If eating more nutritious foods is one among your gardening goals, you’ll want to urge busy growing spinach, a cool-season veggie to boost in spring and fall. Loaded with vitamins and minerals, spinach is taken into account a superfood due to its many health benefits. Eating spinach regularly may help normalize blood glucose levels, prevent cancer, promote stronger bones, and undo the damage done to our circulatory systems once we eat too many fats. All this during a delicious, high fiber package!

Sowing and Growing Spinach

You can start your spring spinach as seedlings, direct-sown seeds, or both. I start seeds indoors for my earliest planting because in late winter spinach seeds germinate better inside where it’s warm. the perfect germination temperature for spinach is 70°F (21°C). I direct-sow a second planting later in spring when the soil has warmed enough to support steady germination.

To improve my germination luck, I prime spinach seeds a couple of days before planting them. This process involves soaking the seeds in temperature water overnight, then letting them dry at temperature for each day or two. When spinach seeds are primed during this way, the primary stage of germination takes place under warm, clean conditions, therefore the seeds are much faster to sprout after they’re planted within the garden.

Cool-season weeds must be plucked bent keep them from overrunning the bed, but spinach seedlings are sturdy little plants. for brand spanking new gardeners, one among the good things about growing spinach is being close to distinguish the seedlings from weeds. Spinach seedlings throw out long, strappy seedling leaves that make them easy to spot when a replacement bed is bursting with unknown green things.

The biological processes that release soil-borne nutrients to plants proceed slowly in cold soil, so early spinach often benefits from a radical drench with an organic, water-soluble fertilizer like fish emulsion. Fertilize your spinach after the seedlings are well established and growing rapidly. you ought to see a quick response because well-fed plants produce larger, more robust leaves than struggling ones. If your plants stay spindly despite excellent care, you’ll get to rule out boron deficiency as a possible problem.

Harvesting Spinach

At a well-stocked produce market, you would possibly choose from baby spinach, larger leaf spinach referred to as teenage spinach or mature plants tied into a bundle. As gardeners, the most important payoff comes when baby leaves are left intact therefore the plants can quickly grow into robust, almost mature teens. you’ll then harvest spinach by pinching off the simplest two or three leaves from each plant every five days approximately for up to 2 weeks.

Chill your leaf spinach immediately to limit the loss of vitamin C , which is usually highest in freshly harvested spinach. make certain to scrub your spinach thoroughly in cool water before eating it, taking care to get rid of soil that always clings to the undersides of the leaves.

Understanding Spinach Bolting

For spinach, long days that last quite 14 hours are a trigger to modify from vegetative to reproductive growth. When this happens, new leaves become smaller and more pointed, and therefore the center of the plant rises and elongates into a stalk – a process called bolting. Pollen-producing male plants bolt a couple of days before seed-bearing females, and in both cases, it’s best to tug up and compost the plants. The leaves of bolting spinach plants taste bitter, and once spinach bolting begins, the plants won’t return to producing tasty new leaves.

Studies have shown that giving spinach an early start in cool soil may delay bolting, so don’t worry about beginning seedlings while the soil remains chilly. you’ll want to possess many crisp leaves to enjoy in strawberry-gilded salads, one among the height experiences to expect once you get into growing spinach.

Will eating many fresh spinach pump up your muscles love it did for Popeye? Probably not, but growing a spring crop of spinach will maximize your garden’s nutritional output of delicious, garden-fresh greens.

If you’ve got ever tried starting spinach from seed, then you almost certainly know first hand just how tricky it are often . But don’t worry, once you learn the secrets for fulfillment , you’ll have a garden filled with these yummy greens!

The best part is that these instructions work regardless of what sort of spinach seeds you would like to grow. Woohoo!

TYPES OF SPINACH SEEDS TO GROW

You may be surprised to find out that there are several sorts of spinach seeds that you simply could grow. Some have slightly different flavors and textures, while others are slow bolting, or have larger leaves.

A few of my personal favorite varieties are Bloomsdale (bolt-resistant), Monstrueux Viroflay (large leaves), Lavewa (heat tolerant), Butterflay (large leaves), and Matador (slow to bolt).

WHAT DO SPINACH SEEDS LOOK LIKE?

If you’ve never planted them before, spinach seeds have a reasonably distinct look to them. They’re generally about 1/4″ wide, though some could also be smaller.

The best thanks to describe their shape is it appear as if a teardrop – one end is rounded, and therefore the other is pointed. Their color also can vary, and be anywhere from brown to cream, or maybe yellowish.Spinach seeds in my hand

RECOMMENDED METHOD FOR SOWING SPINACH SEEDS

Spinach doesn’t wish to be transplanted, and doing so can trigger it to bolt prematurely. So, it’s best to direct sow the seeds, instead of starting them indoors or winter sowing them.

In fact, I don’t even recommend trying to start out them indoors – it’s a recipe for failure. It’s actually very nice because the meaning you don’t need to worry about buying any equipment or caring for the seedlings!

WHEN TO PLANT SPINACH SEEDS

Like I discussed above, growing spinach from seed is all about timing. The key to success is planting it during the cooler months of the year.

If you plant them too late, the seeds might not germinate because it’s too warm. And albeit they are doing find yourself germinating, the warmth will trigger the plants to bolt directly .

Since it prefers the cold, plant spinach seeds directly into the garden 4-6 weeks before your average last frost date, or as soon as your soil is workable in early spring.

You could also plant the seeds in late summer for a fall harvest, since it’s such a quick growing crop. Spinach is cold hardy, so it won’t be killed off by spring or fall frosts.

If you reside during a warmer climate with mild winters, sow the seeds once the weather cools down within the fall, and grow your spinach through the winter.

You can also stagger your harvests by sowing the seeds intermittently throughout the spring and/or fall, therefore the plants mature at different times.

PLANTING SPINACH SEEDS

There’s nothing fancy you would like to try to do before planting spinach seeds, no soaking nicking, or cold stratification is important.

If you would like to undertake it, soaking spinach seeds before planting can help to hurry up germination time. But, since you’ll be sowing them directly into your garden, pre-soaking isn’t necessary.

HOW TO PLANT SPINACH SEEDS STEP-BY-STEP

Probably the most thing that makes spinach seeds very easy to grow is that the incontrovertible fact that you don’t need any equipment in the least. Just a weed-free spot in your garden, and a packet of seeds.

Step 1: Prepare the soil – relax the soil, and take away any weeds, or large rocks and sticks. Amend poor soil with compost or worm castings, then mix an organic granular fertilizer into it before sowing the seeds.

Step 2: find out the spacing – you’ll either space the seeds 2″ apart, then thin them later. Or space them 4-6″ apart if you don’t want to thin the seedlings.

Step 3: Plant the seeds – Spinach seeds should be planted 1/2″ deep. If you’re using fresh seeds, then you simply got to plant one per hole. Otherwise, if they’re old, then plant 2-3 per hole.

You can either lay the seeds on top of the soil, and gently push them down, or make holes first and drop them in.

I like to mark the row spacing with a line, then make shallow holes within the soil so i do know exactly where the seeds will go.Directing sowing spinach in my garden

Step 4: Cover the seeds – Once you’re done sowing the seeds, cover them with soil, and gently press it down. Don’t pack it tight, but only enough in order that the soil will are available contact with the seeds.

Step 5: Water – Use a coffee setting on your hose so you don’t displace the seeds, then water the bed until the soil is evenly moist. Don’t overdo it though, the soil shouldn’t be completely saturated or soggy.

SPINACH GERMINATION TIME

When planted within the right soil, spinach seeds germinate very quickly. It only takes about 5-10 days for the seedlings to start out emerging.

If the soil it too warm or too wet, it’ll inhibit germination. So, if your spinach seeds aren’t growing, then it might be too warm or soggy for them.

WHAT DO SPINACH SEEDLINGS LOOK LIKE?

When they first begin of the soil, baby spinach seedlings will have two long, narrow leaves. These are called the “seed leaves”. All of those that grow than are called “true leaves”.

The true leaves appear as if tiny spinach leaves, and it only takes a few days for those to start out forming after the seed leaves unfurl. Spinach seeds germinating

HOW TO look after SPINACH SEEDLINGS

Since it’s best to direct sow them, you don’t get to worry an excessive amount about caring for the seedlings. Woohoo! But here are a couple of tips to urge them off on the proper foot…

WATER

One of the explanations it’s so low maintenance is that, since it’s usually cool and wet within the spring, I rarely got to worry about watering my spinach plants.

Spinach likes tons of water, but it doesn’t like wet or saturated soil. confirm to grow it during a spot in your garden that has fast draining soil, and never allow it to dry out completely.

FERTILIZER

I like to top-dress my soil with a granular fertilizer before I plant the seeds to offer them the additional nutrients they have.

As soon as spinach seedlings begin growing their first true leaves, you’ll start using liquid fertilizer on them. you’ll buy compost tea concentrate, or get tea bags and brew your own from scratch.

Spinach seedlings also love being fed with fish emulsion or liquid kelp, which are two of my favorites to use in my garden.Baby spinach seedling

THINNING SPINACH SEEDLINGS

If you planted more than one seed per hole, or sowed them too close together, then you’ll need to thin the seedlings.

Once they get to be about 2″ tall with a few true leaves, thin them out so they are about 4-6″ apart. Simply choose the healthiest one to keep, and then remove the rest.

TROUBLESHOOTING COMMON PROBLEMS

There’s nothing worse than taking the time to plant all those seeds, only to have problems that you don’t know how to fix.

• Spinach seeds not germinating – If your seeds never germinated, then it was either too wet, too warm, or the seeds were old, and no longer viable. Always plant fresh spinach seeds in well-draining, cool soil for best results.
• Seedlings aren’t growing – If your seedlings aren’t growing any larger, it could be because it’s too shady, the soil is either too wet or dry, or the weather is too hot for them. Keep the soil evenly moist, and try feeding them to see if that helps to trigger new growth. Otherwise, next time adjust your placement and/or planting schedule.
• Spinach seedlings bolting – There are two things that trigger spinach seedlings to bolt right away. They were either transplanted, or the temperature is too hot. To avoid this next time, never transplant the seedlings, and always either plant the seeds in very early spring, or in the fall for a winter crop.