A guide to seeding vegetables for a spectacular and tasty winter harvest.

Winter Wonders
The warm days of summer may be fading fast, but don't be too quick to put away your trowel and seed packets. If you live in a temperate region (Zones 4-10), you're ready to begin a new gardening cycle that will yield tasty, vitamin-packed vegetables all winter long.

Cool-weather cole crop vegetables -- such as Brussels sprouts, cabbage, cauliflower, collards, kale, kohlrabi, mustard, broccoli, and turnips -- are the stars of the winter garden.

One of the benefits of growing your own winter veggies is getting the full nutrient punch of a fresh-picked harvest.

Simple Seeding
Although potted seedlings of winter veggies can often be found in nurseries in late summer and late winter, it is possible to grow your own favorite cole crops from seed.

1. Plant seedlings using a sterilized, lightweight peat-base potting mix, which aids root development and doesn't dry out too quickly. It's best to moisten the soil prior to plotting to keep down dust. Evenly distribute a few seeds at a time in the soil. Cover the seeds with a thin layer of potting mix.

2. Water the planted seeds thoroughly and gently to ensure you do not bury or wash out the seed. Label the container of the planted seeds with the name of the vegetable and the date. As seedlings begin to grow, thin them out leaving the best ones plenty of room and ventilation for healthy root growth.

3. Evenly mist the soil throughout the initial period of development, never allowing the soil to dry out completely. When the seedlings have grown two sets of true leaves (usually in about 10 days), they are ready for transplanting. At this point, they can be potted in containers to give to friends or to hold until garden space is available.

4. Use a dibber to loosen seedlings and gently tease them out of the "mother flat." The pencil indicates how large spinach seedlings are at transplant time. To avoid damaging the delicate stems of long, thin seedlings, handle them carefully by the leaves.

5. To transplant seedlings to pots, fill the new containers with fresh potting mix (the same mix used initially) and moisten it well. Make a hole in the new soil with a dibber. Once a seedling is removed from the flat, gently lower the roots into the hole of the new location and firm around it.

6. Give the relocated seedlings a final misting, and create enough label markers for each pot to lessen the confusion as plants get shifted and are given away.

Into the Garden
To transplant seedlings directly into the garden, follow steps 1-4 from the Simple Seeding screen, and then begin here.

1. Move seedlings into the garden at the proper time to avoid the young plant roots from becoming root bound. Also, avoid over watering, which can cause damping-off fungus in once-thriving seedlings..

2. Before moving plants into the garden, prepare the soil by working in a balanced organic fertilizer.

3. Continue to fertilize the plants about once a week for a month.