Ciscoe Morris says plant your winter veggies now

If you’re sad about tearing out your summer garden that never really had a chance, there’s hope this winter.

Master Gardener Ciscoe Morris says now is the time to get your winter vegetable starts in the ground. He recommends, if you can find them, starts for broccoli, brussels sprouts, cauliflower, hardy lettuce, kale, and peas.

“It’s so fun eating right out of your garden. There’s nothing better than that,” says Ciscoe.

Bill Radke on Seattle’s Morning News recommends planting kale and then making chips in the toaster oven.

“It’s very hardy into winter,” says Ciscoe. “You could be harvesting that practically all winter long.”

Just because some of these vegetables do a little better than most others in cold weather, doesn’t mean you can leave them out there to fend for themselves. Consider covering them up if temperatures dip really low at night. Also, the cool weather doesn’t mean plants aren’t thirsty. Sometimes we get short dry-spells in October that’ll mean breaking out the hose.

Like any other garden, Ciscoe says you’ll want to prepare your soil to make sure your hard work doesn’t go wasted. You want your soil to be well drained and include a lot of organic matter. The key is really good drainage.

Ciscoe’s test: Dig a one foot deep square hole and fill it with water to see how fast it drains. If it drains one inch per hour, is all you have to do is mix in 4 inches of compost.

If the hole isn’t draining, Ciscoe recommends building up your veggie garden a foot and a half with cobble stones or rocks and then dumping really good top soil to fill it in.

“Then you can grow anything, even if we get (another) rotten June.”

Gardening with Ciscoe can be heard on 97.3 KIRO FM
Weekends Saturdays at 10:00 a.m. and anytime at KIRO
Radio. Get more
tips from Ciscoe and learn about his plant of the week at
MyNorthwest.com/Ciscoe