HOW TO GROW AND HARVEST SPINACH – Growing and harvesting Spinach is so easy and it’s one of those vegetables that is so tasty and so good for you. Don’t believe it… Ask Popeye. In this guide you can learn how to grow and harvest your own tasty spinach, so you’ll never have to buy it again, saving you money on your grocery bills, and you’ll always have a plentiful supply.
Growing Spinach
Step 1
You need to firstly you need to pick a spot in your garden that gets full sunlight. Spinach, with its broad leaves, really loves the sunlight so find a patch that gets direct and full sunlight for as much of the day as possible.
Step 2
Dig over the soil and add plenty of manure. Spinach grows well that has a Soil PH level of between 6 and 7. Mix into the soil 3 Parts Manure, 2 Parts Compost and 1 Part Sand. The manure and compost will provide the nutrients that spinach requires to grow and the sand will help with the drainage.
Step 3
Once you have prepared the soil you can sow your spinach seeds. You should sow your seed a few weeks before the last frost as spinach germinates well in cooler conditions.
Step 4
Plant your seeds approximately 1/2″ deep and about 3″ apart as this will provide sufficient room for each plant to grow. If you have a particularly large vegetable plot, then increasing the space of up to 6″ won’t do you any harm. Remember that spinach does have broad leaves that like the sun, so planting them apart does allow for the leaves to spread open without covering neighboring plants.
Step 5
Spinach like moist conditions so keep the soil damp and add more manure as the seedlings appear. You can add a layer of mulch, once the seedlings appear. This will help keep the weed growth down and it will also help to keep the soil moist.
Harvesting Spinach
Step 1
You can harvest spinach at any time. If you harvest it when the leaves are small, known as baby spinach, then these leaves are really suitable for salads. However you can let these grow much bigger and which become more suitable for cooking. Try cooking in a little olive oil with finely chopped garlic (that you’ve grown), this is simply delicious.
Step 2
Take a sharp kitchen knife and simply grab a cluster of spinach leaves. You can now cut the leaves with just a little stalk showing on each.
Step 3
Wash your spinach, cook it or eat it raw with your salads.
