Know your Zone

Have you ever wondered how to effectively get the most out of your garden? Well I am here to let you in on a little secret. When you garden the first thing to know is what your zone is. What is a gardening zone exactly?

Garden Zones are essentially just a measure to show you what plants can be most effective in your area and the right time to plant them. For instance, I live in zone 5 which has very long cold winters and shorter summers. With this information I can determine when to plant and what to plant.

Have you ever noticed that most cherries are grown either in Door County, WI or Washington state? That is because they are in the same longitude and zone. It is the same reason why you cannot grow tropical fruit in places with long winters. Information like that can be fairly obvious. But I use the zone knowledge to help me plan out my growing season and when to start my seeds. So instead of doing one big dump of seeds in the garden once a year, try looking at your gardening zone.

As I mentioned, a garden zone can help you first off when to plant, knowing when to start plants can be helpful to ensure you get a harvest consistently and make your garden viable. Most zones go off of when the first frost and the last frost dates are. Of course these are just guesses based on past data but the first frost in my zone in particular is around the middle of October. This is when the ground will begin to get colder and eventually freeze. So, many fall plants like garlic and spinach would need to be planted early September to get a good harvest started. The last frost on the other hand, happens in spring around middle of May when the ground begins to thaw. This is when garden centers open and new seeds and garden sales come up. This is a great time to transplant seeds. Transplanting seeds just means that you start seeds inside and move them outside once they germinate. So if your last frost is middle of May, depending on the plant, you will want to start them indoors around middle of April.

So then, the other part is what to plant. There are so many different things to plant and it can be overwhelming so I like to start with things I know my family will eat. I also look at things that are easy to grow. My family loves peppers so I have a few pepper plants in my garden. We only have 2 different varieties but they are thriving and surviving just fine. You can research specific plants and what they need to survive. Seed packets show you the best time to plant them in the ground and how deep to plant the seeds. To have an effective homestead, I also like to look at what other things the plant can be used for that would be useful. For example, growing herbs is an easy thing to do either indoors or outdoors but if you do not need the herbs and the plants get to big, you can dry them! Or, if you are growing tomatoes, you can use them to make homemade pasta or marinara sauce.

If you want to have an effective garden that will last you well into the winter months, I challenge you to look at what zone you are in to determine what to grow and when to start your growing journey.