Traditionally Spring is quite hot and dry for us here in the subtropics. However during the La Niña we have been experiencing a mild spring and a wet one too. In this video we do a video tour of how everything is growing in September in our subtropical veggie patch.
Things we are starting to grow in early spring
August is when we typically shift from cool season crops to warm season crops. So planting in September consists of the staples such as lettuce, spring onions, beans and beets. We typically don't plant carrots unless rain is predicted as getting them to germinate when it's hot is challenging (they can't dry out at all). You can find a full list of things to plant in September here.
Things we are harvesting in Early Spring
As we have our succession planting down pat now we have loads of variety to harvest in Spring. Our subtropical Glen Large Garlic comes out in early September, we've got a continuous supply of greens, carrots are sweet and delicious, the over wintered eggplant turns it up a notch and the peas are still growing like crazy.
Some of the varieties of peas we showed in the video include the Giant Yukamo Snow peas (the tall prolific growers), Purple podded peas (great for soup peas and just beautiful in the garden), Oregon Sugar Snow Peas (great for small spaces) and also the green feast podded peas that grow really well here in the subtropics.
Common problems during early spring
Every year without fail we do get the black aphids on our French onions. They almost wipe them out but luckily they reshoot from the bulbs in the ground. Early spring we also need to be super vigilant about the fruit flys, setup the lure traps, protein baits and protect all the fruit.
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