Kale will definitely grow here..this is my first year growing it, but my sister has grown it for a few years. I got my seeds from Vesey's, but you should be able to find seeds in most greenhouses. If you can't, do you have an Early's nearby? I know they carry at least one variety. They are easy to grow from seed, similar to lettuce, so you don't need to worry about transplants. I think they are a cooler growing plant, so planting now would be good, or in late summer. Or you could grow under shade cloth.

Grow it from seed. It's super frost tolerant so will produce well into the fall, though it does get kind of tough when it's older. Pretty much pest-free once it gets established in my experience, but like any member of the cabbage family it can be severely attacked at the seedling stage. Row cover or chemicals can deal with that.

Kale can be planted any time of year from early spring to late fall (although it goes to seed the second year, so kinda useless to plant in fall for spring harvest). It does taste best during cool weather and especially after a frost. This year, the best time to plant was early May when the snow had melted but you can still plant it now. If it's too bitter, wait until September to harvest. You will be able to harvest it right until the flakes begin to fly, and you can always dig up the snow and harvest it!

Tip: add a splash of white wine when satueeing kale (or other bitter greens) to mask the bitterness.

Seed vs transplant? It depends on how weedy your soil is. The more weedy it is, the more convenient it is to transplant. It also depends on whether you need 5 plants or 50.
Since it is a cool-weather plant, you will want to mulch with straw, leaves or dried grass clippings to keep the soil cool and moist and keep weeds down.

Put Reemay or a similar light insect barrier on it to keep the cabbage worms off of it.

This post was edited by Slimy_Okra on Wed, May 22, 13 at 18:56

I finally found kale transplants at Dutch Growers after going to 8 places looking for seed or transplants! Next year I will order seed but I wanted to get it in the ground right away. Who knew it would be so hard to find. They had every kind of seed except kale go figure. Thankyou for the replies-I look forward to eating fresh kale this year. I also found Praire Sensation apple which I had been looking for.