Broccoli in March

Back in November, I bragged about how beautiful my plants still were in the greenhouse.  I had geraniums galore and I had just started broccoli seeds.  Soon after that, we had a freeze and that was the end of the geraniums.  Go look and see how luscious they were back then.

I predicted that my broccoli might be ready around January.  Broccoli is pretty hardy and even without the greenhouse, I've grown my summer broccoli until December or so.  I figured without heat in the greenhouse and just the protection from the wind and actual snow, I'd probably be able to grow broccoli and maybe chard through the winter.

It's a little later than January, but I did manage to grow this through the winter:

We ate the broccoli the other night and the chard is really coming along nicely.  It's great when there are no slugs to munch on the young plants!

Sunlight really makes a difference.  These plants had no trouble with the cold, it was the lack of sunlight that made them slow.  They moved very slowly through the winter.  And, it was an exceptionally mild winter.  I don't know how they would have done if we'd had weeks of below freezing weather, like we often do.

The way I grow broccoli is against what everything says to do.  I take the florets as they come, and seem to get months worth of broccoli instead of cutting just the head that comes and then pulling them out of the ground.  These plants have some new florets growing, but with the 90+ degree heat in the greenhouse on a sunny day, they are heat stressed.  I think I will move them outside and see what happens.

I'm at it again, already starting lots of seeds for this summer and planning to do lots of succession planting so I always have something ready. 

I kind of like beets and I've never grown them, so that's one thing I'd like to try this year.  And maybe celery.  But I've got to get looking and find them soon.