The coronavirus pandemic has shut down life in many different ways since March, but it hasn’t slowed down the urge for many to grow their own vegetables.
Kelly Lorenz, a horticulturalist and general manager at The Mustard Seed Landscaping & Garden Center in Chanhassen, said there was much more demand than supply this spring.
“It was a wild April and May,” she said. “It was hard to get everything we needed for our customers. We had less product than usual to stock our tables when it came to our season. It came in slowly.
“We’d get a little bit here and there, and we’d contact our customers to say that plant finally came in,” Lorenz added. “Everyone needed to have a little more patience, but I think everyone got what they were looking for.”
Back in April, Burpee Seeds, a Pennsylvania company that’s been around since 1876, reported it temporarily had to stop taking new orders online “after seeing an overwhelming surge in demand” for vegetable seeds.
Times of national crisis tend to bring out more first-time home growers of fruits and vegetables.
In 2009 following the Great Recession in the U.S., a severe financial crisis that lasted from 2007 to 2009, The National Growing Association reported that 60% of home gardeners “said their need to grow food was at least somewhat motivated by economic conditions, and 14% said it was very much motivated by economic conditions.”
The pandemic seems to have brought out the same kind of gardeners now.
“We have definitely seen new people to the growing vegetable world,” Lorenz said. “They’re feeling more ambitious to try to explore it, and that’s a good thing.”
Cal’s Market in Savage also saw a busy spring. Megan Holz, who is part of the gardening team there, said their vegetable plants have pretty much sold out for the season, and in a normal year business usually teeters off around mid-July.
“We usually have large supples of tomatoes and pepper plants; those are usually the most popular,” Holz said. “But all our veggies and annuals have been picked over. Our inventory comes from growers and it’s been hard to get more from them. Everyone was sold out, so we had to search to get more in.”
Lorenz said it’s been an ideal growing season, despite the recent heat wave. The leafy green vegetables like lettuce, spinach and mustard varieties, which prefer cooler temperatures, were able to grow abundantly from April to early June.
The heat-loving plants — tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, squash, zucchini, okra, melons and all of the different cucumber varieties — start to take off in gardens around July. Pole beans and bush beans can be planted after the last frost (usually early May) and they’ll grow all summer long.
The good spring weather was also great for corn and soybean crops, according to the Minnesota Corn Growers Association.
Lorenz said many gardeners are one-season growers, plant in the spring, let it all grow and then harvest over the summer months. But don’t forget about a fall crop. The season doesn’t have to end before Labor Day.
There are plants that you can start by seed in August and harvest in October. A second round of spinach or quick-growing lettuce plants will tolerate cooler temperatures, even when they fall into the 30s overnight.
A second round of sugar snap peas is also an option since they tolerate cooler weather. Kale is so hardy it can last into November, so don’t pull it from the ground too early.
“A row of radishes is a good second crop that can be stretched out into the fall,” Lorenz said.
Don’t forget Halloween either, where some plants you grow in the garden can make decorating the house fun for trick or treaters.
“Pumpkins and gourds can grow late into the season,” Holz said.
July 09, 2020 at 09:00PM
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Pandemic brings out first-time vegetable growers (copy) - SW News Media
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