Roots & tubers
Beets
Spring and fall rounds; roots plus greens.
- Outside
- Direct Feb, again Sep to Oct
- Where
- Raised bed or in ground
- Sun
- Full sun; tolerates light shade
- Water
- Deep soak in dry spells; swings make woody rings
- Harvest
- Apr to May, then Nov to Dec
Care
- Water
- Consistent moisture matters most: a deep soak about weekly, more when the fall dry spells land, with the finger test deciding. Swinging between wet and dry writes itself into the root as pale, woody rings, so mulch and hold the schedule.
- Sow
- Direct sow in February, the county's spring list, and again in September into October on the fall list, half an inch deep and an inch or two apart. Every seed is really a small cluster, so seedlings come up in bunches: thin to 3 to 4 inches, cutting not pulling, and eat the thinnings as greens.
- Feed
- Beets shrug off lean soil, so a shovel of compost worked in at sowing is plenty. Go easy on nitrogen and skip the liquid feed; a surplus pushes leafy tops at the root's expense.
- Ready
- Pull anywhere between a walnut and a small apple; the small roots are tenderest, and the fall round sweetens as the cool settles in. Twist off the tops and cook them like the chard they are related to; the thinnings came first.
- Trouble
- Pale, woody rings through the root: a wet-then-dry swing, so keep the water even. Seedlings left in bunches grow spindly: every seed is a cluster, so thin hard. A spring round still standing in June turns strong and woody in the heat; let it go and wait for the September row.
In a bag?
- No
- The Texas container guide lists no size for beets, and the bed grows the whole crop anyway, roots below and chard-flavored greens above. The February and September rounds in a raised bed outplant anything a patio bag could hold.
Beets run twice here: a February sowing for late-spring roots, and a September round that sweetens into winter, with a bunch of greens off every sowing.
Growing
The county lists beets twice, in the February spring list and the September-October fall list, and both rounds are easy here. Sow thin and expect clusters; thinning to a few inches is not optional, and the thinnings are the first greens of the season. The spring crop pulls in April and May, done before the heat; the fall round matures into the cool, tastes better for it, and holds in ground that never freezes solid.
Varieties
The state sheet lists Chioggia, Detroit Dark Red, Pacemaker II, Red Ace and Ruby Queen; Travis County adds Bull's Blood, Cylindra and Golden.
In the kitchen
Roots roast wrapped and slip their skins under a thumb; the tops go in the pan with garlic, botanically chard in all but name. The fall roots hold in the bed for winter meals pulled as wanted.