Regional guide
Connecticut Crop Planning Calendar Vegetable Garden
UConn Extension crop planning calendar for Connecticut vegetable growers using frost-aware field timing, indoor starts, cover crops, and fall reset windows.
Climate signals
- The UConn Connecticut Vegetable Crop Calendar says it is for educational purposes to assist growers in making planting decisions and cannot guarantee exact planting or harvesting dates.
- The calendar says there are many variables that shift year to year, so the recommendations are generalized.
- In spring, the calendar uses the last frost date as the field trigger before direct seeding peas, beets, sweet corn, Swiss chard, spinach, and carrots.
- It separates protected indoor seeding, direct outdoor seeding, hardening off, transplanting, cover-crop sowing, harvest slowdowns, and soil testing into month-by-month windows.
Planning notes
- In March, prepare seeding trays and potting media, then seed crops indoors or under protection including basil, onions, Asian greens, broccoli, kale, cabbage, cauliflower, beets, spinach, herbs, and lettuce.
- The calendar says to begin seeding these crops indoors or under protection: lettuce, peas, peppers, tomatoes, and eggplant, before continuing protected starts for tomatoes, peppers, and eggplant in April.
- In April, continue protected starts for tomatoes, peppers, and eggplant, plant potatoes, and begin spring cover crops such as mustard, oats, annual rye grass, clover, and alfalfa where those fit the farm plan.
- Direct seed after last frost date: peas, beets, sweet corn, Swiss chard, spinach, and carrots.
- The spring calendar says to plant hardened-off cool-season transplants in the field, then set out transplants to harden off: tomatoes, eggplant, peppers, and sweet corn.
- In late spring, seed melons, summer squash, beans, cucumber, and squash indoors or under protection, then seed radish, turnip, lettuce mix, and corn outdoors.
- In June, plant sweet potato slips, direct seed sweet corn, transplant tomatoes, peppers, and eggplants, seed summer cover crops including buckwheat, and seed winter squash indoors.
- In July, seed fall starts indoors for broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, beets, kale, lettuce, and Brussels sprouts, while also direct seeding carrots and beets.
- In late July, seed fall carrots, beets, chard, rutabaga, turnips, and cabbage, then sow fall cover crops.
- In August, seed heading brassicas, and for a late harvest seed head and leaf lettuce, chard, spinach, radishes, and turnips.
- In September, cucumber, squash, and corn harvests will slow down, and tomato and pepper harvests will slow down; continue harvesting lettuce, spinach, radishes, carrots, turnips, Asian greens, and harvest gourds, squash, and pumpkins while continuing to sow cover crops.
- In October, plant perennial onions, shallots, and leeks, harvest beets, kale, lettuces, brassicas, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, cabbage, carrots, scallions, and spinach, and test your soils for nutrient analysis, pH and acidity, organic matter, and salts.
- In November, plant seed garlic, plant winter spinach and carrots, continue harvesting carrots and brassicas until done, clean field and crop debris, till in crops, remove plastic mulch, and plant winter spinach, mixed greens, and arugula in indoor growing spaces.
- Use these priority catalog links as crop-level examples for UConn's calendar rows, not as named-variety recommendations.
Catalog crop examples
These catalog entries match crops covered by the regional timing source; variety-specific details remain tied to each seed entry's own source.
- Genovese Basil Herb · Warm · 68 days
- Evergreen Bunching Onion Vegetable · Shoulder · 65 days
- White Stem Bok Choy Vegetable · Cool · 45 days
- Waltham 29 Broccoli Vegetable · Cool · 74 days
- Lacinato Kale Vegetable · Cool · 60 days
- Golden Acre Cabbage Vegetable · Cool · 64 days
- Snowball Y Cauliflower Vegetable · Cool · 70 days
- Detroit Dark Red Beet Vegetable · Cool · 58 days
- Bloomsdale Spinach Vegetable · Cool · 42 days
- Black Seeded Simpson Lettuce Vegetable · Cool · 45 days
- Sugar Snap Pea Vegetable · Cool · 62 days
- California Wonder Pepper Vegetable · Warm · 72 days
- Roma Tomato Vegetable · Warm · 76 days
- Black Beauty Eggplant Vegetable · Warm · 80 days
- Spring Oats Cover Crop Cover Crop · Cool · 60 days
- Crimson Clover Cover Crop Cover Crop · Shoulder · 90 days
- Buckwheat Cover Crop Cover Crop · Warm · 35 days
- Hale's Best Jumbo Melon Vegetable · Warm · 85 days
- Provider Bush Bean Vegetable · Warm · 50 days
- Marketmore 76 Cucumber Vegetable · Warm · 58 days
- French Breakfast Radish Vegetable · Cool · 28 days
- Purple Top White Globe Turnip Vegetable · Cool · 55 days
- Danvers 126 Carrot Vegetable · Shoulder · 70 days
- Bright Lights Swiss Chard Vegetable · Shoulder · 55 days
- Golden Bantam Sweet Corn Vegetable · Warm · 80 days
- American Purple Top Rutabaga Vegetable · Cool · 90 days
- Long Island Improved Brussels Sprouts Vegetable · Cool · 100 days
- American Flag Leek Vegetable · Cool · 120 days
- Waltham Butternut Squash Vegetable · Warm · 95 days
- Small Sugar Pumpkin Vegetable · Warm · 100 days
Related regional guides
- Maine Coastal and Northern Vegetable Garden A UMaine planting-window guide for central Maine dates, coastal and northern timing shifts, spring greens, warm transplants, and fall rows.
- Central New Hampshire Memorial Day Vegetable Garden A UNH Extension guide for central New Hampshire's Memorial Day frost baseline, indoor starts, soil temperatures, and sequence plantings.
- Vermont Frost-Relative Vegetable Garden UVM Extension Master Gardener Planting the Garden guide for Vermont vegetable timing by crop hardiness and frost-free-date spacing.
- Massachusetts Extension Planting Chart Vegetable Garden A UMass Extension planting-chart guide for Massachusetts crop groups, frost risk, direct/transplant markers, succession, and regional timing shifts.
- Rhode Island Planting Calendar Vegetable Garden URI Cooperative Extension calendar for Rhode Island gardeners using May 15/October 15 frost dates, method legend, and crop-row timing.