Planting Spinach Successfully and Successively—a Bonus Approach By Jan Fedrizzi Eagle County Master Gardener

Our hearts and taste buds are gladdened in late spring, as the first leaves of garden-fresh spinach appear. What a welcome treat for salads and many a cooked dish! After a few weeks of harvesting tasty spinach, however, gardening frustration sets in. By mid-summer when the leaves are either bitter or have gone to seed (bolted), you are wishing for a magic spinach wand to wave over said patch, enabling a longer spinach-growing season. How to plant smart and harvest much of the year? Spinach seed needs temperatures of 45   ͦF to 65   ͦF to germinate and to produce well. It prefers the cool, sunny weather of late spring and early fall. Any colder and the spinach won’t grow; any warmer and it bolts. In general, spinach requires rich soil: amend the spinach bed well with compost and/or manure and a complete organic fertilizer before planting. Keep the bed evenly moist and weeded and thin to 2” apart. One path to earlier gratification—and a longer harvest--is sowing the spinach initially i