Cover crops – also called green manures – have improved soil for thousands of years. 3,000 years ago Chinese agriculture began planting horsebeans and sesame for soil improvement. Much later the Greeks and Romans sowed special crops to increase soil fertility.
The past 60 – 80 years has seen an incredible amount of knowledge emerge from small farmers experimenting with planting different cover crops and learning from what resulted. This knowledge was built on a foundation of several hundred years of European trial and error.
We now have access to detailed information about how to use cover crops for the maximum benefits in our gardens, pastures and fields.
Our Garden Cover Up Mix was developed from research into the specific benefits we wanted to bring to the home garden soil, as well as what species supported each other.
This photo essay is a look at what one month – 4 weeks – of growth provides in an average raised bed.
After sowing we began watering with our drip system, but the monsoon rains provided a good amount of water over the month. This helped the plant growth along, so your results may be a week or two behind these photos.
Week One
At one week, the mix has almost all sprouted and shown vigorous growth. The oats and rye are shooting up, looking like grass while the buckwheat spreads its leaves and the clover hugs the soil. The peas were just beginning to show up, as they took a few days longer to absorb moisture and begin germinating.
We planted the different parts of the mix separately to get an idea of how they grew by themselves and with other species in support.
The rye and oats both shot up rapidly, germinating within 3 – 4 days and showing good soil coverage.
The crimson clover was also up fast, creating a fluffy green blanket over the soil with its tiny green leaves. Even with only an inch of growth it was easy to feel the temperature differences between the tops of the leaves and the soil temperature – it felt like 15°F difference!
The buckwheat was a couple of days slower coming up than the oats or rye. Once the sprouts appeared they immediately opened their leaves and really started growing.
Week Three
After three weeks the mix has almost completely covered the raised bed. The root system is about 3/4 of the top growth at this point, so the root density below the soil is almost as much as seen here. This is why cover crops are so beneficial to soil fertility.
A closer look shows how much shade the soil has and how thick the mix is growing. This out-competes most weeds above the soil while the roots choke out weeds below.
The young seedlings have just finished emitting auxins, a natural root hormone that inhibits other seeds from growing.
This mechanism gives the cover crops a head start over any other weeds for the next 2 – 3 weeks. When weed seeds can’t germinate, they will often rot as the soil fertility improves.
Week Four
The growth accelerated going into the fourth week, as these photos show. The white PVC stake is about 14 inches tall. Last week the growth was about 3 – 4 inches, but this week it shot up above the top of the stake.
Besides putting on a lot of height, the mix also completely filled in the raised bed. Weeds have no space to grow and we could only find one or two after searching for them.
The soil is much cooler than the surface of the leaves. It is also moister, but that could be due to the amount of recent rains and not the cover crop. The buckwheat is starting to bloom and is attracting bees as seen in the top photo detail.
The buckwheat is the tallest of the mix at about 21 inches tall. The mix is extremely full and thick up to about 16 inches, completely choking out any weeds. The root system is still about 3/4 of the height of the plants, so there is an amazing amount of roots below ground! This shows why planting cover crops does so much to improve the physical structure of the soil.
As the roots die and decay they add organic matter to the soil, open up moisture and air pathways where the roots grew and increase the carbon content – all at the same time!
Pretty good for a few minutes spent planting the seeds and a months’ worth of growth!
Both the rye and oats look like really lush grass. They completely cover the soil and top out at just over 15 inches at one month. We couldn’t find any weeds in this test plot.
Looking closer at the density of the rye planting, it is easy to see why weeds don’t stand a chance. There is no room for anything other than the rye with this dense seeding rate, which is the point.
Next Steps
If a killing frost happened tomorrow there is enough growth to create an excellent mulch while the root system will feed the soil and its microbial populations.
Our first frost is still several weeks off so the cover crops will keep growing both above and below the soil level. The flowers need watching to prevent setting seed and creating another crop next season. We will clip or mow the flower heads as they develop if there isn’t a frost soon enough.
If the rest of the mix can develop before mowing or a killing frost, it gives more nutrition and benefits to the garden bed.
Cover crops will increase the bio-available nutrition in your soil for next season, even if you use a well-aged compost. Both approaches have benefits but if used together support each other and create a better, more fertile soil sooner than if only one is used.
You don’t need a lot of time to grow a good cover crop and seriously improve your garden soil – a month will do! Even if you only have 2 – 3 weeks you will be better off with a shorter planting than none at all.
Go plant some cover crops. Your garden will reward you handsomely next season!
Growing fall onions is sometimes confusing – should you choose the long day or day-neutral ones? When should you plant? Does the color of the onion matter? How to avoid growing non-bulbing onions again this year?
Most questions come down to, “What onions can be grown this fall?”
The short answer is the sweet onions will do best in almost all locations, but there is more to the answer!
Most gardeners can successfully grow the sweet Candy onions for cooking.
Conditions for Fall Onions
There are three conditions fall-grown onions need – day-length, time to mature and temperature.
Day-length
Candy is a day-neutral onion, meaning it forms a bulb with 12 – 14 hours of daylight. The map above shows approximately where the Candy onion will grow. The southern limits are short day length and the northern are too cold too early for a sweet onion in the fall.
Our grower has had excellent results in almost all regions of the US. The exceptions are south Florida, south Texas and the extreme northern states bordering Canada. Even parts of Maine have been able to grow good sweet onions in the fall!
Time to Mature
Our sweet onion needs about 90 – 100 days to mature into good sized bulbs ready for harvesting. This is just over three months, so check your freeze dates to see if you’ve got enough time.
Light frosts aren’t a concern with onions as they continue growing until the first hard freeze.
If you aren’t sure of your medium frost dates, take a few minutes to read our article on understanding your frost dates. How to Plan for Fall and Winter Gardening will get you up to speed!
You are looking for the Fall 24°F date (the orange circle) from your local historical weather data.
This brings us to temperature…
Temperature
Onions are remarkably tolerant of frosts and even moderate freezing weather. They go dormant and then resume growth when favorable conditions return. Winter temperatures down to the early 20’s won’t damage onions if mulched and protected.
An old grower once told me some of the sweetest onions he ever grew were over-wintered ones.
He planted bulbs in the early fall, let them grow and mulched heavily 6 – 8 inches deep just before the first frosts. They went dormant in the winter and when spring came he removed the mulch. The onions resumed growing as spring warmed up. He had the earliest harvest of incredibly sweet, delicious onions.
He would never sell these, as they were too special! He shared them with family and close friends.
So – can you grow onions this fall?
You can have sweet onions this fall or early winter if –
You are not in the extreme southern or northern parts of the US &
have at least 100 days before your area expects to have a freeze of 24°F (or below).
OR
You can have sweet onions in early winter or early spring if –
You are not in the extreme southern or northern parts of the US &
don’t have 100 days before you expect to have a freeze &
don’t get below about 20°F winter low temperatures.
OR
You can have sweet onions for early spring harvest if –
You are not in the extreme southern or northern parts of the US &
don’t have 100 days before you expect to have a freeze &
do get below 20°F winter low temperatures
by growing under heavy mulch.
Knowing these 3 factors, you will be more successful growing your onions this fall.
As the famous radio host Paul Harvey used to say, “Now you know the rest of the story!”
Slow cooked caramelized onions are great, but what if you took that further?
Like, a lot further. Say, six hours full of slow cooked, caramelized goodness.
You would wind up with what Chef Michael Solomonov makes at Zahav, his Israeli-inspired restaurant in Philadelphia.
The ingredients couldn’t be simpler –
1â„2 cup olive oil
6 lbs yellow or sweet onions (about 12 large), chopped
Kosher salt or sea salt to taste
Place the onions in a heavy heat-retaining pot. I’ve used cast iron for over 20 years and haven’t found anything better for this type of cooking!
Pour the olive oil over the top of the chopped onions, then sprinkle the sea salt and stir well.
Here’s where the magic happens – for the next 6 hours, you will cook this very low and slow.
During the summer (when I wrote this) I do a lot of cooking outside on our Kamado, a Japanese ceramic grill fired by charcoal. I use native mesquite charcoal and keep the temperature to around 250°F with a volcanic heat diffuser stone just above the charcoal for indirect heat. The mesquite gives a really nice, intensely smoky flavor without being bitter or over the top.
Yes, it truly does take 5 – 6 hours for the full flavors to develop. You can caramelize the onions faster with higher heat, but will miss the incredibly complex flavors – starting with a deep, rich and sweet note, a quick hit of smokiness, then moving to blackberries or dried cherries, followed by balsamic vinegar sweetness and finishing out with more long, lingering smoke.
The first time someone tastes this, they think it’s a very complex spread and are surprised at the 3 ingredients.
Let’s walk through how to make this yourself!
Chop the onions into smaller pieces. I love using sweet onions as they add a layer to the flavors, but any mild onion will work well.
Of course, growing your own onions will give you the absolute best flavors, but a close second is your local Farmer’s Market. Look for the large, fat, sweet onions for this recipe. Yellow or sweet onions give excellent flavors, but red or purple onions will do just as well with a different color and flavor.
Early fall is a great time for planting onions to over-winter and finish growing next spring – giving you an extra dose of rich flavor and sweetness.
Add the chopped onions to the pot, add the olive oil and salt, then give a good stir to coat the onions.
Put on the covered grill or oven set to 250°F.
The pot of onions has just been put on the Kamado, where I was pre-roasting a chicken for a clay pot dish with onions and Poblano chiles.
Note how full the pot is – within a half inch or so of the top. As we progress, you’ll see how much this drops!
Smoking means cooking! The smoke always means a delicious meal is on the way.
The beauty of slow cooking outside is the freedom it gives you. There is no need to stand around the grill, you can do projects, read or take a nap and check the progress every so often. I try not to lift the lid more than twice an hour, to not lose heat and smoke.
After a couple of hours the onions begin to caramelize. Give them a stir at this point, then about once an hour.
See how much the level has dropped?
The lid is left off so the moisture evaporates and the smoke can infuse the onions.
No, these aren’t burned – they are finished!
What started out as a full pot has cooked down to just a couple of cups. All of those flavors have condensed and intensified, mellowing with the gentle heat and smoke from the grill.
Remove from the pan, let cool and store in the refrigerator for up to a month. They won’t last past a few days, but they will keep up to a month!
Now that you’ve got some smoky caramelized onions, what do you do with them?
Almost anything you want!
They are delicious as appetizers straight on crackers, spread on the bun of a fresh-grilled hamburger or as a remoulade on a steak. Mix half-and-half with our 30 Second Mayonnaise for a sandwich spread that will amaze! Chef Michael serves them mixed with salads, slathered on roast chicken, spread on toast with ricotta cheese, or swirled in sauteed chopped collard greens as a rich side dish.
I like them straight, spread on crackers for that full blast hit of flavors and smokiness. Spread on burgers is sublime as well.
Give this a try and let me know how you like them and what you use them on!
Our cover crop mix has generated lots of questions on how to use it. This means we need to share more information with you. It is fantastic seeing so much interest about improving your soil and your garden!
I’ve taken the most frequent questions and condensed them into a Q&A format below.
“I want to order cover crop seed. I don’t know how much I need, how to prepare the garden before sowing the seeds and when to plant it.”
1 lb will seed 200 square feet, or a 10×20 garden bed or 2 5×10 beds. 8 oz will seed 100 square feet, or a 10×10 garden bed. This gives you a thick planting, boosting soil fertility and decreasing weed pressures.
Ideal planting times are early August through mid-September, depending on your growing season. Plant around mature garden vegetables or in spaces left from the removal of older plants.
Preparation is easy. Broadcast the seeds and rake them into the top half inch of moist soil, or cover with 1/2 inch of mulch or compost. Water equal to 1 inch of rainfall per week until seedlings become established.
The best time to plant is 6 – 8 weeks before your first frost date. If you don’t know your expected first frost date, use the First and Last Frost Dates tool from the National Garden Association.
Enter your ZIP code and find the weather station closest to you.
The first frost date is the intersection of the vertical 50% column and horizontal Fall 32°F line.
Count back 6 to 8 weeks to determine when you should sow the cover crop seed. By planting a few weeks early you’ll have bigger growth, but may need to clip the spent flowers to prevent re-seeding.
“Can/should cover crops be used in raised beds? Approx 3-4′ X 6-8′. Do they need to be turned in the spring? Do they go to seed and become intrusive?”
Cover crops are good for any sized garden larger than a container garden where it is easier to change the soil out. Your raised beds would benefit from our cover crop mix.
If you get a good freeze, the mix will “winterkill”, meaning they will die after a hard frost of around 24°F or so. Then the plant matter will fall down to become mulch for the soil, while the roots decompose. You can turn them under, but I don’t recommend it as tilling or turning disturbs the soil structure. You can plant right among the mulch in the spring.
The cover crops will set seed and scatter those seeds if you let them. Plant cover crops 6 – 8 weeks before the first frost so they get good growth and flower but usually don’t have the chance to set seed. If you see seed forming, just clip those seed heads off and throw them away.
This way the cover crop can’t be an unwanted guest next spring!
“I would like to start a cover crop on a small portion of my property and put in a garden next year. What do I have to do to prepare the soil to put in a cover crop. Also, when do I turn over the cover crop?”
You have a great thought in using the cover crops to help establish and improve the garden soil for next season.
This is the exact method used by organic farmers and growers to prepare fallow soil for a crop. Growers will plant cover crops in succession, or they allow the flowers to re-seed themselves.
Rake to loosen the top inch or so, broadcast the cover crop seed and rake again until just covered. Water the area equal to 1 inch of water per week until the seeds sprout and the plants establish themselves.
Let the plants flower and start setting seed, then clip the heads to prevent them from re-seeding. Allow the plant matter to die in the frost, creating its own mulch. The roots and topsoil mulch decompose over the winter, giving you with an excellent start to next gardening season!
“I am slowly working toward taking my area back from prairie dogs and building a garden plot on 4 acres that are usually dry and sandy. Do you have a general ground cover seed mix to assist in soil health and holding my sand back from flowing away during the monsoon season?
I keep chickens with portable netting so something edible for them would be good.”
Our Garden Cover Up Mix provides plenty of nutritious forage for your chickens. Plant a test plot close to where they are. Water the area equal to 1 inch of water per week until the seeds sprout and the plants establish themselves. Then you can trim some as fodder for the chickens as it grows and develops.
Our Backyard Chickens collection is another option. It has a variety of tasty edibles like sunflower, corn, Swiss chard, mustard and kale.
For erosion control, I would plant a straight (50/50) mix of buckwheat and cereal oats. Both are fast growing with good root systems that hold the soil in place. They provide good mulch after the plant dies off. You might test plant a strip about 3 – 5 feet deep crosswise to how the water flows during monsoon season. This acts as a catch strip, slowing the water down and reducing the amount of soil moved. It also creates a berm for future moisture retention. The roots create a “sink” for the water flow which diverts the water into the soil and away from flowing across it. This starts to build up the shallow soil and water reserves on your property.
I would not mow or kill this planting but allow it to re-seed and establish itself well. If the test works, you can replicate this downstream of where the water flows as many times as needed.
Once the initial berm starts to form, plant the Garden Cover Up mix up stream. This takes advantage of the extra moisture to reclaim and build some good soil!
This will only take 2 or 3 seasons to establish some excellent berms fully and then you can plant more.
“I have celiac disease and therefore cannot be around wheat, and am also sensitive to oats. Do you have any other recommendations?”
Buckwheat is not related to wheat at all, as it is in the Rhubarb family – if you can believe that! You should not have any reaction to buckwheat. You can avoid the oats by ordering the individual cover crop varieties. The Crimson clover and hairy vetch are strong nitrogen fixers, where the Buckwheat and Rye are fast growing ground covers.
You can make your own mix by ordering the smaller amounts of the individual cover crops, avoiding what you are sensitive to.
“After the cover crop dies or you kill it – should you till it into the ground?”
The cover crop mix will die after a couple of hard frosts. It becomes a mulch insulating and protecting the soil over the winter. During that time the roots decompose and increase the soil fertility. Depending on your climate over the winter the mulch should almost dissappear by next spring’s planting time.
I don’t recommend tilling a cover crop, it disturbs the soil you spent the winter improving. When planting, open a small space in the mulch. Then it continues covering and protecting the soil while smothering weeds.
If you do feel the need to till, raise the tines to only till the top 2 – 3 inches of soil and don’t disturb deeper layers. This will work the decomposed vegetative matter into the soil where it will be used quickly.
The process is to plant a fall cover crop, let it die and overwinter to improve the soil. Next spring, plant another after the garden crops are in and up. This covers the soil and shades out most weeds. Repeat this cycle yearly and the soil becomes incredibly fertile after a year or so.
In fertile soil weeds aren’t as much of a problem because they just don’t germinate as well. Fewer weeds leads to fewer insects, as many insects “partner” with specific weeds for habitat or to lay eggs on. Increased soil fertility means healthier plants which do not attract predatory insects.
“I planted clover one fall as a cover crop, and found that in spring it had formed such a dense mat of roots I had to use a pickax, and it never DID die back in winter! (Living in a warmer winter climate.)
I have clay in my soil and have been amending it for several years now. Wouldn’t tilling the soil deeply (about 12 inches) be beneficial for breaking it up and making it more accessible to my garden plants’ root systems? It’s really solid and unfriendly down there in the root zone!”
Thanks for your question! That’s why you need to kill the cover crops manually if the weather doesn’t freeze cold enough to kill them. Mowing or weed-whacking is the easiest way to do this. Otherwise, the plants don’t die, the roots don’t decompose and you struggle to plant your garden.
If you kill the cover crops from late October to mid-November, they will benefit the soil!
There are a couple of ways to open up the soil, especially with a clay component.
1 – You can deep till the soil. Realize you are destroying many micro-organisms as you are completely changing where they live. This is ok once or maybe twice when first establishing the garden, but is detrimental to the soil health if done often.
2 – Use a broadfork or other mechanical means to open up the soil without disturbing the layers. This is often done by hand, so will only work in a smaller garden. Because you won’t be able to drill down deep in a hard soil, this might need to be done a few times over a couple of seasons.
3 – Plant cover crops or aggressive root crops such as sunflower, wheat, sesame or Daikon radishes which drill down and open up the soil. This isn’t a one time, fix-all solution, but with replanting in spring and fall the cover crops can continue building and improving the soil.
Beat the heat with your own second chance garden. Let’s look at why Fall gardening can be so much better!
Do you have extra space opening up in your garden right now? As you harvest crops think about replanting something in its place that does well in cooler weather. Now is the time to think about these planting techniques, to get the most from your garden!
Always have seeds or transplants ready to plant when you harvest. Filling the space of a harvested plant means less weeding and less moisture loss. A little planning goes a long way, pay attention to days to maturity for a cool season variety and you can stagger your plantings to get a bigger, longer harvest.
Continuous planting
Plant a few spinach seeds every week from August to October, and you will have a continuous supply as the weather cools off into late fall. The same goes for many cool season crops like lettuce, carrots, beets and cabbage.
Plan for over-winter crops
Do you know about growing onions over the winter? Fall planted onions yield a very sweet onion come next spring. Plant the seed in mid to late summer, then mulch heavily with straw just before the first frost. In the spring, the onions will continue growing and give you an early harvest of delicious onions.
Does your climate allow for some types of vegetables to easily grow through the winter, even if it needs some temperature protection? Is your climate conducive to year round tomatoes, with a little planning and frost protection?
Save space for garlic, which is planted in the Fall and harvested early the next summer. Think about where you would want spring flowers to appear next season, attracting pollinators that help your garden. Many flower seeds enjoy being planted in the Fall and magically appear in the Spring.
Root crops
Turnips, radishes, carrots and beets can all be planted in late summer and early Fall. They grow quickly in the warmer weather, then turn really sweet as the nights cool off.
Plant some Fall lettuce, it will thrive in cooler temperatures. Mustards, kale, chard and spinach also thrive in the Fall. Try a second planting of sweet peas, as they will love the cooler weather. We love the versatility of Spinach Beet-Greens as they grow through our 100°F+ summer days and continue until hard frost stops them. They are one of the first greens to re-start early next season!
Parsley and chives are great year-round and planted in early Fall, they can last into early winter. Depending on your climate they might die back with the first strong freezes, but can be the first to reappear in the spring. Think about planting herbs in pots now and you can bring them inside during the winter and enjoy their flavors year-round!
Biting insects are often the bane of our gardening lives – just when the weather is the best to be outside enjoying the garden those annoying biting insects join the party. Due to our long co-existence with insects, many approaches exist to make time in the garden or outside more enjoyable.
Most modern solutions don’t recognize the difference between beneficial and pest – such as bug zappers and sprays or lotions – and their effectiveness over a wider area (such as a garden) decreases drastically.
A more visually and aromatically pleasing approach is planting herbs or flowers which naturally deter biting insects, or cultivating plants which attract beneficial insects to prey on the unwanted or destructive pests. This provides multiple benefits; less costly with unwanted insects repelled better, longer lasting effects while attracting beneficial insects and humans in both color and aromas.
The natural essential oils in these plants are the key to repelling those unwanted biting insects, but they are not a silver bullet. Simply planting these herbs can’t guarantee a bug-free garden or patio.
Insects bite people due to a number of factors; the unique chemistry of an individual, how the environment encourages or deters pest insects, beneficial insect population and the flowers they depend on, to landscape maintenance such as how often grass is mowed or weeds removed that can harbor sizable populations of pesky, biting insects.
It may take a bit of experimenting and close observation to see what is truly going on, but once you start to discover the specific factors that reduce and deter the unwanted insects, you will soon be enjoying lots more time outside!
Let’s look at some plants proven to be strong and effective deterrents to biting insect, while are also attractive to people and useful as medicinal or culinary ingredients.
Overall, the easiest way to use these plants is in planters, containers or in beds along the garden gate, entryway or border of the garden, or around the front and back doors of your home or anywhere you want to have fewer biting insects. Some of these plants will naturally repel mosquitoes, flies and such, but brushing with a hand or crushing a few leaves releases their powerful aromatic compounds and scents.
All of these plants can be used just as they are in the garden, but if you want to increase their insect repellent properties they can be made into extracts, dilutions or tinctures and combined to make very strong and effective sprays.
You need to do your research on this, as concentrating them can make them more effective but sometimes dangerous or toxic.
Please don’t blindly or ignorantly experiment! If you are in doubt, simply use them as they are – crushing or bruising the leaves releases their aromatic oils at a safe level and gives you protection.
Biting Insect Repelling Herbs
Here are eight easy to grow herbs for you to plant, some of which you may already have in your garden! Some are annuals which will re-seed themselves if left alone, while others are perennials that will live and fill out their areas over several years.
Basil (Ocimum basilicum) – This much-loved center point of many cook’s gardens has a secret: the aroma which attracts us repels biting insects, making basil effective against mosquitoes, chiggers, gnats, fleas, ticks and houseflies. Plant-based insect repellent sprays are made by crushing fresh leaves, releasing their natural aromatic oils.
Lemon basil leaves can be picked, lightly crushed or bruised in the hand and rubbed on exposed skin as a repellent while smelling lemony and fresh. The Journal of Entomology has shown Sweet basil oil is an effective alternative to synthetic pythrethrums as a mosquito repellent.
Calendula (Calendula officinalis) – More commonly known as Pot Marigold, this hardy annual is multi-talented with healing and nutritional qualities, in addition to repelling biting insects.
Most insects avoid it, confirming its historic uses as a base ingredient for insect repellents. Interplanting among cabbage reduces aphid, cabbageworms and diamondback moth problems in Poland. On a different note, the tachinid fly uses calendula as a host plant and attacks pest insects such as cabbage loopers, Japanese beetles, cutworms, codling moths and squash bugs, among others.
Catnip (Nepeta cataria) – Famous for attracting cats with its pungent earthy-minty aroma, its most powerful and active volatile aromatic compound is nepetalactone which repels mice, rats, mosquitoes, cockroaches and numerous other household insects. An Iowa State University study from 2001 showed nepetalactone to be 10 times more effective than DEET – the common synthetic biting insect repellent – and was effective in concentrations as low as 1%.
Chrysanthemum or Feverfew (Tanacetum parthenium) – An ancient medicinal plant long used for the treatment of fevers, migraine headaches, toothaches and insect bites. Recent studies have discovered there are more than 30 naturally occurring plant based chemical compounds called sesquiterpene lactones. In addition to being medically effective, they are also very potent insect repellents, as most garden and house pest insects will not go near its fragrance.
Lavender (Lavandula angustifolia) – Another highly enjoyable aromatic for people, but detested and avoided by biting insects. Moths, fleas, many flies and mosquitos are repelled, even while it’s been added to homes, sachets and clothes closets for its soothing scent. Growing a bunch or two close to the door and brushing or lightly rubbing it helps keep insects out of the house. Rub the freshly crushed leaves on exposed skin.
Marigold (Tagetes patula) – The common, pretty and colorful marigold repels blowflies and safari ants in Africa and India, and also effectively deters aphids while being a beneficial companion plant for many garden vegetables.
There are three active aromatic compounds which studies have shown to be as effective against mosquitoes as DEET.
Pennyroyal (Mentha pulegium) – This is the most pungent and powerful of the mint family and is known as Mosquito Plant and Tickweed. Crushed leaves have a very strong fragrance similar to spearmint. Throughout history it’s been grown and valued as a multiple use herb for culinary, medicinal, flavoring and insect repellent for millennia because its pungent odor is attractive to us, but strongly avoided by insects. Both Greeks and Romans used it in cooking and healing.
Rosemary (Rosmarinus officinalis) – Another herb whose scent is much appreciated by people but avoided by pest insects, especially mosquitos. Brushing or stroking the stems releases the volatile, aromatic oils and chases insects away. Rub the oils on exposed skin or clothing after brushing the stems to extend the repellent properties.
Try a few of these powerful allies in your insect repellent search, now you know more about them. Test plant a small grouping near a high-traffic area in a container that can be moved, then observe what insects are around.
With some testing, you should soon see positive results. You might find certain plants work best for different members of your family, so containers or planters in areas where they like to hang out can work wonders.
https://underwoodgardens.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/Mosquito.jpg478850Stephen Scotthttps://underwoodgardens.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Survey-Header.jpgStephen Scott2016-06-24 19:45:452024-06-23 15:48:07Biting Insects Repellents You Can Grow
Cover Crops – Better Soil in a Month
Can cover crops improve garden soil in one month?
Cover crops – also called green manures – have improved soil for thousands of years. 3,000 years ago Chinese agriculture began planting horsebeans and sesame for soil improvement. Much later the Greeks and Romans sowed special crops to increase soil fertility.
The past 60 – 80 years has seen an incredible amount of knowledge emerge from small farmers experimenting with planting different cover crops and learning from what resulted. This knowledge was built on a foundation of several hundred years of European trial and error.
Our Garden Cover Up Mix was developed from research into the specific benefits we wanted to bring to the home garden soil, as well as what species supported each other.
After sowing we began watering with our drip system, but the monsoon rains provided a good amount of water over the month. This helped the plant growth along, so your results may be a week or two behind these photos.
Week One
At one week, the mix has almost all sprouted and shown vigorous growth. The oats and rye are shooting up, looking like grass while the buckwheat spreads its leaves and the clover hugs the soil. The peas were just beginning to show up, as they took a few days longer to absorb moisture and begin germinating.
We planted the different parts of the mix separately to get an idea of how they grew by themselves and with other species in support.
The rye and oats both shot up rapidly, germinating within 3 – 4 days and showing good soil coverage.
The crimson clover was also up fast, creating a fluffy green blanket over the soil with its tiny green leaves. Even with only an inch of growth it was easy to feel the temperature differences between the tops of the leaves and the soil temperature – it felt like 15°F difference!
The buckwheat was a couple of days slower coming up than the oats or rye. Once the sprouts appeared they immediately opened their leaves and really started growing.
Week Three
After three weeks the mix has almost completely covered the raised bed. The root system is about 3/4 of the top growth at this point, so the root density below the soil is almost as much as seen here. This is why cover crops are so beneficial to soil fertility.
A closer look shows how much shade the soil has and how thick the mix is growing. This out-competes most weeds above the soil while the roots choke out weeds below.
This mechanism gives the cover crops a head start over any other weeds for the next 2 – 3 weeks. When weed seeds can’t germinate, they will often rot as the soil fertility improves.
Week Four
The growth accelerated going into the fourth week, as these photos show. The white PVC stake is about 14 inches tall. Last week the growth was about 3 – 4 inches, but this week it shot up above the top of the stake.
Besides putting on a lot of height, the mix also completely filled in the raised bed. Weeds have no space to grow and we could only find one or two after searching for them.
The soil is much cooler than the surface of the leaves. It is also moister, but that could be due to the amount of recent rains and not the cover crop. The buckwheat is starting to bloom and is attracting bees as seen in the top photo detail.
The buckwheat is the tallest of the mix at about 21 inches tall. The mix is extremely full and thick up to about 16 inches, completely choking out any weeds. The root system is still about 3/4 of the height of the plants, so there is an amazing amount of roots below ground! This shows why planting cover crops does so much to improve the physical structure of the soil.
Pretty good for a few minutes spent planting the seeds and a months’ worth of growth!
Both the rye and oats look like really lush grass. They completely cover the soil and top out at just over 15 inches at one month. We couldn’t find any weeds in this test plot.
Looking closer at the density of the rye planting, it is easy to see why weeds don’t stand a chance. There is no room for anything other than the rye with this dense seeding rate, which is the point.
Next Steps
If a killing frost happened tomorrow there is enough growth to create an excellent mulch while the root system will feed the soil and its microbial populations.
Our first frost is still several weeks off so the cover crops will keep growing both above and below the soil level. The flowers need watching to prevent setting seed and creating another crop next season. We will clip or mow the flower heads as they develop if there isn’t a frost soon enough.
If the rest of the mix can develop before mowing or a killing frost, it gives more nutrition and benefits to the garden bed.
Cover crops will increase the bio-available nutrition in your soil for next season, even if you use a well-aged compost. Both approaches have benefits but if used together support each other and create a better, more fertile soil sooner than if only one is used.
You don’t need a lot of time to grow a good cover crop and seriously improve your garden soil – a month will do! Even if you only have 2 – 3 weeks you will be better off with a shorter planting than none at all.
Fall Onions Made Easy
Best Onions in Fall
Growing fall onions is sometimes confusing – should you choose the long day or day-neutral ones? When should you plant? Does the color of the onion matter? How to avoid growing non-bulbing onions again this year?
Most questions come down to, “What onions can be grown this fall?”
The short answer is the sweet onions will do best in almost all locations, but there is more to the answer!
Most gardeners can successfully grow the sweet Candy onions for cooking.
Conditions for Fall Onions
There are three conditions fall-grown onions need – day-length, time to mature and temperature.
Day-length
Candy is a day-neutral onion, meaning it forms a bulb with 12 – 14 hours of daylight. The map above shows approximately where the Candy onion will grow. The southern limits are short day length and the northern are too cold too early for a sweet onion in the fall.
Our grower has had excellent results in almost all regions of the US. The exceptions are south Florida, south Texas and the extreme northern states bordering Canada. Even parts of Maine have been able to grow good sweet onions in the fall!
Time to Mature
Our sweet onion needs about 90 – 100 days to mature into good sized bulbs ready for harvesting. This is just over three months, so check your freeze dates to see if you’ve got enough time.
Light frosts aren’t a concern with onions as they continue growing until the first hard freeze.
If you aren’t sure of your medium frost dates, take a few minutes to read our article on understanding your frost dates. How to Plan for Fall and Winter Gardening will get you up to speed!
You are looking for the Fall 24°F date (the orange circle) from your local historical weather data.
This brings us to temperature…
Temperature
Onions are remarkably tolerant of frosts and even moderate freezing weather. They go dormant and then resume growth when favorable conditions return. Winter temperatures down to the early 20’s won’t damage onions if mulched and protected.
An old grower once told me some of the sweetest onions he ever grew were over-wintered ones.
He planted bulbs in the early fall, let them grow and mulched heavily 6 – 8 inches deep just before the first frosts. They went dormant in the winter and when spring came he removed the mulch. The onions resumed growing as spring warmed up. He had the earliest harvest of incredibly sweet, delicious onions.
He would never sell these, as they were too special! He shared them with family and close friends.
So – can you grow onions this fall?
You can have sweet onions this fall or early winter if –
OR
You can have sweet onions in early winter or early spring if –
OR
You can have sweet onions for early spring harvest if –
Knowing these 3 factors, you will be more successful growing your onions this fall.
As the famous radio host Paul Harvey used to say, “Now you know the rest of the story!”
Six Hour Caramelized Onions
Slow cooked caramelized onions are great, but what if you took that further?
Like, a lot further. Say, six hours full of slow cooked, caramelized goodness.
You would wind up with what Chef Michael Solomonov makes at Zahav, his Israeli-inspired restaurant in Philadelphia.
The ingredients couldn’t be simpler –
Chop the onions into smaller pieces. I love using sweet onions as they add a layer to the flavors, but any mild onion will work well.
Add the chopped onions to the pot, add the olive oil and salt, then give a good stir to coat the onions.
Put on the covered grill or oven set to 250°F.
The pot of onions has just been put on the Kamado, where I was pre-roasting a chicken for a clay pot dish with onions and Poblano chiles.
Note how full the pot is – within a half inch or so of the top. As we progress, you’ll see how much this drops!
Smoking means cooking! The smoke always means a delicious meal is on the way.
The beauty of slow cooking outside is the freedom it gives you. There is no need to stand around the grill, you can do projects, read or take a nap and check the progress every so often. I try not to lift the lid more than twice an hour, to not lose heat and smoke.
After a couple of hours the onions begin to caramelize. Give them a stir at this point, then about once an hour.
See how much the level has dropped?
The lid is left off so the moisture evaporates and the smoke can infuse the onions.
No, these aren’t burned – they are finished!
What started out as a full pot has cooked down to just a couple of cups. All of those flavors have condensed and intensified, mellowing with the gentle heat and smoke from the grill.
Remove from the pan, let cool and store in the refrigerator for up to a month. They won’t last past a few days, but they will keep up to a month!
Now that you’ve got some smoky caramelized onions, what do you do with them?
Almost anything you want!
They are delicious as appetizers straight on crackers, spread on the bun of a fresh-grilled hamburger or as a remoulade on a steak. Mix half-and-half with our 30 Second Mayonnaise for a sandwich spread that will amaze! Chef Michael serves them mixed with salads, slathered on roast chicken, spread on toast with ricotta cheese, or swirled in sauteed chopped collard greens as a rich side dish.
I like them straight, spread on crackers for that full blast hit of flavors and smokiness. Spread on burgers is sublime as well.
Cover Crops FAQ
Cover Crops Q & A
Our cover crop mix has generated lots of questions on how to use it. This means we need to share more information with you. It is fantastic seeing so much interest about improving your soil and your garden!
I’ve taken the most frequent questions and condensed them into a Q&A format below.
The Garden Cover Up mix page lists the coverage rates for each variety.
1 lb will seed 200 square feet, or a 10×20 garden bed or 2 5×10 beds. 8 oz will seed 100 square feet, or a 10×10 garden bed. This gives you a thick planting, boosting soil fertility and decreasing weed pressures.
Ideal planting times are early August through mid-September, depending on your growing season. Plant around mature garden vegetables or in spaces left from the removal of older plants.
Preparation is easy. Broadcast the seeds and rake them into the top half inch of moist soil, or cover with 1/2 inch of mulch or compost. Water equal to 1 inch of rainfall per week until seedlings become established.
The best time to plant is 6 – 8 weeks before your first frost date. If you don’t know your expected first frost date, use the First and Last Frost Dates tool from the National Garden Association.
Enter your ZIP code and find the weather station closest to you.
The first frost date is the intersection of the vertical 50% column and horizontal Fall 32°F line.
Count back 6 to 8 weeks to determine when you should sow the cover crop seed. By planting a few weeks early you’ll have bigger growth, but may need to clip the spent flowers to prevent re-seeding.
Cover crops are good for any sized garden larger than a container garden where it is easier to change the soil out. Your raised beds would benefit from our cover crop mix.
If you get a good freeze, the mix will “winterkill”, meaning they will die after a hard frost of around 24°F or so. Then the plant matter will fall down to become mulch for the soil, while the roots decompose. You can turn them under, but I don’t recommend it as tilling or turning disturbs the soil structure. You can plant right among the mulch in the spring.
The cover crops will set seed and scatter those seeds if you let them. Plant cover crops 6 – 8 weeks before the first frost so they get good growth and flower but usually don’t have the chance to set seed. If you see seed forming, just clip those seed heads off and throw them away.
This way the cover crop can’t be an unwanted guest next spring!
You have a great thought in using the cover crops to help establish and improve the garden soil for next season.
This is the exact method used by organic farmers and growers to prepare fallow soil for a crop. Growers will plant cover crops in succession, or they allow the flowers to re-seed themselves.
Rake to loosen the top inch or so, broadcast the cover crop seed and rake again until just covered. Water the area equal to 1 inch of water per week until the seeds sprout and the plants establish themselves.
Let the plants flower and start setting seed, then clip the heads to prevent them from re-seeding. Allow the plant matter to die in the frost, creating its own mulch. The roots and topsoil mulch decompose over the winter, giving you with an excellent start to next gardening season!
Our Garden Cover Up Mix provides plenty of nutritious forage for your chickens. Plant a test plot close to where they are. Water the area equal to 1 inch of water per week until the seeds sprout and the plants establish themselves. Then you can trim some as fodder for the chickens as it grows and develops.
Our Backyard Chickens collection is another option. It has a variety of tasty edibles like sunflower, corn, Swiss chard, mustard and kale.
For erosion control, I would plant a straight (50/50) mix of buckwheat and cereal oats. Both are fast growing with good root systems that hold the soil in place. They provide good mulch after the plant dies off. You might test plant a strip about 3 – 5 feet deep crosswise to how the water flows during monsoon season. This acts as a catch strip, slowing the water down and reducing the amount of soil moved. It also creates a berm for future moisture retention. The roots create a “sink” for the water flow which diverts the water into the soil and away from flowing across it. This starts to build up the shallow soil and water reserves on your property.
I would not mow or kill this planting but allow it to re-seed and establish itself well. If the test works, you can replicate this downstream of where the water flows as many times as needed.
Once the initial berm starts to form, plant the Garden Cover Up mix up stream. This takes advantage of the extra moisture to reclaim and build some good soil!
This will only take 2 or 3 seasons to establish some excellent berms fully and then you can plant more.
Buckwheat is not related to wheat at all, as it is in the Rhubarb family – if you can believe that! You should not have any reaction to buckwheat. You can avoid the oats by ordering the individual cover crop varieties. The Crimson clover and hairy vetch are strong nitrogen fixers, where the Buckwheat and Rye are fast growing ground covers.
You can make your own mix by ordering the smaller amounts of the individual cover crops, avoiding what you are sensitive to.
The cover crop mix will die after a couple of hard frosts. It becomes a mulch insulating and protecting the soil over the winter. During that time the roots decompose and increase the soil fertility. Depending on your climate over the winter the mulch should almost dissappear by next spring’s planting time.
I don’t recommend tilling a cover crop, it disturbs the soil you spent the winter improving. When planting, open a small space in the mulch. Then it continues covering and protecting the soil while smothering weeds.
If you do feel the need to till, raise the tines to only till the top 2 – 3 inches of soil and don’t disturb deeper layers. This will work the decomposed vegetative matter into the soil where it will be used quickly.
The process is to plant a fall cover crop, let it die and overwinter to improve the soil. Next spring, plant another after the garden crops are in and up. This covers the soil and shades out most weeds. Repeat this cycle yearly and the soil becomes incredibly fertile after a year or so.
In fertile soil weeds aren’t as much of a problem because they just don’t germinate as well. Fewer weeds leads to fewer insects, as many insects “partner” with specific weeds for habitat or to lay eggs on. Increased soil fertility means healthier plants which do not attract predatory insects.
Thanks for your question! That’s why you need to kill the cover crops manually if the weather doesn’t freeze cold enough to kill them. Mowing or weed-whacking is the easiest way to do this. Otherwise, the plants don’t die, the roots don’t decompose and you struggle to plant your garden.
If you kill the cover crops from late October to mid-November, they will benefit the soil!
There are a couple of ways to open up the soil, especially with a clay component.
1 – You can deep till the soil. Realize you are destroying many micro-organisms as you are completely changing where they live. This is ok once or maybe twice when first establishing the garden, but is detrimental to the soil health if done often.
2 – Use a broadfork or other mechanical means to open up the soil without disturbing the layers. This is often done by hand, so will only work in a smaller garden. Because you won’t be able to drill down deep in a hard soil, this might need to be done a few times over a couple of seasons.
3 – Plant cover crops or aggressive root crops such as sunflower, wheat, sesame or Daikon radishes which drill down and open up the soil. This isn’t a one time, fix-all solution, but with replanting in spring and fall the cover crops can continue building and improving the soil.
Second Chance Gardening
Beat the heat with your own second chance garden. Let’s look at why Fall gardening can be so much better!
Do you have extra space opening up in your garden right now? As you harvest crops think about replanting something in its place that does well in cooler weather. Now is the time to think about these planting techniques, to get the most from your garden!
Succession Planting
Always have seeds or transplants ready to plant when you harvest. Filling the space of a harvested plant means less weeding and less moisture loss. A little planning goes a long way, pay attention to days to maturity for a cool season variety and you can stagger your plantings to get a bigger, longer harvest.
Continuous planting
Plant a few spinach seeds every week from August to October, and you will have a continuous supply as the weather cools off into late fall. The same goes for many cool season crops like lettuce, carrots, beets and cabbage.
Plan for over-winter crops
Do you know about growing onions over the winter? Fall planted onions yield a very sweet onion come next spring. Plant the seed in mid to late summer, then mulch heavily with straw just before the first frost. In the spring, the onions will continue growing and give you an early harvest of delicious onions.
Does your climate allow for some types of vegetables to easily grow through the winter, even if it needs some temperature protection? Is your climate conducive to year round tomatoes, with a little planning and frost protection?
Save space for garlic, which is planted in the Fall and harvested early the next summer. Think about where you would want spring flowers to appear next season, attracting pollinators that help your garden. Many flower seeds enjoy being planted in the Fall and magically appear in the Spring.
Root crops
Turnips, radishes, carrots and beets can all be planted in late summer and early Fall. They grow quickly in the warmer weather, then turn really sweet as the nights cool off.
Plant some Fall lettuce, it will thrive in cooler temperatures. Mustards, kale, chard and spinach also thrive in the Fall. Try a second planting of sweet peas, as they will love the cooler weather. We love the versatility of Spinach Beet-Greens as they grow through our 100°F+ summer days and continue until hard frost stops them. They are one of the first greens to re-start early next season!
Parsley and chives are great year-round and planted in early Fall, they can last into early winter. Depending on your climate they might die back with the first strong freezes, but can be the first to reappear in the spring. Think about planting herbs in pots now and you can bring them inside during the winter and enjoy their flavors year-round!
Enjoys these tips, the days may start to shorten as summer progresses but the cooler weather allows for so much more garden activity!
Biting Insects Repellents You Can Grow
Control Biting Insects Naturally
Biting insects are often the bane of our gardening lives – just when the weather is the best to be outside enjoying the garden those annoying biting insects join the party. Due to our long co-existence with insects, many approaches exist to make time in the garden or outside more enjoyable.
Most modern solutions don’t recognize the difference between beneficial and pest – such as bug zappers and sprays or lotions – and their effectiveness over a wider area (such as a garden) decreases drastically.
A more visually and aromatically pleasing approach is planting herbs or flowers which naturally deter biting insects, or cultivating plants which attract beneficial insects to prey on the unwanted or destructive pests. This provides multiple benefits; less costly with unwanted insects repelled better, longer lasting effects while attracting beneficial insects and humans in both color and aromas.
Insects bite people due to a number of factors; the unique chemistry of an individual, how the environment encourages or deters pest insects, beneficial insect population and the flowers they depend on, to landscape maintenance such as how often grass is mowed or weeds removed that can harbor sizable populations of pesky, biting insects.
It may take a bit of experimenting and close observation to see what is truly going on, but once you start to discover the specific factors that reduce and deter the unwanted insects, you will soon be enjoying lots more time outside!
Let’s look at some plants proven to be strong and effective deterrents to biting insect, while are also attractive to people and useful as medicinal or culinary ingredients.
Overall, the easiest way to use these plants is in planters, containers or in beds along the garden gate, entryway or border of the garden, or around the front and back doors of your home or anywhere you want to have fewer biting insects. Some of these plants will naturally repel mosquitoes, flies and such, but brushing with a hand or crushing a few leaves releases their powerful aromatic compounds and scents.
Biting Insect Repelling Herbs
Here are eight easy to grow herbs for you to plant, some of which you may already have in your garden! Some are annuals which will re-seed themselves if left alone, while others are perennials that will live and fill out their areas over several years.
Basil (Ocimum basilicum) – This much-loved center point of many cook’s gardens has a secret: the aroma which attracts us repels biting insects, making basil effective against mosquitoes, chiggers, gnats, fleas, ticks and houseflies. Plant-based insect repellent sprays are made by crushing fresh leaves, releasing their natural aromatic oils.
Lemon basil leaves can be picked, lightly crushed or bruised in the hand and rubbed on exposed skin as a repellent while smelling lemony and fresh. The Journal of Entomology has shown Sweet basil oil is an effective alternative to synthetic pythrethrums as a mosquito repellent.
Calendula (Calendula officinalis) – More commonly known as Pot Marigold, this hardy annual is multi-talented with healing and nutritional qualities, in addition to repelling biting insects.
Most insects avoid it, confirming its historic uses as a base ingredient for insect repellents. Interplanting among cabbage reduces aphid, cabbageworms and diamondback moth problems in Poland. On a different note, the tachinid fly uses calendula as a host plant and attacks pest insects such as cabbage loopers, Japanese beetles, cutworms, codling moths and squash bugs, among others.
Catnip (Nepeta cataria) – Famous for attracting cats with its pungent earthy-minty aroma, its most powerful and active volatile aromatic compound is nepetalactone which repels mice, rats, mosquitoes, cockroaches and numerous other household insects. An Iowa State University study from 2001 showed nepetalactone to be 10 times more effective than DEET – the common synthetic biting insect repellent – and was effective in concentrations as low as 1%.
Chrysanthemum or Feverfew (Tanacetum parthenium) – An ancient medicinal plant long used for the treatment of fevers, migraine headaches, toothaches and insect bites. Recent studies have discovered there are more than 30 naturally occurring plant based chemical compounds called sesquiterpene lactones. In addition to being medically effective, they are also very potent insect repellents, as most garden and house pest insects will not go near its fragrance.
Marigold (Tagetes patula) – The common, pretty and colorful marigold repels blowflies and safari ants in Africa and India, and also effectively deters aphids while being a beneficial companion plant for many garden vegetables.
There are three active aromatic compounds which studies have shown to be as effective against mosquitoes as DEET.
Try a few of these powerful allies in your insect repellent search, now you know more about them. Test plant a small grouping near a high-traffic area in a container that can be moved, then observe what insects are around.
With some testing, you should soon see positive results. You might find certain plants work best for different members of your family, so containers or planters in areas where they like to hang out can work wonders.