Hey everyone this is Shannie from Baker Creek, and today I'm gonna tell you what
crops you can grow in the month of August. Now we're here in the Missouri
Ozarks, which is about a zone 6, and these recommendations are really most ideal
for anyone who's growing between a zone 5 and a zone 7 or 8. But if you grow in
a zone warmer or a zone cooler, just be sure to do a bit of your own research
and maybe add or subtract a bit of time to really hit your window correctly. But
I'm speaking to the mostly the middle part of the country when I'm talking
about growing in August. So some of our biggest challenges of growing in August
are just going to be to keep the ground and keep your planting area nice and
cool as the plants establish. Once that cooler weather sets in, and once you get
consistent moisture plants are going to flourish, they're gonna grow really
easily. So just be sure to focus on finding cooler microclimates in your
garden, establishing a good irrigation system where plants are getting
consistent moisture, and using mulch all are going to help you to keep a more
consistent and balanced climate for your crops to get established in. And then
once the weather cools off, they're going to just they're going to take off; it's
going to be beautiful. So here are my picks for planting in August. Komatsuna
is going to grow beautifully during the heat of the summer and then the cooler
weather through the fall. It's the most versatile crop growing wise. It's this
beautiful Asian green, maybe you've never tried it before. It's not as common as it
really should be. It's got a really nice, mild, sweet, lightly spicy flavor. It can
only be described as complex. It's beautifully balanced. The culinary
potential is astounding: eat it raw, you can cook it up, it goes with a million
different applications. And what's great about it is it's easy to grow. It's going
to produce these beautiful, big leaves, with this really nice complex flavor and
it thrives in all kinds of weather. So grow it in a greenhouse, grow it outdoors,
you can really try it in any application and it's gonna bring these really nice
kind of lightly pungent sweet notes to whatever dish you want it to. So August
is when you're going to want get those carrot seeds in the ground.
Carrots are my number one favorite fall crop, but they do take a bit of skill to
get them past the germination point. That's because you're sowing them in
August, when it's super hot and they do not love to germinate in the super heat.
So what you want to do is make sure and keep the soil nice and moist for carrots.
You can cover the freshly sown carrots seed bed with maybe a wooden board or
anything to cast a bit of shade. You can situate your carrot planting in a bit of
natural shade in your garden. But what you're really going to want to do is
make sure that those seeds don't dry out. That's the real challenge with carrots
once you get them germinated and established, they're actually really easy
to grow, and they are gonna sweeten up and be candy sweet in the fall. So get
them past that tricky little germination phase in August and then let them just
cruise until you harvest them after the first fall frost. Because once they get
exposed to frost they, get even sweeter. They're amazing. And this variety I have
here is called Oxheart, and it's a super thick carrot. So maybe you have a nice,
raised bed, like these with light fluffy soil, for good carrot production, and you
don't necessarily need something like Oxheart. But if you don't - if you have
harder soil, or if you have rocky soil, if you've had trouble growing long carrots
before, try Oxheart, because it's gonna just blast right through that difficult
soil and give you a beautiful carrot no matter how heavy that soil is. So
bunching onions are another great choice for planting out in August. They're going
to fill your fall diet with lots of pungent onion flavor, and it's going to
boost your immune system because it's got that pungent quality to it.
He Shi Ko Bunching Onions are super easy to grow. This is a great choice for a
cold frame if you want to plant it out even a little bit later. They grow really
nicely in a cold frame, or you can just really stuff them into any kind of
partially shaded part of your garden. They appreciate a bit of dappled shade
in the hotter part of the season, so find yourself a little shady piece of the
garden and try bunching onions. They're lovely. So I want to
introduce one of my absolute favorite flowers- calendula. Why do I love
calendula? Well because it's beautiful. But mostly because it actually has pest
repelling qualities, so I like to plant it in my August garden so it can help to
ward off some of those pests later in the season. And this variety in
particular - Resina- it's actually the strongest calendula variety in terms of
medicinal properties. And yes this is also a medicinal plant. People make salves
and healing salves and things like that with Resina calendula. So grow it to
ward off pests, to add a little beauty to your fall garden. This is an awesome fall
kind of pumpkiny orange color, and you can use it for medicinal purposes as
well. And another bonus-calendula petals are actually edible. So that's why I love
this plant. I remember the first time I saw kohlrabi, I had no idea what I was
looking at. It looks like some sort of alien life-form; it's a totally funky
plant. But what it is it's it's a Brassica. It's related to cabbage and
cauliflower, and- and to Brussels sprouts. And you really grow it for this big,
swollen, stem. It's a little bit easier to grow than some of the other brassicas which
is a reason that I love it. This variety in particular gets really
really big. You can harvest it when it's small, or you can let it get to this
really big size. But the great news is it's an awesome variety for storing for
longer periods of time, and it stays super tender and buttery
even as the stems get really really big. You can make an entire meal out of just
one of these. So try some kohlrabi, treat it like the rest of the brassicas
that I've been talking about. So start it indoors, keep it cool, and then transplant
it out into the garden afterwards. And make sure to keep it well watered. A
great crop to start indoors in August is cabbage. You're going to want to start it
indoors, because you're going to be able to baby the crop a little bit better and
keep it cool and keep it moist, rather than if you were to direct sow it in the
hot August sun in your garden. So start these inside, start them in pots, and then
transplant them out to the garden when they're about this tall - a few inches tall
and more established. It's key to keep your cabbages well watered
until they're really established and growing during this hot, beginning part
of the growing season for them. In August it might be dry, and they're not going to
like that, it's going to really stress the plants out. So keep them well watered,
providing a few layers of mulch is going to really, really help. So give them a bit
of mulch, keep them well watered, maybe using a drip hose, whatever you need to
do, but keeping your cabbage well watered is going to be a recipe for success. Then
they're going to just cruise along until they mature in the fall. And these I love
these heads on this variety Kalibos. the pointed heads. They're so beautiful.
Customers keep sending in these phenomenal photos, it's one of the most
eye-catching varieties I've ever seen. And they're just gonna sweeten up for
fall, so you're gonna have beautiful slaws, sauerkraut, or it's just a great
cooking cabbage, whatever you want to do with it. And it's gonna really sweeten up
as those first fall frosts come in. So you don't want to miss out on growing
beets. This is one of my favorite crops of all time. I just love the earthy
flavor. Chiogga is a really good variety if you're not into the super earthy beet
flavor cause it's a little bit more mild. Market gardeners love this variety
because it's got those beautiful concentric rings. People really, really
respond well to this one. And also the beet greens on this one are really
really mild and tasty. So as far as a variety that's excellent for fall, Chiogga
is number one. I love this variety for fall. And then growing beets is actually
really, really easy this time of year. You just got to get them keep them cool and
well watered, when they're first germinating but once they take off,
they're quite easy to grow, and they're going to sweeten up fantastically by
fall. If you let them get exposed to just a little bit of frost, they're going to
convert some starches to sugars - they're gonna taste super sweet! And this is also
a great storage crop. They're gonna last a long time if you store them properly.
So it's great to start your broccoli indoors in August.
You're gonna want to get the plants established in pots, maybe trays - cell
trays whatever you can find, and then once they're about a few inches tall, you
can transplant them out into the garden. The key with good broccoli is to keep it
well watered. Don't let this plant get exposed to drought. Keep it well watered,
maybe adding a few inches of mulch will really, really help. Using drip tape is
really helpful - that's a drip watering system that's just going to consistently
provide moisture and it's not going to give a bunch of excessive moisture on
the leaves. It's going to just keep that moisture right at the root system.
Broccoli is super easy to grow once it's established, and if you give it enough
water. And once you harvest that first head it's actually going to produce tons
of little side shoots. And when this gets exposed to cool weather it just gets
more and more sweet. So don't worry about letting it get hit by a light frost- it's
actually going to do tremendously well after hitting being hit by a light frost.
So parsley is one of the most densely nutritious dark greens that you can grow.
And it loves cool weather so planting it in August is going to give it some time
to mature. Because parsley does take a little while to germinate, but once it
gets going it's a very easy crop and it loves cool weather. And you're going to
get these beautiful dark green sauces, you can blend up into beautiful sauces,
use it as a garnish. There's so many different uses for parsley, and its
really one that I recommend just sneaking into your winter diet, your fall
diet as much as possible because it is deeply nutritious. So be sure to plant
through the month of August. There's so much potential and you're going to reap
the benefits throughout the entire fall season - it's so incredibly rewarding. Some
takeaway tips: don't forget to keep your soil nice and cool and your plants well
watered at the very beginning of their growing stage in August. The plants might
be stressed out, so give them whatever support you can. If that means drip tape,
or just getting out into your garden and hand watering as much as possible but
keep those plants nice and cool. Don't forget to add a layer of mulch. Mulch is
going to conserve water, and it's going to keep the soil temperature from
extreme fluctuation. So mulch, keep your plants nice and watered. In order to keep
your pests down, because you may find that
your pest pressure is very high in August, you may consider things like
netting or floating row cover or you may have to do a bit of organic approved
spraying. Whatever you have to do be sure to keep those pests at bay at the early
part of the season. Maybe it means inter planting some things like calendula and
marigold in your garden to keep the pests at bay. So keep your pests pressure
down, don't skimp on the mulch, and be sure to keep your plants nice and cool
as they're getting established, and don't skimp on the watering. And good luck and
you guys are gonna have a beautiful crop for the fall.
you