It's an easy way to save a little money and get some great tasting vegetables. With the downturn in the economy, gardening is gaining popularity.
Whether you have a container garden sitting on your apartment balcony, retirement home patio or a full blown garden in your backyard, there is a lot of rewards and benefits to growing some of your own food.
To start off you need to know that Cincinnati is located in the
USDA Hardiness Growing Zone 6A. A few of our Indiana counties in the northwest part of our viewing area are Zone 5B.
The average date of our last frost is April 13. That gives you 192 growing days to grow your favorite vegetables and herbs.
The first crop that you can plant in your container or garden are frost-hardy plants. They are able to withstand the early frost that sometimes still occurs in early spring.
Frost-hardy crops allow you to get an early start to your garden. Many times you will be able to harvest these early crops before it is even warm enough to plant tomatoes.
Frost-hardy crops include kale, lettuce, spinach and swiss chard. Root crops like beets, carrots, onions, potatoes, radishes and turnips are also part of this group.
Peas are another favorite. They grow best at air temperatures between 60F and 65F and can be planted when the soil temperature reaches 40F.
