Make the most of picking veggies

Fall vegetables are full of flavor and vitamins to keep you healthy. Here are some points to consider when picking these crops.

All winter squashes should be ripe and ready for harvest by now. This diverse family includes a variety of long-keeping squashes such as acorn, butternut, buttercup, delicata, hubbard and kabocha.

Leaving them out in your garden exposed to the sun for a week or so after they ripen will toughen their skins and improve storage quality. Cool basements with temperatures down to 50 degrees are preferred for storage.

Heads of lettuce are harvested by cutting with a knife close to the ground and severing the stem. Individual leaves can also be picked as you need them, allowing the plant to continue growth.

Scissors come in handy when harvesting lettuce growing under more crowded conditions. You can grab a handful of lettuce leaves with one hand and cut them loose with scissors in your other hand.

The way to harvest spinach is one leaf at a time. By pinching off only the largest leaves, you can keep spinach plants productive through next April.

Cabbages are ready for picking when their heads are firm and of a suitable size. Each cabbage plant produces one head, and it is best harvested before it splits open.

A single head of broccoli grows in the center of each broccoli plant. You harvest this crop by cutting with a knife several inches below the broccoli head. Always cut your broccoli heads before their florets separate and show yellow color.

Brussels sprouts are harvested by snapping them off the stalk by hand. You start snapping them off at the bottom of the stalk and work your way upward as time goes by and the sprouts get bigger.

Root crops can be pulled up and eaten whenever they reach a desirable size. This applies to beets, turnips, rutabagas and radishes. Carrots accumulate sugar throughout the fall and you can leave these cold hardy roots in the ground until you want to eat them.

Greens are harvested by removing their outer leaves as needed. Flavor is always better after a few frosts, so do not be in a hurry to harvest all of your mustard, kale, collard and turnip.

The leeks you planted last spring are finally ready to begin digging out of the ground. You will want to leave plenty of them in the ground, as these hardy members of the onion family can be harvested all winter.

Arugula is harvested much like lettuce, using scissors, or by removing only the oldest outer leaves. This spicy salad green is very cold hardy.

Davis is an Extension Agent for the Virginia Cooperative Extension. He can be reached by calling 455-3740.