I can now add "quite tolerant of cold" to its list of attributes, as my chard plants overwintered with just a thin frost blanket covering them all winter. I didn't know how they'd fare this way, but it's time to find out.
They didn't look perfect -- lots of brown leaves to clean out:
Looking past the brown though, most of the plants looked green, healthy -- just great!
After removing the dead and dying leaves, you can see that things are looking good:
The compost pile will be happy to get some more "greens":
Down at this end of the bed the plants don't look as good. Lots of stems showing, not as much fresh foliage:
I'll see what happens though. Last year's kale looked like this after the winter and it sprouted from the stem once it warmed up. I'm interested to see how these do.
There's plenty of healthy growth at the other end of the bed though!
As somebody who's always struggled a bit with the veggie garden, it looks like I've finally figured a few things out. Is this the year I'll not be disappointed with my food crop?
Doesn't it look delicious?
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Looks good to me.
ReplyDeleteThis year, I'm going to try growing kale,more parsley, and beet greens...all in containers.
I should take a leaf out of your book and focus more on veggies this year. You've had so much success.
ReplyDeleteMaywyn: Everybody should be growing kale! I'll show you my kale patch soon. :)
ReplyDeleteHappily addicted to chard.
ReplyDeleteBeautiful and delicious! Greens are easy to grow and so prolific!
ReplyDeleteMy chard just kept going and going and going, even through our 45c Summer days (though it wasn't happy about it!) and it's even self-seeded about the place so I think we are set up for chard for life! Definitely a particularly easy-care (or no-care) vegetable.
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