kale, and kohlrabi. The trick to growing cabbage is steady, uninterrupted growth. That … Continue reading →

Homegrown cantaloupe and honeydew offer an explosive taste that doesn’t compare to their store-bought cousins. The key is plenty of moisture, sunlight, and heat. Melons demand two to three months of heat, which makes growing them in northern regions challenging, … Continue reading →

Cauliflower is a cool-season crop in the cole family (Brassica oleracea), which includes broccoli, Brussels sprouts, cauliflower, collards, kale, and kohlrabi. However, it is more temperamental than its relatives. The trick to growing cauliflower is consistently cool temperatures, which is … Continue reading →

If you don’t live in the South, you might not see collards very often; they are a leafy, cool-weather vegetable very popular for cooked greens. However, collards grow well throughout the country. A relative of cabbage, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, kohlrabi, … Continue reading →

Sinking your teeth into a perfectly ripened ear of sweet corn is one of the finest pleasures of summer, and early-maturing sweet corn varieties like Sugar Buns will offer a harvest sooner than you might think. You will need to … Continue reading →

A tropical vegetable, cucumbers thrive when the weather is hot and water is plentiful. Plants are so frost-tender that they shouldn’t be set into the garden until soil temperatures are reliably in the 70-degree range (no less than 2 weeks … Continue reading →

Discover the natural partnership between eggplant and outdoor grilling, and you will make these stately plants welcome residents in containers, ornamental borders, and raised bed and traditional gardens. Small-fruited eggplant varieties tend to be especially heavy bearers, and you can … Continue reading →

Jicama is a root vegetable, traditionally grown in Mexico and Central America where it is native. Enjoy jicama (pronounced HEE kah mah or hee KAH mah) raw or cooked. It adds delicate sweetness and crunch to salads and stir-fries, but … Continue reading →

Cold-hardy and resilient, kale is an easy member of the cabbage family to grow. You can set out plants quite early in spring as long as you protect the young plants from severe cold winds with a cover. They will … Continue reading →

Kohlrabi is an odd-looking member of the cabbage family grown for its bulb-like stem that tastes like a mild, sweet turnip. You can also eat the leaves. High in fiber and vitamin C, kohlrabi is a fast-growing, cool-season crop for … Continue reading →

Grace your dinner table with an easy-to-grow, elegant onion cousin: the leek. Sweet and mild, leeks are gentle on the digestive system and play the role of onion in dishes, only toned down. Unlike onions, leeks don’t produce bulbs, but … Continue reading →

If you grow only one vegetable other than tomatoes, it should be lettuce. Lettuce is so easy, takes up little space, and you can even grow it among flowers. Lettuce grows for many weeks in the mild weather of spring … Continue reading →

As more gardeners discover that they really like okra, the range of this warm-natured hibiscus cousin is steadily edging northward. Okra requires warm weather, but by using seedlings, you can shave 3 weeks or more from its usual long season. … Continue reading →

If you can poke a hole into the ground, you can grow an onion from a little plant. Our onion varieties are sold as little seedlings in bare-root bundles rather than as plants in biodegradable pots; each plant will start … Continue reading →

From fruity sweet peppers in rainbow shades of yellow, orange, or red to habaneros hot enough to bring tears to your eyes, all peppers share a preference for a long, warm growing season. Set out plants a week or two … Continue reading →

Pumpkins stand as an enduring symbol of fall, whether as smiling jack-o’-lanterns or stacked near cornstalks for a quiet autumn scene. But this vegetable boasts more than decorative good looks. It’s also full of nutrition, dishing up vitamin C, beta-carotene, … Continue reading →

One of spring’s garden harbingers, rhubarb stems burst through soil early in the growing season. The tart, colorful stems grace pies and jams with tangy flavor that is typically tamed with sugar or teamed with sweet strawberries. A true perennial, … Continue reading →

One of fall’s ideal vegetables, rutabaga ripens best in cool autumn weather, taking on its characteristic mild, rich flavor after fall frosts descend on the garden, and staying in the ground for a long time for later harvests. Rutabagas are … Continue reading →

Whether you are planting your first vegetable garden or have years of experience behind you, snap beans should be at the top of your planting list. Dependable and easy to please, snap beans are also among the most productive veggies … Continue reading →

Spinach is a cool-weather vegetable related to beets and Swiss chard. A fast-growing plant, it yields many leaves in a short time in the mild weather of spring and fall. The trick lies in making spinach last as long as … Continue reading →

Start with assorted varieties and you can fearlessly grow many, many squash in a surprisingly small space as they have a reputation for burying gardeners with their prolific output. By planting a buttery Yellow Crookneck, a prolific Yellow Straightneck, and … Continue reading →

In this Article Soil, Planting, and Care Troubleshooting Harvest and Storage FAQs The best strawberries you’ll ever taste will come from a garden, because fully ripened strawberries have a rich, aromatic flavor unmatched by their supermarket counterparts. Savoring the melt-in-your-mouth … Continue reading →

Mouthwatering and tender, homegrown peas are flawless, gracing your meal with vibrant color and delicious flavor. Traditional English peas have sweet, round, green peas inside a pod; you shell the peas and throw away the pod. Another type of pea … Continue reading →

Unlike regular potatoes, which grow best when the soil is cool, sweet potatoes like it hot! They are tropical plants that are very sensitive to cold weather. In warm climates, many gardeners plant sweet potatoes about a month after the … Continue reading →

Colorful stems and bright green leaves make Swiss chard the single most glamorous garden green as well as a nutritious vegetable. Because it does not ship well, you are not likely to find it at the grocery store. The only … Continue reading →

Tomatillos are the odd-looking distant cousins of the beloved tomato. Native to central America, they can be found growing wild in fields of corn and beans, and they are gathered to be eaten or sold in local markets. As with … Continue reading →

In this Article Soil, Planting, and Care Troubleshooting Harvest and Storage FAQs Sun-ripened tomatoes deliver the taste of summer in every bite. Just a few healthy plants will produce buckets of fruit. Tomatoes run on warmth; plant in late spring … Continue reading →

Turnip greens are extremely easy to grow, especially in fall. As nights get longer and cooler, turnip greens become crisper and sweeter. Best of all, a new flush of tender leaves will grow after each picking, with plants remaining productive … Continue reading →

Sweet, juicy homegrown watermelons capture the magic of summer with explosive taste that doesn’t compare to their store-bought cousins. Like their cantaloupe cousins, watermelons demand 2 to 3 months of heat to produce ripe fruit, which makes growing them in … Continue reading →