A green hedge against winter

12-26-2009

A green hedge against winter

An afterthought is growing on the glass-enclosed front porch, and soon it will fill - and refill - the salad bowl. In early October, I scattered the leftovers of a seed packet over the soil of a forlorn-looking window box, watered it when I remembered and was pleased a couple of weeks later to see lettuce growing.

We brought the box in before the killing frost, and the abundance there against a backdrop of snow, plus encouragement from Sam Kass and Kathleen Merrigan on backyard hoop houses, helped motivate us to create cold frames for the backyard garden.

They will be simply made of translucent plastic with wooden sides, most likely A-framed and sitting within the raised beds. Beneath them, I will start spinach, lacinato kale, chard, collards - and more mesclun. Salads, unlike any other green, provide the gumption required to get through the winter.



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