Snap Beans: 60-80 days. Planted 8″ apart in warm soil in late May. There are two varieties: pole beans and bush beans. Pole beans are vines which can reach to 6′ or more, but need netting or a trellis to support them. They begin producing a little later but can bear pods for up to 2 months. Bush beans are freestanding and earlier but produce only for 2-3 weeks. Solve this problem by planting more than once. Most people harvest their beans too late-pick them when they are the diameter of a pencil or less. In full swing they can be picked every three days. They come in many colors.
Lima Beans: 90 days. Plant 18 inches apart in warm soil in late May. There are pole and bush varieties. For other care see snap beans.
Soy Beans (Edamame) :80 days. Plant 18″ apart in warm soil in late May. Plants can reach 4′ tall. Pick and boil pods in salt water for 5 minutes.
Fava Beans: Plant 1′ apart as early as the soil can be worked, usually in March. Fava bean plants are remarkable for their size and beauty. Pods hang horizontally from stems attached to center stalk. Fava beans don’t like warm weather.
Sweet Corn: 70 to 120 days. Plant 6″ apart in warm soil in late May and again every two weeks thru the middle of June. Since plants are wind pollinated they should planted in blocks rather than in a single row. There are three types of sweet corn: old fashioned varieties like Silver Queen known as SUSU corn; SESE (sugar enhanced) sweet corn and Sh2 sweet corn, both recent innovations. With the old-fashioned varieties sugar content drops from the minute you pick it. SESE and Sh2 types actually get sweeter for a period after picking. Corn benefits from having dirt hilled up at their base to keep them standing in strong winds. Corn is ripe when the tassle, or silk, turns brown and withers. Keep in mind that the raccoons will know exactly when it’s ripe. Electric fences help. It’s always worth a try to plant some corn early, in late April. Planting it 2″ deep rather than the typical ½” to 1″ deep. The soil will protect the seeds and sprouts can survive a frost or two. Stagger planting dates or plant varieties with different maturation dates to prevent unwanted cross-pollination. Growing your own popcorn is also a lot of fun.
Cucumbers: 55-80 days. Plant 18″ apart in warm soil, typically late May. Plants grow best from seed. All members of this family-including melons, squash and pumpkins-are best grown in hills. To construct a hill, excavate a saucer-shaped depression 12″ deep and 2′ across. Taking and 80/20 mix of compost and manure and fill the depression to a height of 12″ above grade. Place a layer of soil 4″ deep on top of that. Plant 5 to 7 sets of two seeds each in a circle on top of the hill. Keep the most vigorous plant in each set and yank the other. Cucumbers will need netting or a trellis on which to climb. Keep in mind that the first few flowers are always male and won’t produce fruit. Flowers are edible. There are English, Japanese and Middle Eastern cucumbers. Especially tasty are white cucumbers which don’t require peeling because the skin isn’t bitter.
Celery:120 days. Grown from starts germinated 10 weeks before planting in late April. Celery is swamp plant that requires constant moisture. It’s tough to germinate and tougher to grow. Homegrown celery has an incredibly intense flavor. There are red varieties and celery root, also known as celeriac, which is used in soups. It’s easily one of the gnarliest-looking things you can grow. The leaves of all types make a tasty garnish.
Eggplants: 60-110 days from setting out starts on Memorial Day. Plant them 18″ apart. There are dozens of types and colors of eggplants. All require warm, rich soil and full sun. They have a tendency to produce more fruit than they can ripen-limit them to 4-6 fruit per plant. In growing the standard purple type you’ve set yourself a task, in terms of eating the whole thing. It’s better to plant smaller-fruited varieties, like the Japanese Ichiban, which produces 6″ cylindrical fruits. There are purple, white pink, yellow orange and multicolored eggplants, all waiting to be turned into baba ganoush.
Melons: 65 to 120 days. From seed or starts. Planted 3′ or more apart in hills (See cucumbers). You know you’re a good gardener if you can successfully grow melons. Cantaloupes or muskmelons are usually the quickest and easiest. The earliest varieties, like Minnesota Midget, can come in 50 days or less. Honeydew melons take longer, and watermelons longer still. It helps to grow them on black plastic mulch that increases the warmth of the soil. Once a fruit has appeared on a runner, let the runner grow out two or three more leaves, then cut the growing tip off. This will help the plant ripen the fruit it has rather than putting out a string of ever-smaller fruits that never ripen. Sometimes you can sweeten the fruit make dialing back on the water as the melons mature. Cantaloupes grow increasingly fragrant as they ripen. The bellies of watermelons shade from white to yellow as they ripen. And there’s always the “thunk” test. Rap the melon with your knuckle: the deeper the sound, the riper the fruit.
Peppers: 65 to 120 days. Grown from starts planted in early June. Peppers are perhaps the most cold- adverse plants in your garden. Even a few nights in the 40’s will stall your plants for a month or more. They won’t grow, they won’t die-they’ll just sit there. Peppers also need good drainage, so it’s a good idea to incorporate some sand in the soil. Peppers can thrive in poorer soil than tomatoes or eggplants, members of the same family. There are sweet peppers, hot peppers and a spectrum of flavors in between. Peppers start out green, turn yellow and eventually, at the peak of their flavor, become red. While many gardeners grow bell peppers, there are a lot of options, often more productive and with more flavor. Gypsy, an All-American Selection, produces a dozen or more sweet, cylindrical fruits. Pimento peppers are another good alternative to bell peppers. They produce plenty of ox-heart shaped fruit, two-thirds the size of a bell pepper with a much better flavor. Banana peppers, from Hungary, are terrifically productive. You can crank up the heat with the mildly hot Hungarian Wax, the Numex, the Fajita Bell and Mexibell peppers. Hot pepper lovers should try the Szechwan and scotch bonnet. The “heat” of hot peppers is rated in Scoville units, with the hottest pepper usually sold, the Habenero, rated at 230,000 Scoville units. A recently discovered “Ghost” pepper from northern India is the hottest pepper known, topping out at 400,000 Scoville units. The largest sweet peppers include the Chinese Giant and the Marconi, whose fruits can reach 9 inches or more. There’s even a “Peter Pepper” which looks like the male reproductive member. Peppers can be grown in containers and over wintered in a sunny spot inside. Perhaps the best advice when growing peppers is to think beyond the bell.
To read all of Todd’s Avant Gardening posts, see the Avant Gardening Series category.
