Believe it or not, it’s time to start planting your Fall garden!

It can be hard to imagine it becoming rainy again, much less it cooling off. So planning you Fall Garden can seem like a waste of time.

But, of course, the weather does change, and you’ve got to plan what vegetables to grow for the cool and rainy days ahead that sap the vitality from tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers and other summer vegetables.

Growing fall vegetables is like having another whole growing season in the garden. Cool weather brings out the best flavor from vegetables such as kale, broccoli and carrots.

And the harvest season is long; fall vegetables just sit pretty, awaiting harvest at your leisure. In spring and summer, cool-season vegetables like spinach, radishes and lettuce bolt, sending up a flower stalk and becoming poor for eating if not harvested quickly enough.

Three commitments you need to make before beginning to plan for fall vegetables.

First: is you need to keep at the same level soil fertility. Don’t forget you’re getting another growing season out of your garden, so apply fertilizer and liberal amounts of compost or other organic matter to the soil. Fall’s predominantly leafy vegetables are heavy feeders.

Second: don’t forget to water. Seedlings beginning life in summer often cannot get enough water for themselves. Natural rainfall and cooler temperatures eventually will lessen or eliminate watering chores as fall approaches.

Third: weeding. Summer weeds compete with vegetable plants for water, space and nutrients.