The second half of July is an exciting time in my garden. Fresh crispy greens, cherry tomatoes, cucumbers, green onions and herbs in abundance. The summer squash is producing it's first fruits, the cabbages are heading and the beans are flowering - within a few weeks it will be time to harvest.
Some of these plants will keep producing until the first frost, but many will have done their bit and leave empty pockets behind toward the middle of August, leaving plenty of time to replant the pockets for a fall garden.
The best time to plant a fall garden will vary for where you live - here on the west coast of Sweden the second half of July is a great time for sowing spinach, ruccola, beets, lettuce, green onions, Welsh onions, radishes, mustard greens, rutabaga, Swiss chard, kale, endive/radicchio, dill and Asian greens like pak choi and tatsoi. In a warmer climate these can of course be sown even later.
Varieties that are fast growing and/or tolerant of cold are ideal, and if you have an enclosed balcony or greenhouse to move your GreenStalk into as the temperatures drop or if you get a rainy autumn, you can extend the season even more.
I got my fall garden started in plug trays to have small plants ready as growing pockets become available.