I have done very well in past year with cabbage but this year got hit terrible with bugs. Soon I will grow under cover from beginning. I like cabbage a lot and eat it instead of lettuce. It lasts for months in the frig. And I really want to ferment cabagge beets and red onion together.

It seems like the easiest crop for me to grow. I don't know any tricks except protect with row cover.

Amy, this still perplexes me. Are they too spoiled with your cultures? I know they're heavy feeders and all, but they handle stress pretty good. Def keep trying. Hate dealing with the bugs, but they're so nice to harvest.

Amy, last year was my first year growing it. It was very successful. This year...not as successful. When does everyone plant their cabbage?

I didn't do bad growing the cabbage, considering--ended up with 3 nice-sized heads and four more littler ones (too much shade, I suppose). But like you, Amy the caterpillars got them (even so salvaged 3 big heads and a little one--and I'm so excited to grow them again next year under cover in an appropriate bed. I'm a big cabbage fan, too. I planted mine late, because the seeds didn't develop well, so ended up buying some sets. So probably about the first week in April. So having done many things wrong still managed to get a little bit. Now feel better-armed for next year.

I expect I plant too close together, and too late, and with not enough fertilizer. I have a lot of varieties. All Seasons actually made a head. I have these visions of a bed full of big heads. I don't have a bed for them. I am giving Brussels Sprouts one more try then I give up..

I hear you, on the cabbages. No room for broccoli at all, do Brussels sprouts get as big as broccoli?

Amy, I'm infatuated with beds full of floating rosettes smiling at the sun.
I get them to grow allright, but by the time they are "floating" they're full of holes. LOL

I'm in. How many brussel plants?

Nancy, this year was the first with broccoli full grown for me. I look at it and said, "That's a whole lotta real estate for such a small crop!" But it was good ... real good.

I normally plant my broccoli, cabbage plants in the middle of march. For a fall crop you can direct sow your seed in the middle of august.

You have a really big place. Do you sell at the market, Rob?

I used to sell at the market. But now it is too time consuming and I have too much to do here. I have 250 acres here that keeps me behind.

I plant cabbage in February from home-grown transplants that are 3-5 weeks old and have 3-5 true leaves. I put low tunnel hoops over them, cover it with MicroMesh netting and just leave the netting over it until I harvest. Cabbage is the easiest thing on earth to grow in my garden as long as I keep the pests off of it. I like to plant the varieties that mature in 60-70 days so I can harvest them and replant something else in their place before the real heat sets in. I usually harvest in late April through late May depending on exactly when I planted and what the weather was like. I stay away from the varieties that produce huge heads. They take too long and take up far too much space and, also, there's only so much cabbage we can eat at one time so we don't need huge heads. I make 2 years worth of sauerkraut every other year, so in that year I plant more plants and in a non-sauerkraut year I plant less. Cabbage is a great fall crop too and it won't freeze in the winter until the temperatures are pretty cold.

That reminds me I want to order seed for the Gonzalez cabbage. Tiny palm size heads. I think would be a big hit.

Sure wish you had mentioned them before my seed order. Have them down for spring. Both Johnny's and Fedco were sold out. Pinetree had them.

I wish I had thought about them lol. The other day running errands little man checks off our errands bank, post office, etc. Then he says groceries? I said no not today. He said are you sure you have plenty cabbage?

Wow does he pay attention. He can not stand cabbage but apparently I eat a lot of it.

That is ADORABLE, Kim!!!! Good (little) Man!!

I can get cabbage to grow, but not Brussel sprouts. Caraflex is about the best cabbage I have ever grown. I want to try to grow the mini ones I see at Johnny select seeds. I wish they made a heat tolerant-cold tolerant-bug tolerant Brussel sprouts! LOL...

All of you who grow fall broccoli, cauliflower, brussels sprouts, chinese cabbage, carrots, beets, etc...

I've never done these cole crops before, but I've got transplants of everything that are getting big. Am I doing it too early? I have row cover and soaker hoses, so should I use that for them?

I would also like to sow seed for beets and carrots. Am I still a little too early or should I wait till about the first of August? I'm trying to follow the OSU planting guide, but it seems too hot to be planting some of these things now.

Amy, you are in my area...when are you doing yours?

Thanks!!

I have grown both Caraflex and Gonzalez many times. I like that a gardener can plant many of them in a fairly small space since they aren't huge monsters. They both also produce really mild, tender leaves. Other mini cabbages that are well worth growing are sold by Renee's Garden Seeds---she has a mini napa cabbage and a small cabbage called Pixie that is round. I like Caraflex's pointed shape. It is the only pointed cabbage I've grown that is a mini.

Kim, How adorable it is that Ryder wanted to be sure you got enough cabbage. He's such a smart boy and a good boy too.

Mary, It is always hard for me to plant when OSU recommends in the fall---it is just so danged hot and I am not in the mood to plant. However, heat doesn't bother brassicas as much as we think it will at this time of the year and part of the reason for that is that it isn't as if they've been exposed to any cold weather at this point. Often, the heat issues they have in Spring relate to their biennial nature where the cycles of cold and then hot weather cause bolting. Since there's not been any cold weather, nothing will set off fall plantings and try to get them to bolt. The only hard part will be to keep them alive in the heat and the pests. This seems to me like it is one of the worst caterpillar years in the last decade so I'd be sure to put the row cover over them as soon as they are planted.

Maybe today I'll drag out the seed box and paw through it and find seeds to start. It's hot, I'm not in the mood, etc. but I need to do it now so I'll have seedlings to put in the ground when the right time arrives down here. I tend to plant brassicas later than OSU says, but we never cool off much any more in autumn so I can get away with it. Last year we got the usual small break in the heat in August, and then still had highs in the 90s for most of September before a better break in the heat arrived at the end of September. Despite the heat holding for so long, our first freeze arrived in the third week of November right on time as usual. So, that's why we have to try to plant when OSU recommends---because even though it seems insanely hot at the time, we know the cold weather probably arrives on time anyhow and our plants need to be large enough to deal with it. I'd go ahead and try to follow OSU's recommendations if you have the space and the seeds. One reason I always am slow is because I hate, in general, to pull out producing hot season plants to make room for cool season plants. Since everything has produced like gangbusters this year, I am not going to have any problem yanking out hot season stuff, so at least there's that.

Ezirah, Have you tried brussels sprouts in Autumn? They do much better in Autumn than they do in spring when we seem to run out of cool weather too early for them. I always have better luck with BS in Autumn. I still can get a harvest from them in Spring most years if I plant them in January, about a month earlier than recommended and if I can keep them from freezing when planted that early. It is dependant on the weather though and this year the heat arrived too early....like....in January. I sort of knew when I planted them that it wasnt going to be a good brussels sprouts year and it wasn't. It also helps to choose varieties with shorter DTMs. Two Brussels Sprouts varieties that produce pretty early from seed in comparison with other BR varieties are Tasty Nuggets and Bubbles.

Dawn

Mary, I am ALWAYS behind. Lol. I plan to start my cole crop seeds this week. I'm going to put carrots and beets in fabric pots, but I think those are done in August. In 2015 I started them 8/21. Last year it was mid Sept. 2015 was a good crop. Last year must not have been impressive, I can't remember. I have never grown them in pots. I think I will put them on the east side of the house until it's cooler then move them to full sun in Sept. I can grow broccoli, collards, chard and kale. I have not been successful with Brussels Sprouts, cauliflower, or cabbage. I just don't care about cauliflower (not my favorite). Cabbage and BS I expect I have crowded, so they have not grown well. Also, I think my soil is better this year than at any other time, so they may just have not been getting enough nutrients.

Well, Dawn and Amy, I think I've started too early. I was trying to go by the OSU guide, and it shows planting broccoli and brussels sprouts (transplants) from July 15 thru Aug. 15. Unless I am misunderstanding the guide, which wouldn't be a big surprise. A good portion of mine, not all, are probably ready to go into the ground. I'm hardening them off right now on the patio. It also shows starting carrots now from seed about now, and leaf lettuce around the first of August. I may just have to start more seeds for Cauliflower because mine are just too early, it looks like. I always expect it to take the full 6-8 weeks to get big enough to transplant, but most of my transplants never take that long. I had to pot up the remaining tomatoes that I'm giving away into one gallon pots, because they are getting really big outside and already root-bound...again...in their 16 oz containers at 5 weeks old, and they had been potted up twice already! That makes 3 times!

So, I don't know what to do. I have 5 flats ( 8 oz styrofoam coffee cups) of broccoli, cauliflower, acorn and butternut squash, chinese cabbage, brussels sprouts, sugar pumpkin..just a couple of those). I guess I could repot some of them into larger containers to try and hold them off, but more than half are already outside! I know I can get the squash and pumpkins in the ground, and they should have already been out. They are short DTM varieties, so I hope I'll be ok with them. I still haven't constructed that trellis...lol Maybe I'll start that when the temps dip below 150. ;)

Mary, If you have the seedlings ready now, I say you should just go ahead and put them in the ground now. Since it is so hot, of course you'll have to water and watch them carefully or maybe even shade them for a few days, but they should be fine. (I get new weeds sprouting daily, so why can't desirable plants sprout and grow in the same conditions?)

You realize that the OSU Fall Gardening guide is the opposite of the spring guide---so the earliest dates are for NW OK and the latest dates for SE OK and everyone else can plant anywhere in between? So, I'd go for it and put stuff in the ground now if it is ready now. The calendar flips from spring to fall because in fall, the cold arrives first in northern OK (specificially NW OK) and last in southern OK (specifically SE OK) which is the opposite of how the heat arrives in spring.

Plant, plant, plant, plant plant! That's what you do. (grin) I never worry much about planting too early because we never know what the weather will do, so it always seems to me to be better to plant early rather than late.

Dawn

I love your advice, Dawn. And follow it! Even before you, always, every single year, I always have had some bad things happen, and some delightful surprises. The gift you give is three-fold--knowledge, a surety that not everything will go right, and that there will be disappointments and delights. But armed with your valuable knowledge helps so much! Plant plant plant! :)

Dawn, thank you. Weird time for me to post, but I was having crazy dreams and got up to get a drink. I probably can't go back to sleep right now, so I'll just type. My confusion with the OSU planting guide is where they say I can either seed or transplant, and then they tell you "set plants in the garden 1 to 1 1/2 months after planting the seed", as a bottom notation. I took that to mean that I should set transplants into the ground, at that time, after my seedlings were 1 to 1/2 months old. That makes a big difference in planting directions.

So, thank you. I'll keep hardening them off a little longer, and get the spot ready for them. In they will go :)

Nancy, Thanks. I agree that every year is full of surprises---both good and bad. Y'all all know that my surprise this year is that the squash bugs and squash vine borers haven't managed to take out a plant even though I haven't been doing anything to hurt them or even discourage them. It doesn't make any sense. It could make sense if there were no squash bugs, but there's plenty of them. Other than damaging an occasional leaf, I don't even know they are there. This is both a good surprise (what? no damage?) and a bad surprise (I wouldn't have planted 25 different summer squash plants if I had thought all the plants would survive. I would have been happy with 6 or 8.)

Mary, I wish they would word that differently on footnote 1. I wish they would indicate that a person should start their seeds 4-6 weeks before their targeted planting date if growing from seed, and base the targeted planting date on the planting recommendations. I think it is confusing as written. It does make a big difference.

For what it is worth, I have planted fall brassicas earlier than recommended. I have planted fall brassicas later than recommended. I got a great harvest either way. The only thing I've ever had hurt fall brassicas was a prolonged very early autumn very cold spell (freezing or below) that confused the plants and caused them to bolt. For that to happen, the early cold spell has to last about a week, and usually our early cold spells are just cold for a day or two.

I fear that sometimes we gardeners make it harder on ourselves than it has to be. A friend of mine directly sowed brussels sprouts seeds way too late one winter/spring a few years back. I believe he put the seeds in the ground in March, and our soil already was so warm that the seeds never germinated. After a while he gave up on them and planted something else in that space. Imagine his surprise when those brussels sprouts seeds survived the whole summer in wicked red clay and the weeds that inevitably take over a garden in late summer, and then those seeds surprised him and sprouted in October. Yes, October. By the end of December he was harvesting brussels sprouts and still was getting the sprouts in either January or February when he asked me about different ways to cook them. He was so delighted to have the brussels sprouts even though it was many months later than expected.

Dawn

Dawn, thank you. I will carry on and hope for the best:) I still may try to keep them in a holding pattern for another week or two...if I can. Thankfully, 2 trays are still under lights. I don't know what I'd do without you guys !

You're welcome, Mary. I suspect you'd be fine without us, but I am glad we all have each other here. No one understands the trials and tribulations of gardening here better than other folks who endure the same things in the same climate.

Dawn - thanks for the advice, I am going to have to give those varieties a try.