Organic Gardening Tips by Elena Gilbert - HTML preview

Chapter 8:

Harvesting

Synopsis

You have spent many days working hard for your organic garden and it is now about time to reap what you have sown. Harvesting is the most exciting and fulfilling part of your gardening journey. Though harvesting seems to be the final part of reaping the fruits of your hard works, you still need to do this task the right way. You need to carefully determine if the plants are really ready for harvesting. The following information can serve as your helpful harvesting guide.

It is highly essential to know the right harvesting time in your organic garden. This does not just depend on the ripeness of the crops or fruits nor the length or duration of growing season. There are other factors that need to be taken account for to ensure that you will have quality and plentiful harvest.

Maturity is one factor that defines if the plants are ready for harvesting. However, environmental conditions like day length and temperature can affect maturity.

There are different harvesting rules concerning each and every kind of plant and these are outlined below:

Harvesting

• Crops that gardeners have grown for vegetative parts such as roots, stems and leaves must be harvested while they are tender, young and immature. Good examples of these are radishes, lettuce, basil and broccoli. As a common rule, harvest often and early.
• Fruits like apples and tomatoes must be allowed to ripen in the plant however, there are exceptions to these. There are vegetable fruits that are better picked when young.
• Plants like pumpkins must be harvested when they reach the stage of maturity. Facilitating a thumbnail test is the best way to determine if these have already reached maturity.
• If you have planted potatoes and onions, harvest them when their tops started dying or falling over.
• Harvest pepper even if it is not yet ripe. These can be eaten in just any state or size but these are more flavorful when fully matured. Peppers are in full size and reached its final color which have reached full maturity

The most ideal time to harvest your organic garden is during early in the morning. This is because plants and crops during these times are cooler and got high water content. These are also crisper in texture as compared to those plants harvested during the latter part of the day.