Marie Iannotti - Grow Great Vegetables in New Jersey

Marie Iannotti

TIMBER PRESS

Portland, Oregon

Copyright 2019 by Marie Iannotti.

All rights reserved.

Photography and illustration credits on .

Published in 2019 by Timber Press, Inc.

The Haseltine Building

133 S.W. Second Avenue, Suite 450

Portland, Oregon 97204-3527

timberpress.com

Cover design by Amy Sly and Adrianna Sutton

eISBN 978-1-60469-951-7

A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress.

Learning to garden is an enthralling, never-ending process made all the more enjoyable by the many, many people who generously share the knowledge they have gleaned from both their triumphs and their disappointments. I thank them all. I appreciate every tip, every piece of advice, every seed or seedling, and especially every taste Ive so graciously been given.

I am especially grateful to the folks Ive met and worked with at Cooperative Extensions. What a wonderful organization filled with the most enthusiastic, helpful people. Whenever I have a question, they have an answer.

I can only imagine what goes on after I write the words. I am in awe of and so grateful to Julie Talbot, Cobi Lawson, and the team at Timber Press, whose persistent optimism make imposing tasks seem like a cakewalknot unlike gardening.

And, as always, huge thanks to my incredible husband, Michael, for never questioning my sanity as deadlines approach, in print or in the garden.

Becoming a seasoned vegetable gardener takes a lot of digging in the soil and digging for answers. I hope this book helps you with both.

I cant look through a seed catalog without choosing enough varieties to plant a football fieldsized garden, with an appetite for more. Just thinking about vegetable gardening makes me hungry. Few things in this world can compete with biting into a freshly picked fruit or vegetable. The scents, the vibrancy, and the anticipation of that eruption of flavor make growing food an all-sensory delight.

Very few edible plants cant be grown in New Jersey, especially if you are willing to push the seasonal envelope. Leafy greens, earthy root crops, luscious berries, and hearty winter squash are all possible. This climate provides gardeners a warm, sunny summer and plenty of chill days for those exacting plants like rhubarb that need a rest between seasons (kind of like us gardeners). We take a brief pause to celebrate the holidays, and then we reach for our seed catalogs and the gardening season is back underway.

Vegetable gardening allows us to be part of the seasons and their changes. Although some people mark spring by the whims of a mercurial groundhog, there is no denying that spring has begun when we see the first green shoots of spinach, asparagus, or rhubarb. Its not summer until we can bite into a beefy, glowing tomato, and just when the garden is overflowing with abundance in early fall, the shortening days remind us that it is time to slow down. The New Jersey vegetable garden may go under cover for the winterunder mulch, under plastic, under snow, or undergroundbut the process never ends; it just keeps re-creating itself in a most comforting, and often frustrating, way.

Our part of the world is the perfect place to enjoy the change of seasons, and each season brings its own reward. The information offered here will help you make sure you do not miss out on any of the gardening enjoyments the state has to offer, whether it is filling your winter home with sprouting greens and luscious fruits or the succession of harvests from the first spring thaw through the closing curtain of frost in the fall. New Jersey may be thought of in some places as urban and industrial, but it is also home to some of the best farmers markets, locavore restaurants, and resilient gardeners who can turn any abandoned lot or alleyway into a feast for the soul.

Having four true seasons offers the down time needed to plan and prepare the garden year, and getting the most from a vegetable garden does require a little advanced planning. Its all laid out for you in this book, including a year-round schedule to show what you can prepare, plant, and harvest each season. Whatever your level of gardening experience, you can jump in at any time and get up to speed. Read and digest it all at once, and keep it handy to guide you month by month.

Viewing your garden throughout the year is the best way to learn the intimate nuances of what each plant wants. That knowledge will serve you well, because no two years are the same. It is the rare spring when we can enjoy the gardening tradition of planting our peas on St. Patricks Day, but it is not unheard of. What I most hope you will glean from this book is the cycle of the garden and the role you play in keeping it moving forward. New Jersey offers a climate for savoring everything from arugula to zucchini; think about what you love to eat, and get ready to take it to another level.

Whether youre maximizing space in a single raised bed or transforming your backyard, a vegetable garden gives you lots to look forward to.

The vegetable garden at Jockey Hollow in Morristown shows the potential of New Jersey gardens in early spring, including an explosion of rhubarb.

New Jersey got the nickname The Garden State because it was growing enough food to help feed its neighbors, Pennsylvania and New York. Though manufacturing has long since outpaced agriculture here, it does give you a sense of how hospitable New Jersey can be for growing vegetables, with a sought-after combination of good soil, abundant rain, and plenty of sunshine and warm days. However, it also presents challenges, in the form of hurricanes, noreasters, and those hazy, hot, humid summers that can wilt gardeners along with their plants. For a small state, it has a surprising amount of diversity. Farms here may be losing ground, but New Jersey gardeners are still growing and enjoying the fruits of the land.

Asking a gardener what zone he or she gardens in is an invitation for commiseration or envy. Plant hardiness zones tell us the length of an areas growing seasonwhen we can expect the first and last frosts of the seasons, which is crucial information for any gardener. Not all growing seasons are equal, however. Knowing the arc of your areas particular growing season will help you extend the time in which you can grow and harvest vegetables. Youll know when its safe to get started with frost-tolerant, leafy greens; when you can expect them to fizzle out and need replacing with plants that like it hot; and how long you can expect to enjoy every harvest.