Tomatoes
We plant around 30 tomato plants every year. This year we had 16 varieties of tomatoes. Most of them produced well. We plant them about a foot (30 cm) apart.…
What We Grow: Heirloom Crops & Varieties.
08curated dispatchesin this chapter
In a four-month growing window (June through September), variety selection determines whether a 2,000-square-foot garden produces a few summer salads or a full year of food. We prioritize indeterminate, vining, and cut-and-come-again cultivars that keep yielding until hard frost.
- 01 / Primary Strategy
- Multi-Harvest Indeterminate & pole cultivars
- 02 / Warm-Season Window
- 120 Days June through September in 5B
- 03 / Fertility System
- 100% Organic Comfrey tea, seaweed & castings
- 04 / Crop Dispatches
- 08 Guides Varieties, spacing & kitchen prep
8 dispatches in What we grow
2018 Field Study · Updated 2026 Edition · South-East Wisconsin (Zone 5B)
Asian Gourds
Bitter gourd, snake gourd, ash gourd, hairy gourd, luffa and tindora are vegetables we love. They need a longer growing season than what we have. So, we start…
Pole Beans
Every year we plant three or four varieties of pole beans and a couple of varieties of bush beans. Pole beans are much better suited to our needs. First of all,…
Bush Beans
We plant a couple of varieties of bush beans too every year. Though some of them are quite tasty, they are a pain to harvest. Bending down to pick them is not…
Brussels Sprouts
We had stopped growing them many years ago, as these large plants take a lot of space in the garden and they require almost the entire growing season to mature.…
Large Leafy Greens
In addition to the compact greens we grow on raised beds, Swiss Chard, Japanese Mustard, Kale, Leek, Celery, Nasturtium etc. are grown outside the raised beds.
Peppers
Cayenne is our favorite pepper. We use them in a lot of preparations in the kitchen. So, we grow at least 10-15 plants each year. They are either harvested when…
Kulli Corn
We try to avoid plants that take a lot of space in the garden and give a single harvest. Corn is one of them. Not only are they large, but they can grow quite…