To beat the cool, overcast spring we’ve left 3 out of 4 leafy-greens per square foot, and replaced the 4th with a pepper or an eggplant. You will have to clear out the rest of the square to give your summer plants room to grow, but for now they can share to give you a little more spring harvest. Radishes are ready to pick around 25 days after you plant them. Harvest them now to enjoy them while they are at their best and to make room for your other veggies (cucumbers) to grow.
Important maintenance tasks right now: Water on days where it is not raining, water deeply ideally in the morning. Weed early and often to keep small weeds from getting big and taking over your vegetable garden. Also remove any diseased or damaged leaves from any of your plants to keep your garden clean producing well.
Harvest your leafy greens by removing the outer leaves. The small inner leaves will continue to grow for a continual harvest. Be sure to remove the entire leaf right down to the bottom. Step outside with your salad bowl and a leaf from all your greens: roquette, lettuce, bok choy, tatsoi, kale, swiss chard and rapini for your daily garden salad. Some of these greens are starting to go to seed. You can pick the flowers and eat them as well! Pinching out the flowers will help keep the greens tasting better longer.
Slugs are starting to come out. At this time of year they are still small. It is important to get them out of the garden right away. They grow quickly and multiply! Use beer traps and hand picking to get out ahead of the population explosion. Watering in the morning instead of at night can greatly reduce slug populations as it makes it harder for them to get around at dusk on the dry soil surface.
The leaf miners are back. They cause the burn-like damage on Swiss chard and beet greens. You can save your plants by removing any damaged leaves right away, and inspecting the underside of healthy leaves and remove any eggs.