Elzer-Peters - Northwest fruit & vegetable gardening: plant, grow, and harvest the best edibles

First published in 2013 by Cool Springs Press, an imprint of the Quayside Publishing Group, 400 First Avenue North, Suite 400, Minneapolis, MN 55401

2013 Cool Springs Press

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Digital Edition: 978-1-61058-966-6
Softcover Edition: 978-1-59186-554-4

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Elzer-Peters, Katie.

Northwest fruit & vegetable gardening : plant, grow, and harvest the best edibles : British Columbia, northern California, Oregon & Washington / Katie Elzer-Peters.

p. cm.

Includes index.

ISBN 978-1-59186-554-4

1. Fruit-culture--Northwest, Pacific. 2. Vegetable gardening--Northwest, Pacific. I. Title. II. Title: Northwest fruit and vegetable gardening.

SB355.5.N67E48 2013
634--dc23

2013027050

Acquisitions Editor: Mark Johanson
Design Manager: Cindy Samargia Laun
Layout: S. E. Anderson

FRUIT & VEGETABLE GARDENING

Plant, Grow, and Harvest the Best Edibles

KATIE ELZER-PETERS

For my Dad. I will never forget our long, long, long drive to Seattle and back, and our 2 a.m. stop in Murdo, South Dakota. Thank you for everything.

I always liked to write, but without the patient instruction of Mrs. Wilhoite, Mrs. Quandt, Mrs. Libby, Dr. Swasey, Dr. Garrison, and a graduate student teacher at Purdue whose name Ive long forgotten, but whose influence was enormous, I would not be the same person today, and would not have the privilege to do what I do. Billie Brownell has continued to nurture my writing over the past few years, and I appreciate all of the insights and improvements she has helped me make. Billie, I hear your voice in my ear when I writeand thats a good thing.

My thanks go to Roger Waynick, original Publisher of Cool Springs Press, and to Mark Johanson, my Acquiring Editor for this project, each for taking a chance on me.

Once you start working on a book, there are people along the way that take the word doc and make it into a beautiful book. For that I have to thank the copy editors and designers and hort editors and indexers for their work. Without them, its all just words on the computer that might or might not make sense, and are certainly not very interesting to look at.

Every writer needs a cheerleader, and Tracy Stanley at Cool Springs has been that and more. She is the most patient, encouraging, and helpful editor one could ask for. This has been much easier with you to help me. Thank you so much, Tracy!

The Owner and Chef of Epic Food Co., James Bain, along with his staff, have been so friendly and nice, allowing me to camp out, drink their tea, eat their chocolate chip cookies, steal their WiFi, and devour their glorious vegetable creations while working on this book. Thank you.

And I couldnt do anything without the love and support of my parents, who never said no when I wanted them to buy me a book and my husbandchief garden-waterer and dog wrangler in the house. Joe, you have the patience of a saint, and Im glad youre mine.

I have been gardening since I could walk, and I have enjoyed, throughout my professional career, teaching others how to garden.

When faced with the task of making vegetable gardening an easily digestible (pun intended) topic for new gardeners, I tried to come up with a method of organization that differed from the usual AZ list of plants.

Organization by Function, Not Name

Gardens dont grow well when alphabetized. I know this because Ive tried to plant alphabet vegetable gardens for kids. The cucumbers end up growing all over the beets, and the grapes shade the eggplants. Its messy. So why should your gardening book be organized that way? Sure, its easy to look things up alphabetically, but what if the book, through the way it is organized, could help you plan your garden?

Now were talking! (Theres always the index and the alpha-order plant list to help you look up the location of your favorite veggies information.)

This book covers two fairly different climates in Oregon and Washington: the moist temperate coastal region, which experiences a fairly narrow range in temperature throughout the year, and the inland Northwest (the eastern parts of the states) that are colder in the winter and hotter in the summer than the coastal region. Certain plants, traditionally known as cool-season vegetables, flourish year-round in the coastal regions, but grow best in the spring and fall in the high plains. Warm-weather vegetables require more TLC on the coast, but perform well during the summer in the East. How do you know what to plant, when? Thats why we grouped the plants the way we did.

Your fruit or vegetable garden doesnt need to be this big in order for you to enjoy fresh produce!

A few holes in the leaves of this eggplant plant wont affect the fruit.

It isnt just weather you have to be concerned about, though. The plant families (stone fruits, cabbage relatives) and their growth habits (tree, shrub, vine) also influence where you plant them and how you grow them. The fruits section is organized by growth habit to make it easy for you to figure out where to plant the plants so that they produce well for you without taking over your entire garden.

Hopefully this admittedly unusual style will help when youre ready to put shovel to soil. Just open to the section you want to tackle and go!

Never Too Ugly to Eat

If theres one piece of advice I could give to any new gardenerthe one thing you cant ignoreit is this: your garden doesnt have to be gorgeous to produce well. Your tomato plant could look like it is on its last legs, but if it is still flowering and pumping out tomatoes, dont sweat it.

The eggplant leaves might have spots. The eggplants will probably be fine. Just because you see a few holes here and there doesnt mean you need to bring out the big guns and spray everything.

If you see aphids on the plants, get out the hose and spray them. If that doesnt work, try insecticidal soap. (Read on to learn how to deal with aphids and other pests.) If you see a giant tomato hornworm, pluck it and squash it. But dont feel discouraged if your garden doesnt look like a magazine cover. Is what youre growing tasty? Good. Thats what youre going for.

Now get out there and get your hands dirty! Get the book dirty, too! Thats what its for.