What to Plant in November: Vegetable Garden Growing Guide

Learn what to plant in November with Homesteaders of America Vegetable Garden Growing Guides!

Many folks throughout the country have closed down their garden for the growing season and are turning more to indoor activities now that the weather has grown cold. The rest is a welcome break from the garden toil of the past several months and a time to recharge the mind & body before another gardening year is upon us. Use this time to take soil tests, order amendments to replenish the garden’s nutrient levels, visit the library and expand your knowledge, plan a crop rotation, and take seed inventory. Before you know it those first seed catalogues will be in your mailbox and you can start discovering your new favorite crops & varieties and planning to make your next garden even more successful!

Meanwhile, in the southern parts of the United States, many fall gardens are in full-swing. Preparations are being made for frost with row cover and other season extension tools. Garlic is being planted, cover crops & mulch are being put down to protect the soil from run-off while supplying organic matter.

In the furthest reaches of the south, you may just be starting to plant the fall garden that, with an eye on the forecast, will take you all the way to spring with a supply of fresh vegetables.

What to Plant in November: Vegetable Garden Growing Guide

How to Use the Growing Guides

In the Growing Guides, you will learn what to plant each month according to when your last frost date. 

• Look up your last frost date by zip code if you don’t know it already.
• Choose the Growing Guide for this month
• Find which month your last frost date is in
• Follow the seed starting suggestions on the graphic

The Growing Guides will be targeted for the continental United States, which also includes some of the warmer areas of our country such as southern extremes Texas and Florida. Their growing season is vastly different from folks living in the northernmost states.

Be sure to follow us on social media, read our newsletter, or check back on the blog for updates throughout the year! 

Last Frost Date in January

Want to know what to plant in November if you last frost date is in January? The answer is, “Plenty!” Check out these crops you can be growing. You can start most of these either indoors or outdoors depending on your circumstances.

Last Frost Date in February

If you want your summer crops to keep churning out the produce, make sure you stay on top of the harvest. Your plants job is to make seed and if you skip harvesting for a week and the fruit over matures it will signal to the plant that its job is done and will begin to die.

Last Frost Date in March

Want to know what to plant in November if your last frost was in March? The good news is you can still get your greens in the ground and get a harvest before Jack Frost starts nipping. Make plans for season extension and you’ll be able to make the harvest roll in for even longer!

As some of your main crops begin to to die off, be sure to sow cover crop seeds to support your soil life, maintain topsoil, add fertility, and build organic matter. Winter rye is a good choice for overwintering. It can be tilled under in the spring or you can use a solarization tarp to kill it off. Other choices would be a combination of oats & peas or daikon radishes and turnips if you’d like to break up soil compaction. All of those will be killed off over the winter, leaving your garden ready to plant in the spring.

Also, if you didn’t save garlic seed from your harvest this year, make sure you’ve got seed ordered!

Last Frost Date in April

If you’d like to keep your garden going you’ll need to be thinking about which solution you’ll need to extend your season. Remember that every layer of protection will effectively bump you one growing zone south. Some northern gardeners can keep their garden growing almost year-round. Check out Eliot Coleman’s book, The Winter Harvest Handbook, for the best information about how to achieve this.

Last Frost Date in May & June

Without frost protection, your gardening season is over. Try to get as much clean-up and prep work for the spring done now because you never know if a soggy spring will set you back next year.

This is a great time to take a soil sample and submit it for testing. That way you can be sure to have all of your amendments purchased and ready to spread in the spring before planting. Amending your soil ensures that your plants have all the nutrients they need to grow and produce well. And well-nourished plants mean nutrient dense produce for your family’s table. Grow Abundant is an excellent resource & tool to help you learn how to replenish your soils depleted nutrients.

If you didn’t sow cover crops in your garden you can still protect the soil from runoff (while suppressing weeds) with a mulch of leaves, grass clippings, organic straw or weed-free hay.

If your ground is still workable, you can get garlic seed in the ground. Be sure to cover it with a nice bed of mulch to protect it over the winter.

Now is a great time to learn how to grow windowsill microgreens. It’s quite simple! They grow quickly and in a few short weeks you’ll once again be munching on fresh, crispy, homegrown greens. Try pea shoots, sunflower sprouts, and radishes to start. You can also grow broccoli, kale, beets, and more!

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