Six Weeks Ahead

Gather sweet, pineapple-flavored husked berries off the ground about ten weeks after planting, and expect a heavy crop until frost.Ground cherries thrive in Alabama heat and sprawl wide, so give each plant room or a low cage to keep the fruit off wet soil....

Pick fiery orange lanterns roughly three months after planting from a pepper that only gets better in deep Alabama summer heat.Habaneros need more heat and a longer season than common peppers, so set them out late enough that soil is genuinely warm and they...

Harvest your first hot peppers in roughly eleven weeks, then keep picking heavier and hotter fruit right up to the November frost.Hot peppers love the Alabama summer and actually build more heat under dry, sunny stress than under constant coddling. Plant into warm soil,...

Pick firm, dark green jalapenos about eleven weeks after planting, with a single plant easily producing dozens of pods through summer.Jalapenos are among the most dependable warm-season crops in Alabama, but they need warm soil at planting or they sit and sulk for weeks....

Dig crisp, nutty sunchoke tubers after the first fall frost, harvesting from a tall sunflower relative that returns every single year.Sunchokes are supplied as dormant tubers rather than seedlings, and they are a true perennial that comes back reliably and spreads vigorously, so give...

Start cutting tender leaves in about eight weeks and keep harvesting all fall and winter, with frost making every leaf noticeably sweeter.Kale is at its best as an Alabama fall and winter crop, standing through hard freezes and producing long after the tomatoes are...

Plant these young leeks now and you'll be pulling thick, mild white shanks for soups and braises in about three to four months.Leeks are slow but forgiving, and Alabama's mild winters let them sit in the ground for months without bolting. Set the transplants...

Grow your own sponges and tender young gourds from this vigorous vine, with edible fruit by midsummer and mature sponges to peel by fall.Luffa needs every warm day zone 8a can give it, so get transplants out as soon as frost danger passes and...

Harvest thick, glossy, spinach-flavored leaves all through the worst of an Alabama summer, starting roughly six weeks after you set this vine out.This is the crop that takes over when true spinach quits: real spinach bolts here by early May, while Malabar spinach only...

Cut your first bowl of tender mixed baby salad greens about three weeks after planting, then keep cutting for six weeks or more.Mesclun is a mixed cell of lettuces, mustards and arugula meant to be harvested as baby leaf, so plant the whole clump...

Start snipping feathery, mildly peppery mizuna leaves for salads and stir-fries about three weeks after transplanting, and keep cutting the plant for months.Mizuna is the most heat- and cold-tolerant of the Asian greens, shrugging off frost into the low 20s under a row cover...

Cut dense, sweet, crinkled heads for kimchi, slaws and stir-fries roughly two months after you set these transplants into cool spring or fall soil.Napa cabbage is far touchier about timing than regular cabbage: a spring planting set out too late runs straight to flower...

Pick your first tender pods about two months after planting, then keep cutting every day or two right through the heat until frost.Okra is a hot-weather crop that stalls in cold ground, so wait until soil is above 65 degrees rather than rushing it...

Set these young cells out early and dig long, sweet, nutty white roots after the first hard frosts, roughly four months from planting.Parsnips are a taproot crop that genuinely resents disturbance, so this is sold as a young multi-seeded cell to be planted out...

Start picking long, tender snap beans about two months after planting, and keep the vines producing until frost if you harvest often.Beans are normally direct-sown, and this transplant exists mainly to beat cool spring soil and to get past the crows, doves and cutworms...

Set this vine out and you'll be cutting hard-shelled pumpkins for pies, porches and jack-o'-lanterns roughly three and a half months later.Timing is everything for Halloween pumpkins in Alabama: count back about 100 days from when you want them, which puts planting in late...

Pull crisp, peppery radishes just three to four weeks after planting, making this the fastest thing in the whole spring or fall garden.Radishes form a taproot and dislike being moved, so this is offered as a young multi-seeded cell meant to go into the...

Harvest a mix of purple, yellow, white and orange roots in about ten weeks for the most colorful raw platter of the season.Like all carrots, these resent root disturbance, so they are grown as a young multi-seeded cell to be planted out very early...

Plant these certified seed potatoes in late winter and dig smooth, thin-skinned red potatoes for boiling and potato salad by late May.This is sold as certified seed potatoes, not as a rooted seedling: cut larger pieces so each has one or two eyes, let...

Pull thick crimson stalks in spring for the sharpest, most electric pie filling in the garden, tart in a way no other crop delivers.Be honest with yourself about zone 8a: rhubarb needs real winter chill and it genuinely sulks in Deep South summers, so...