Vegetable Growing Guides for Canada

Vegetable growing guides for Canadian gardens. With a frost-free season running from about 90 days in the north to 222 on the Pacific coast, and zones from 0 to 9, every crop here has to answer one question first: will it finish before the frost returns? Each guide gives days to maturity, the sowing window, and the honest answer for a short season.

Find your growing band

Long season: The only part of Canada where overwintering vegetables outdoors is routine rather than experimental. Medium season: Long enough to ripen tomatoes and peppers from indoor starts, but days-to-maturity has to be checked against the season, not assumed. Short season: Long summer daylight partly compensates for the short calendar, but short-season cultivars and season extension are not optional.

Choose crops that fit the season you have

In a long season, crop choice is a matter of taste. In Canada it is arithmetic, and it is the single decision that most often separates a full harvest from a disappointing one. Before you buy the seed, check that the crop can finish.

The method is simple and worth doing on paper. Take days to maturity from the packet. Add two to three weeks, because catalogue figures assume ideal conditions and growth slows sharply as August days shorten. Count forward from your realistic planting-out date — which for tender crops is after your last frost, not on it. If the answer lands past your first fall frost, the crop will not finish.

Two things buy back time and cost almost nothing. Choosing an earlier cultivar can remove two to three weeks of risk for free — a 65-day tomato and an 85-day tomato are the same amount of work. And frost-improved crops extend the far end: kale, leeks, parsnips, Brussels sprouts and carrots do not merely survive frost, they sweeten after it, so counting their season as ending at first frost understates them by weeks.

Growing guides (20 crops)

New to growing? Start here

These forgive a late sowing, patchy watering or a first attempt at spacing. Get three or four of these right before you commit a whole bed to anything trickier.

• Radishes — Ready in under a month, so a failed sowing costs you nothing in a season where every week counts.
• Lettuce — Fast and forgiving — succession-sow through the cooler parts of the season rather than one big row.
• Spinach — Handles cold well; the only real skill is timing it around the short window before it bolts in June heat.
• Peas — One of the first things you can sow outdoors in spring, and close to effortless once it's in.
• Beets — Roots and greens from one sowing, slow enough to forgive an uneven start.
• Bush beans — No staking required — wait for warm soil, then largely leave it alone.
• Green onions — Sow direct, cut as you need them, sow again — about as low-commitment as a crop gets.
• Fava beans — Hardy enough to overwinter in mild areas, and they leave the soil better than they found it.

The reliable core of the plot

Once you've got a season behind you, most of a productive plot is built from crops in this group — well understood, forgiving of an average year, and worth the space every time.

• Tomatoes — Worth starting indoors early; in a short season the transplant date matters more here than almost anywhere else it's grown.
• Potatoes — Reliable and high-yield for the bed space, and tolerant of a season that doesn't go entirely to plan.
• Onions — Needs an early indoor start — often as early as February on the Prairies — but is dependable once that's in place.
• Carrots — Wants loose, stone-free soil more than it wants skill; get the bed right and the crop follows.
• Cabbage — A dependable staple, but rotate it properly — clubroot spores persist in soil for years once established.
• Zucchini — A couple of plants will out-produce most households across even a short Canadian summer.
• Cucumbers — Rewards black plastic and warm soil in cooler regions; one of the best returns per square foot once it gets going.
• Leeks — Slow but dependable, and they stand in the ground through winter until you want them.
• Shallots — Planted as sets like onions, but each one splits into a cluster — low effort once they're in.

Crops that ask more of you

Get the timing and conditions right and these are the most satisfying things you'll grow. Get them wrong and they sulk, stall or fail outright — there's very little room in between.

• Peppers — Marginal without a low tunnel or greenhouse in the shortest-season regions — genuinely worth the extra protection where the season allows.
• Sweet corn — Needs a block rather than a row for pollination, and a cultivar bred for a short season — both are worth getting right.
• Broccoli — A narrow window between cold enough to head and warm enough to bolt; exclusion netting also solves most of its pest pressure.
• Kale — Exceptionally cold-hardy — can be harvested under snow in the mildest regions, which makes it worth the bed space through the shoulder seasons.
• Cauliflower — The trickiest common brassica — firm soil and even moisture decide whether you get a curd at all.
• Celery — Thirsty and slow, and it wants trenching — most gardeners either love growing it or skip it.
• Grain amaranth — An unusual grain crop for anyone with space to experiment — sow warm, harvest the seed heads in autumn.
• Love-lies-bleeding amaranth — The ornamental cousin of grain amaranth, grown as much for the trailing flowers as the edible leaves.
• Eggplant — Slow to establish and fussy about heat, but few crops produce like it once it's away.
• Brussels sprouts — Slow and space-hungry, but the flavour genuinely improves after the first hard frost.

Plant once, harvest much later

These don't run on a normal sowing-to-harvest rhythm. Plant them, do very little for months, and the payoff arrives on its own schedule — sometimes not until next year.

• Garlic — Planted in autumn, left alone through winter, lifted the following summer — one of the few crops a short growing season doesn't limit.
• Sweet potatoes — Marginal outside the mildest regions without a greenhouse — a genuine long-game crop that needs a full warm season to pay off.
• Winter squash — A long season from sowing to a storage-ready fruit, but what you get keeps for months once it's in.
• Strawberries — Plant a bed once and it crops every summer for three or four years before it needs renewing.
• Elephant garlic — A leek relative with garlic-sized ambitions — plant like garlic, but give the giant cloves real room.
• Pumpkins — Wants space and feeding more than skill; the reward is sized by how much room you give it.

Month by month

• What to plant in January Canada
• What to plant in February Canada
• What to plant in March Canada
• What to plant in April Canada
• What to plant in May Canada
• What to plant in June Canada
• What to plant in July Canada
• What to plant in August Canada
• What to plant in September Canada
• What to plant in October Canada
• What to plant in November Canada
• What to plant in December Canada

Just need the timing?

• When to plant tomatoes in Canada — sowing and planting-out windows on their own
• When to plant bush beans in Canada — sowing and planting-out windows on their own
• When to plant hardneck garlic in Canada — sowing and planting-out windows on their own

Where gardeners lose a season

In a hundred-day season there is no room to recover from an early mistake, so the failures below are more expensive here than anywhere else on this site.

The pattern is the same one every time: a decision made in February or March that only becomes visible in September. That is precisely the gap a written plan closes.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do I know which Canadian season band I am in?

Find your local last spring frost and first fall frost dates and subtract. Roughly 150-222 frost-free days is the long band, 130-170 the medium band, and 90-130 the short band.

Why do Canadian guides start with days to maturity?

Because season length is the binding constraint here. A crop that needs more days than your season provides will not finish, however well you grow it. Checking the arithmetic first avoids the most expensive mistake.

How many crops do these guides cover?

20 vegetables, each checked against Canadian frost dates, with season extension advice and short-season cultivar guidance.

Last updated 25 August 2026

Every Canadian growing guide, by plant family

Every one of our 285 Canada vegetable growing guides, grouped by plant family — the same grouping the Garden Layout Planner uses, because plant family is what decides where a crop can go in your crop rotation. Open a family to see its crops, or search below.

Free Garden Layout Planner →Once you have picked your crops, drop them into the planner and it works out spacing, bed layout and crop rotation for you.Canada Printable Garden Planner (PDF) →A printable short-season planner: the sowing and harvest windows from these guides mapped to a Canadian growing season, with rotation and journal pages.How the Canada Planner Works →Zones, provinces and the printable PDF explained in plain language.

Search Canada growing guides

The onion family24 guidesGarlic, leeks, shallots and every onion relative. Slow, hardy, and worth a long rotation — white rot lingers in soil for years.

• Babington's Leeks
• Broadleaf Wild Leeks
• Calçots— biennial, harvested as second-year resprouts
• Chives
• Elephant Garlic
• Garlic Chives
• Golden Garlic
• Great Yellow Allium
• Green Onions— Grown as a fast annual salad crop
• Hardneck Garlic— perennial (cultivated as a winter annual)
• Keel-leaved Garlic
• Kurrat
• Leeks— Hardy biennial grown as an annual
• Nodding Onions
• Onions
• Pearl Onions
• Potato Onions
• Ramsons
• Rocambole— herbaceous perennial, grown as an annual crop
• Sand Leeks
• Shallots— Hardy biennial grown as an annual
• Three-cornered Leeks
• Tree Onions
• Welsh Onions

Brassicas & mustards43 guidesCabbages, kales and their peppery cousins from radish to horseradish. Net them against cabbage white and keep them moving around the plot.

• Arugula
• Black Radishes
• Broccoli
• Broccolini
• Brussels Sprouts
• Cabbage
• Cauliflower
• Chinese Cabbages
• Choi Sums
• Collard Greens
• Daikons
• Horseradishes
• Kailans
• Kale— biennial for most varieties, cropping
• Kohlrabis
• Komatsunas
• Lacinato Kale— biennial grown as an annual, or true biennial for winter harvesting
• Land Cresses
• Marrowstem Kale
• Mibunas
• Mizunas— biennial, harvested in its first year as a fast-growing compact plant
• Mustard Greens
• Nine Star Perennial Broccoli— herbaceous perennial, cropping for 3-4 years before decline
• Pak Choi— annual/biennial, grown as annual
• Pointed Cabbages
• Radishes
• Rat-tailed Radish
• Red Cabbages
• Red Russian Kale
• Romanesco Broccoli
• Rutabaga
• Savoy Cabbages
• Shepherd's Purses
• Siberian Kale
• Sprouting Broccoli— biennial grown as an annual, or true biennial for overwintering purple sprouting types
• Tatsois
• Thousandhead Kale
• Tree Collards— perennial or partial perennial, living several years
• Turnipsready in 42–70 days
• Wasabis
• White Mustards
• Wild Rockets
• Winter Cresses

Peas & beans23 guidesNitrogen-fixers that leave the soil better than they found it. Follow them with a hungry brassica.

• Bush BeansHow to grow bush beans in Canada starts with a question most guides skip: whether the crop
• Chickpeas
• Cowpeas— Frost-tender annual or short-lived perennial
• Crimson Clovers— PFAF corroborates independently
• Edamame (Soybean)6+ hours of sun, soil pH 6–7
• Edible Lupins— Annual/biennial nitrogen-fixing legume
• Fava Beans6+ hours of sun, soil pH
• Green Beans
• Hyacinth Beans— Perennial climber, usually grown
• Lentilsready in 90–90 days
• Lima Beans
• Lucernes
• Mangetouts— Annual, climbing by tendrils, deciduous foliage (RHS)
• Moth Beans
• Peanutsready in 90–150 days
• Pearl Lupins
• Peas
• Pigeon Peas— Erect annual or short-lived perennial, usually grown as an annual
• Red Clovers
• Rice Beans
• Runner Beans
• Tamarinds— Long-lived evergreen tree, bearing fruit from seven to ten years old
• Yardlong Beans

The potato & tomato family14 guidesHungry, blight-prone and best kept together so you can rotate them hard — potatoes, tomatoes, peppers, aubergines.

• Ashwagandha— Tender evergreen shrub, grown as an annual outside USDA
• Chilli Peppers— short-lived perennial (grown as annual)
• Eggplant
• Ground Cherries— Annual, low, sprawling herbaceous plant (Penn
• Habanero Chillies— Annual or short-lived perennial grown as
• Naranjilla— Tender, fast-growing shrubby perennial, nearly 2m tall (Purdue NewCROP)
• Pepino Dulce
• Peppers
• PotatoesCanada's shorter season makes timing matter: get potatoes into the ground as soon as the soi
• Rocoto Peppers
• Tamarillos— Fast-growing, tender, woody evergreen
• Tomatillos
• Tomatoes
• Wonderberries— Grown as an annual outside the tropics

Roots & tubers28 guidesEverything you dig rather than pick. Most want stone-free, unmanured ground and steady moisture.

• Beets
• Burdock (Gobo)
• Carrots
• Celeriacs— annual/biennial, grown as annual
• Chinese Artichokes
• Fennel— cool-season annual (Florence
• Hamburg Parsley
• Jerusalem Artichokes
• Macas— biennial (grown as an annual for its root)
• Mangelwurzels
• Mashuas— Tuberous, climbing perennial
• Ocas— Tuberous, short-day perennial grown as an annual crop
• Parsley
• Parsnipsready in 100–120 days
• Perpetual Spinach
• Pignuts
• Salsify6+ hours of sun, soil pH 6.5–7.5
• Scorzonera
• Sea Beets
• Skirret
• Sugar Beets
• Sweet Fennel
• Sweet Potatoes
• Swiss Chard— biennial (requires two growing seasons, but
• Taros— Tuberous, evergreen perennial
• Ullucos— Tender tuberous perennial grown as an annual
• Water Chestnuts
• Yacons

Leaves & salads28 guidesCut-and-come-again crops that reward little and often sowing — the fastest return in the garden.

• Blood AmaranthBlood amaranth will not survive below about 10°C, so timing follows your local last frost
• Callaloos
• Celeryready in 70–84 days
• Chicories
• Chinese Celery) — Biennial, grown as an annual for its
• Corn Salad (Lamb's Lettuce)Are ready to harvest 14–21 days after planting
• Dandelions— Evergreen herbaceous perennial
• Endivesready in 70–100 days
• Epazotes— perennial in warm climates, grown as an annual elsewhere
• French Sorrels— Low-growing, mat-forming herbaceous perennial
• Good King Henry
• Huauzontles
• Ice Plants
• Kaniwa— Annual, and notably frost-tolerant for
• Lettuce
• Love-Lies-Bleeding Amaranth
• Malabar Spinach— RHS rates it H1C (5-10°C minimum), needing very warm conditions
• Marsh Samphire— Annual halophyte -- germinates, crops and
• New Zealand Spinach— Herbaceous, highly branched, sprawling perennial grown as a summer annual
• Oraches
• Purslanes6+ hours of sun
• Shungikus
• Sorrel
• Spinach
• Strawberry Blites
• Water Spinach
• Watercress
• Winter Purslane (Miner's Lettuce)(Claytonia perfoliata) — annual

Squashes & cucumbers15 guidesSprawling, thirsty and frost-tender. Give them room, warmth and more compost than you think.

• Achochas— annual (grown as, perennial in native range)
• Ash Gourds
• Bitter Melons
• Bottle Gourds
• Chayotes
• Cucamelons
• Cucumbers
• Egusi Melons— Perennial in habit but grown
• Loofahs
• Melons
• Pumpkins— tender plants requiring a long, hot growing season
• Shark Fin Melons— RHS treats it as an annual climbing/trailing squash
• Squash
• WatermelonsWatermelons will not survive below about 15°C, so timing follows your local last frost date
• Zucchini

Herbs & aromatics51 guidesKitchen herbs, from a windowsill pot of basil to a permanent bay. Most prefer poorer soil and sharper drainage than you would guess.

• Alexanders
• Angelicas
• Bay Laurels— Evergreen shrub or small tree
• Bergamots— Clump-forming herbaceous perennial
• Borage
• Calendulas— Hardy annual (RHS also lists a biennial habit)
• Capers
• Caraways
• Cardamoms— Evergreen rhizomatous perennial
• Chamomiles
• Chervils
• CilantrosAre ready to harvest 70–70 days after planting
• Costmary— Woody-based, rhizomatous herbaceous perennial (RHS
• Cumins
• Dillready in 42–42 days
• Fenugreeks
• Galangals
• Gingers
• Heartseases— Tufted annual, biennial or short-lived evergreen perennial with small tri-coloured flowers
• Herb Fennel
• Holy Basil— Small, upright, bushy annual (in temperate climates) with highly aromatic, serrated, purpl
• Hyssops— Herbaceous perennial or evergreen sub-shrub with linear, aromatic leaves and spikes of tub
• Lemon Balms— Vigorous, clump-forming perennial herb in the mint family, lemon-scented
• Lemon Thyme— Compact, bushy, mounding evergreen sub-shrub
• Lemongrass— Clump-forming, tender perennial grass
• Lovages
• Marjoram— Tender perennial sub-shrub, usually grown as an annual in cooler climates
• Mitsuba
• Mugwort— Upright, rhizomatous herbaceous perennial
• Myoga Gingers— Aromatic rhizomatous perennial
• Nasturtiums
• Oregano
• Peppermint— Vigorous, rhizomatous, spreading perennial herb
• Rosemary
• Saffron Crocuses— Autumn-flowering perennial corm
• Sage
• Salad Burnet
• Sea Hollies
• Shisos— Bushy, upright annual with toothed, aromatic, often red or purple leaves and insignificant
• Signet Marigolds— Annual, USDA zones 2-11, UK hardiness zone 3 (PFAF)
• Spearmint
• Stevia— Tender perennial usually grown as a half-hardy annual outside
• Summer Savories— Bushy hardy annual -- genuinely distinct from the perennial Winter Savory (Satureja montan
• Sweet Basil
• Sweet Cicely
• Szechuan Peppers— Bushy, spiny, deciduous shrub or small tree
• Tarragon
• Thyme
• Turmerics
• Valerians— Cut back to ground level in autumn
• Winter Savories— Dwarf, sub-shrubby, hardy perennial -- genuinely distinct from the annual Summer Savory (S

Fruit & berries34 guidesTrees, canes and bushes that crop for years once established — the longest-term planting decisions you will make.

• Alpine Strawberries— Herbaceous perennial, semi-evergreen
• Apples
• Apricots— Deciduous tree, self-fertile -- only one tree needed for a crop (RHS), though USU Extensio
• Aronias— Small, deciduous, bushy, spreading shrub with glossy dark-green leaves that colour red
• Black Mulberries— Deciduous tree, dioecious or monoecious depending on source population -- Growables.com
• Blackberries
• Blackcurrants
• Blueberries
• Cape Gooseberries
• Cranberries
• Damsons— Deciduous tree, 10-20 years to full maturity
• Figs— Deciduous shrub or small tree
• Goji Berries6+ hours of sun, soil pH 5.5–8
• Gooseberries
• Grapes
• Honeyberries— Very hardy deciduous shrub, a form of edible honeysuckle
• Japanese Wineberries— Deciduous perennial shrub with biennial canes -- roots are perennial, canes fruit in their
• Jostaberries— Deciduous shrub, self-fertile -- RHS confirms self-fertile bushes crop well, with more fru
• Kiwi Fruits— Vigorous, deciduous, woody climber
• Lingonberries
• Loganberries— Deciduous shrub with biennial canes -- each cane grows vegetatively in its first year, fru
• Medlars— Deciduous tree, self-fertile and bee-pollinated -- only one tree is needed for a crop (RHS
• Nectarines— Deciduous fruit tree, self-fertile
• Peaches
• Pears
• Plums— Deciduous tree, 5-10 years to full maturity
• Quinces
• Raspberries
• Redcurrants
• Sea Buckthorns— Deciduous, thorny, dioecious shrub or small tree with narrow, silvery leaves and inconspic
• Sour Cherries— Deciduous tree, self-fertile -- only one tree is needed for a crop (RHS
• Strawberries
• Sweet Cherries
• Tayberries— Deciduous shrub with biennial canes, often thornless or lightly prickled (RHS

Nuts5 guidesLong-lived trees for patient growers. Plan for the eventual canopy, not the sapling.

• Almonds— Deciduous stone-fruit tree, a close cousin of peaches and nectarines but less cold-hardy (
• Hazelnuts— Deciduous, monoecious shrub or small tree bearing separate male catkins and female flowers
• Pine Nuts
• Sweet Chestnuts— Large, vigorous, long-lived deciduous tree
• Walnuts

Grains & pseudo-grains9 guidesCereals, oilseeds and seed crops — practical at allotment scale for green manure, straw and a novelty harvest.

• Buckwheat— Fast-growing, half-hardy annual broadleaf, not a true cereal but often called a pseudocere
• Grain Amaranth
• Oats
• Quinoa
• Rye
• Safflowers
• Sesame
• Sweet Cornready in 80–95 days
• Wheat

Plant once, harvest for years9 guidesCrops that stay put. Prepare the ground properly before planting, because you will not get another chance.

• Asparagus
• Cardoons
• Daylilies— Herbaceous, clump-forming perennial
• Globe Artichokes
• Hostas— Herbaceous, clump-forming perennial
• Moso Bamboos— Evergreen, running-rhizome bamboo
• Ostrich Ferns— Deciduous, stoloniferous fern
• Rhubarb
• Sea Kale

More crops to try2 guidesThe rest of the collection — unusual, ornamental-edible and specialist crops.

• Okras
• Sunflowers6+ hours of sun, soil pH 6–7.5

Planning tools & reference13 pagesThe calendars, planners and problem-solving guides that sit alongside the crop guides.

• Vegetable Planting Calendar
• What to Plant in April
• What to Plant in August
• What to Plant in December
• What to Plant in February
• What to Plant in January
• What to Plant in July
• What to Plant in June
• What to Plant in March
• What to Plant in May
• What to Plant in November
• What to Plant in October
• What to Plant in September