A week ago, I harvested the whole bed of chard. I did this because our temperatures were rising (up to 90 degrees!) and it was wilting terribly during the day. Some of the leaves were starting to look a bit crispy around the edges. My sweetie suggested I just harvest it all and that would be the end of it.
Well, as occasionally happens, I ignored my sweetie's advice. I did harvest all of it, almost, but I refused to give up on it. As I was cutting the stems, I noticed that all of the plants had young leaves nestled down in the center. Maybe they would keep growing. I knew, though, once I harvested the big leaves, the lack of shade meant the hot sun was going to roast those poor tender leaves within an hour.
This was an easy problem to fix. We had a metal cage that would fit over them and a few small pieces of shade cloth in the garage. I used some spare blocks and pavers to secure the edges since we've been having high winds lately. A few minutes of work and the chard was protected.
This is the result one week later. The leaves are growing quickly. I'll harvest some tomorrow for lunch and see how long I can keep this bed going. Maybe I should ignore my sweetie more often. Well, maybe not, but even he will have to admit that I was right this time.
9 comments:
It won't be really pretty, but it'll keep going all summer long.
Great! Chard is one of my favorite cooking greens.
I've had chard last through the winter. It bolted the next year and tried to flower but I didn't allow it to do that for a while.
We do, however, live in the Portland, OR area, so our winters are perfect for overwintering live plants.
Your chard looks so pretty!
I swear my chard has some green stuff growing and it was 20 below here this winter. I am so jealous. I just realized that when you mentioned Sharon being in town you meant Sharon Astyk. I live only an hour from her and I have yet to hear her speak.Someday we have to plan a sustainablity conference/cooking class/gardening forum and have everybody get together for a few days. The only problem is that none of us feel good about traveling and we are all held hostage to some extent by our gardens and critters. Ah well, as long as we have power we have the blogs.
It is so beautiful. If it would stop snowing, I'd love to get out and explore the gardens - nearly 90 sounds miserable, however. I kind of like the cold better.
Yup I harvest the outter leaves and it grows and grows each time. I planted 3-4 plants and been harvesting enough for the two of us all winter, and hopefully summer.
Same with collards too.
One of my chard plants keeps going and going and going, three years now. I eat it as long as it tastes good.
If the chard is still going when we move this summer, I'll be sure to let the owner of the house know so she waters it and harvests it!
It will probably go to seed soon. Chard is a biennial.
EJ
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