Plant in mid to late summer, some could be planted earlier or later depending on what you plant. and you can also plant broccoli, cabbage, carrots, and kale, and there's a few others that aren't coming to mind right now. hope it helps ;)

luv2garden09

I got a winter gardening catalog from Territorial Seeds that had some really interesting suggestions about what and when to plant for fall/winter harvest. I haven't visited their site lately, but they probably have the same information posted there.

I'm in the GR area, and want to plant some fall crops, too. I'm planning spinach, lettuce, and peas, too,and hope to put a cold frame over part of the bed to extend the season. I also have lots of leeks and some parsnips I can leave in the ground into the winter. I don't have lots of experience with it either, so let's see what we can do!

I am in SE MI and my garden is 50% winter garden, with hoophouses.

First, you should decide how far into the Fall you want to go. I go into February, which means I have a good idea of what is less or more cold-tolerant (inside a hoophouse).
The most tolerant are kale, radicchio, and collard, and some smaller greens such as corn salad, miner lettuce and arugula are hardier still. Root crops that will do well in the ground include parsnips and carrots. Then you have to decide whether you want a root cellar, which would allow you to eat a number of crops during the winter.

It is too late to plant Brussels sprouts, rutabaga, parsnip, and leeks. It is somewhat late to plant cabbage. You should plant collard and radicchio now. In July, plant carrots, turnips and broccoli. In August, kale, fava and peas. In september, bok-choy, broccoli raab, and arugula. In september, I also plant lettuce for the next spring, as it can overwinter in the hoophouse. I also plant garlic seeds (taken from garlic tops) to eat garlic shoots in February-March.

There is no need to save beds for the Fall garden. In my case, kale always follows garlic, collard and radicchio follow lettuce, collard, lacinato kale and fava follow early potatoes. I am also fairly ruthless in taking out squash or tomatoes which have stopped producing (or have been killed by SVB), and plant something else right away. I always have trays of seedlings at hand.

Posted by glib . . . In september, bok-choy, broccoli raab, and arugula. . .

I can't run that late in planting Asian greens but bok choy, especially, is an important part of my fall garden. I'm sure that it would be a good choice in a hoop house and I grow it there beginning in March, just haven't gotten around to protected growing in the fall. I plant those greens when the hot weather breaks in late August.

Posted by chinamigarden. . . I intend to try beets, lettuce, spinach and sugar snap peas. What else would work well for me?

I plant snow peas during the hottest week of the year - the last few days of July (on average, here). They have enuf time to produce pods before heavy frost in October. My reason in choosing them rather than the other pea types is that they should be able to produce pods even if developing seeds will be too late.

I'm also happy to have some pea tendrils during those last few weeks of the season but snap peas would work just as well for that purpose.

Steve

Cole crops grow well in September, but how do you get them started? Seedlings grow very long and stragly in the summer heat.

How do pea seedlings do in Summer heat? Will they just turn brown in 85-90 degree heat? If I waited until mid August to plant the seeds, I don't see how I could get much production by the end of October. Lack of solar radiation by late Sept can't help spur growth.

Carrots do well all year, you can pull them until December.

I've never had luck with Lettuce in the fall. Small and full of the bitter white sap. Yuck.

glib, can you give more information about your trays of seedlings? Do you have them outside or in the hoop house. Do you have them in part sun or full sun? I have not done well growing seedlings indoors. I have seen beautiful trays of large lettuce seedlings at a farmers market growing in flats with individual cells. Do you plant, then transplant to something larger?

In dappled shade outside. I use compost as growing medium. By now it is too hot to keep them in the sun. There are seedlings that will come up with this heat and some (like lettuce) that will just refuse to. Right now I have a tray of radicchio available, came up in days, no problem (it always does). I am waiting to clear some lettuce to plant these.

In the last two weeks I dispatched a tray of lacinato kale and one of collards. They don't grow much with the heat right now, but they came up fine and they will take off later and be ready in November.

To plant, I usually make time if there is rain in the forecast. With the tray, you can wait a bit until the time is right. I try to do it after work, so they have the night ahead of them, and I soak them good right away, even though they may be soaked again in another hour. I then help them (water daily) until the second good rain.

Here is a link to a planting guide for all of Indiana. I would think you could adjust by a week or so. I plan on planting brussells, cabbage, snap bean, carrot, broccolli, cucumber, sugar snap pea and spinach. Seems like the cabbage have bug issues planted in fall. But I have room and seeds. On this chart it has the average frost date, So adjust to your area.
http://www.hort.purdue.edu/hort/ext/Pubs/HO/HO_186.pdf

chinamigarden,
Click the link below, pick 'fall garden', plug in your dates and click 'process my data.' Easy-peasy.

Here is a link that might be useful: Grow Guide

thanks glib, I'm about to pull out spinach. Last year I lost some late planted beans just as they were flowering to an early frost. A low tunnel is supposed to be in the works. I can brag about my spinach and sugar snaps but other things didn't get watered enough while I was away so the germination was just about nil. I'm increasing the amount of water I put on the garden. I agree that an overcast day with rain predicted is a good day for the garden. I also like to use liquid fish fertilizer on transplants.