I prefer
kale to not get very stunted, if only for aesthetics: on my soil,
one vanity fertigation about mid-July keeps this row looking
impressive all summer. Other gardens with poorer soil might need
more support. This much kale may seem an enormous oversupply, but
between salads and steaming greens with potatoes we manage to eat
almost all the tender small leaves it grows during winter.

Row 4: Root Crops

Mostly carrots, a few beets. No irrigation, no fertigation, none
needed. One hundred carrots weighing in at around 5 pounds each and
20-some beets of equal magnitude make our year's supply for salads,
soups, and a little juicing.

Row 5: Dry-Gardened Salads

This row holds a few crowns of French sorrel, a few feet of parsley.
Over a dozen giant kohlrabi are spring sown, but over half the row
grows endive. I give this row absolutely no water. Again, when
contemplating the amount of space it takes, keep in mind that this
endive and kohlrabi must help fill our salad bowls from October
through March.

Row 6: Peas, Overwintered Cauliflower, and All Solanaceae

Half the row grows early bush peas. Without overhead irrigation to
bother them, unpicked pods form seed that sprouts excellently the
next year. This half of the row is rotary tilled and fertilized
again after the pea vines come out. Then it stays bare through July
while capillarity somewhat recharges the soil. About August 1, I wet
the row's surface down with hose and fan nozzle and sow overwintered
cauliflower seed. To keep the cauliflower from stunting I must
lightly hand sprinkle the row's center twice weekly through late
September. Were water more restricted I could start my cauliflower
seedlings in a nursery bed and transplant them here in October.

The other half is home to the Solanaceae: tomato, pepper, and
eggplant. I give this row a little extra width because pea vines
run, and I fertigate my Solanaceae, preferring sprawly tomato
varieties that may cover an 8-foot-diameter circle. There's also a
couple of extra bare feet along the outside because the neighboring
grasses will deplete soil moisture along the edge of the garden.

Row 7: Water-Demanding Brassicas

Moving away from irrigation on the other side of the raised bed, I
grow a succession of hybrid broccoli varieties and late fall
cauliflower. The broccoli is sown several times, 20 row-feet each
sowing, done about April 15, June 1, and July 15. The late
cauliflower goes in about