The time of year for greens

The air is chilly. The nights seem frosty from time to time. Rain drops pop in every now and then. Yes, its the time for greens. But get them planted soon, because by May, it will be too late. If you love fresh lettuce in your sandwiches, or you like having lots of fresh greens around for salads, start growing them! They are so easy. Just throw the seeds on top a bag potting soil from the garden center or add a half a container of purchased mulch or old leaves to half a container of your garden soil, dust the top with a handful or two of the same soil, and within a few weeks, you'll have some seedlings peeking through. If it doesn't rain, remember to water about every other day. Greens will even grow in 3/4 sun, they don't need whole 8 hours of sun each day since about 6 will do.

Pony packs speed up the process

Or, to make it easier, just go grab couple of pony packs of lettuce from Home Depot or your local hardware or grocery store. Oftentimes, they use these packs as loss leaders to build traffic and very reasonable. There's a hardware store up the street that sells pony packs for about $2.00. You will quickly see how rapidly they grow and how tasty and delicious it is to have fresh greens handy. It will also cut down on your grocery bill. I started putting a small container in my sink...I put in coffee grounds, veggie scraps, banana and orange peels, etc. Then, say if I'm dumping out a glass of water that my child didn't drink, or a pot of water from the pasta, I just made, I'll dump it in the container. Then I have an easy way to get my lettuce or other pots watered without having to use virgin water from the hose.

Wanda goes after one of her favorite plants...the hollyhock.

What works and what doesn't for me

The only green that I can't seem to grow well here in San Diego is spinach. It just seems to take too much water for me to keep up with. After all, I'm not a bog gardener. However, I've had great luck with rocket (a fast-growing spicy dandelion-like green, swiss chard (both tender miniature ones and larger heads), asian greens including mizuna and daikon (but got mostly green parts...underground radish portions were pretty wimpy), collard and mustard greens, cabbage, kale, and all sorts of kinds of lettuce from butter lettuce to a green one with red freckles and even romaine (which takes a little longer).

One trick, though, is that rabbits also love them, so high raised beds will always be better or surround your greens with chicken wire, or try tall, wide pots. My kids at school and I have learned pretty quickly, that rabbits can take any green to the ground pretty fast. Rabbits do, however, leave the stub. As I have a rabbit, it surprised me when I learned that they don't eat the whole plant. After all, they want to come back for snacks later, so why take the whole thing down at the first try? My rabbit has continued to nibble at the low pot of greens that I grew at her level. She never eats it all. The past week, I bought a beautiful, huge purple cabbage from Home Depot and then the wind blew the container off the top of the planter...what a surprise when I found that the same day I purchase it, she had taken it down to a nipped purple stub...you'd hardly know it even existed. But somehow, it was still alive.

Kids love to sample greens...I'm amazed at all the different kind of greens the kids at school will try.

However, if you live in San Diego, get them planted now, because by May and June, it will heat up and the greens will bolt to seed rapidly. However, for now, we are still safe, and the greens will come fast and furious once they start popping up.  And if you miss it, there's always the fall to start again.