Hensley’s succession planting and harvest programs
Above: harvesting a crop of purple sprouting broccoli.
Choosing varieties for each planting and harvest window
A planting program lays out how to stretch the harvest of one crop, using several methods, so you can supply your market for longer than a single planting would allow. Hensley’s planting programs take the guesswork out of succession planting and help you keep a crop coming through the season while getting the best yield and quality.
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Three ways to make a planting program work
- Sow different varieties at different times, each in its own planting and harvest window.
- Sow several varieties with different maturity dates on the same day so they come in one after another.
- Use season extenders such as row cover, or protected growing indoors or in tunnels, to get earlier spring crops and later fall and winter crops.
Why Use a Planting Program?
- Some varieties do best in warm months and others in cool weather. Grown in the wrong window, a variety may not reach its potential and can end up poor quality or unsellable, so timing matters.
- Growth speed changes with the season. In the long, warm days of late spring and early summer you can plant slower, heat-tolerant varieties; in the short, cool days of fall, choose faster, cold-tolerant ones.
