
Beets
Beta vulgaris
Beets are a popular root crop used for pickling, roasting, and salads. They come in an array of colors, including red, yellow, and red and white striped.
Beets are a popular root crop used for pickling, roasting, and salads. They come in an array of colors, including red, yellow, and red and white striped.
Boston Marrows are large, bright orange squashes that can weigh anywhere between 10 and 50 lbs., although 25 lbs. is more common. They are an excellent eating squash and can be turned into soups or pies.
Broccoli is a cool season vegetable which has been cultivated since the Roman Empire. It is grown for its tender florets which can be eaten raw or cooked.
This large plant is used to make brooms. However, it is not a true corn.
Bush beans are compact, low growing plants that produce large crops of beans. They can be used for fresh eating or as dry beans.
Bush lima beans are vigorous, productive plants. Their smaller size makes them easy to grow in the home garden and they still provide a bounteous harvest. They can be used dry or fresh.
Cabbage is a cool season annual that was a staple crop in the colonial period and continues to be so today.
Cauliflower is a cabbage relative with broad blue-green leaves and a large white head. It is slow to harvest and benefits from a long cool season.
This crop is grown for the fibers it produces, although ornamental varieties do exist.
The name "cowpea" was probably coined for their use as a fodder crop for cows, and while grown for their edible bean, the leaves and pods can also be consumed. Black-eyed peas can be harvested as a snap bean, or dried, and are the main ingredient in Hoppin' John, a traditional Southern dish ritually…
This clover is used primarily as a cover crop and fodder, but it is also a good nectar source for bees.
Dipper gourds are sprawling plants that produce enormous quantities of fruit over the course of the season. The gourds they produce can be used to make drinking vessels, birdhouses, and other decorative items.
This plant's large leaves add a unique texture to the back of the border, while its yellow flowers provide late season interest. Elecampane is used in France and Switzerland to make absinthe.
This crop has bright blue flowers. It is primarily used to make linen from its fibers and its seeds used as supplements and for linseed oil.
Hemp is originally from central Asia, and has been cultivated throughout history as a source of fiber, seed, oil, and medicine.
Jerusalem artichoke is a perennial sunflower relative that produces a profusion of bright yellow flowers atop ten foot stalks. It is valued for its edible tubers, which resemble the flavor of water chestnuts.
Kale is a popular leafy green that can be used cooked or in salads. It is also used as an ornamental plant in fall gardens. Historically, coarser types have been used as animal fodder.
Leeks are an onion relative with strappy green leaves which an edible stalk which is usually blanched.
Lettuce is a cool season leafy vegetable that is most frequently used in salads. Its leaves come in a variety of colors, from green to red to splotchy.
Muskmelons are a trailing, vining plant with small yellow flowers which often performs better when grown on a trellis. They produce fruit in a wide variety of shapes and colors. Their fruits are frequently fragrant.
Okra is a tall plant with cheerful yellow flowers that are reminiscent of hibiscus blossoms. They produce green seedpods that are best harvested when they are 2 to 3 inches long.
Onions are commonly planted in the fall for a spring harvest. Red and yellow types are available to grow.
Parsnips are a large root vegetable which somewhat resemble white carrots and can be used in similar ways. Just like the wild parsnip, cultivated plants attract a range of pollinators and are host plants for several moths and butterflies, including swallowtails. Handling the plants should be done with…
This small, colonizing tree produces the largest edible fruit indigenous to the United States. It has dark maroon flowers in the early spring which are pollinated by flies.
Peas are tender spring vegetable on short vines. They often have large showy flowers in colors like pink and white. The pods can range in color from purple to green. Peas are best direct sown outdoors in the early months of spring, and if you have a long, cool fall, a second crop can be grown.
Pole beans, such as kidney and butter or lima beans, produce long vines that do best when supported on some type of trellis. They are prolific growers and can easily cover a trellis in the course of a season while producing many beans which can be eaten fresh or dried.
Pole lima beans are vigorous plants that do best when grown on trellises. They are fast growing and produce beans which can be used fresh or dried.
Potatoes are a tomato relative and are often mistaken for them, as their foliage is somewhat similar in appearance. They are an agricultural staple that ranks with wheat and rice as among the most important in the world. Their South American origin is often obscured by their fame as a mainstay crop…
Radishes are a root vegetable that add a pleasant bite (if you like that kind of thing) to salads. They come in a variety of colors including black, purple, red, and white. They are useful as a winter cover or forage crop. Radishes are incredibly easy to grow, with high germination rates and a fast…
Salsify is a unique biennial root vegetable with grass-like leaves. In the spring it produces masses of daisy-like purple flowers followed by large seedheads that resemble those of dandelions. The root is said to taste somewhat like oysters and looks like a white carrot.
These gorgeous native plants bloom in a variety of colors and sizes, including pale yellow, oranges, and golds. Some are grown merely for their beauty while others, such as the Mammoth sunflower, are grown for their seeds.
Sweet potatoes are vigorous, running plants that will easily exceed their allotted space in the garden if not kept under control. They should be grown in mounds, much the way one would grow potatoes. They are extremely cold sensitive and should be planted after the soil has warmed in the spring and harvested…
Swiss chard is a leafy green that can be harvested continually to be used in salads or cooked. Its leaves may be plain green or have red midribs.
Peanuts are small leguminous plants with many bright yellow flowers. They form their fruits underground and they should be harvested in the fall when the plant begins to yellow.
This plant is used for the production of its leaves, which provide the tobacco which goes into cigarettes, cigars and other forms. It can also be used as an ornamental, with its dramatic height and delicate pink flowers
Watermelon plants are vigorous, vining plants which need to be given quite a bit of space to ramble in. They produce large melons of varying sizes and colors, depending on the variety.
Bird peppers are large plants, easily growing to 6 feet over the course of a season. They thrive in the heat of the year and produce masses of tiny red peppers with a lot of heat and excellent flavor.
This common cereal grain is used in distilling, as animal fodder, for cooking, and is also used as a cover crop.
Crookneck squash grow in a dense, leafy clump and produce many yellow squashes which need to be harvested nearly every day. They are susceptible to most squash pests, including squash bugs, powdery mildew, and squash vine borers.