Melinda’s Garden: Maximizing Your Harvest

Now that you've made your garden grow...how do you reap the most benefits when it comes to harvesting?

Now that you’ve made your garden grow…how do you reap the most benefits when it comes to harvesting?

Enjoy the biggest harvest, best flavor and most nutritional value from your garden vegetables with proper harvesting.
Harvest tomatoes when they are fully colored.
Leave them on the plant for an extra five to eight warm days for even better flavor.
You can harvest as soon as they start to show color and finish ripening them indoors if needed to beat a killing frost or hungry animals.
Pick snap beans when the pods are full size but before the seeds begin to bulge for the best flavor.
Thin onion plantings and use as green onions.
Harvest the remaining onions when the leaves topple and begin to dry.
Cut the outer leaves of leaf lettuce when four to six inches tall for the best flavor and greater productivity.
Once your family experiences home grown flavor, it will be easier to get them to clean their plates.
I’m Melinda Myers, check out our website for this and other gardening tips.