I am doing research on how to garden in the possible upcoming Grand Solar Minimum. Learn more about this possible cooling of the planet for upcoming decades here.

http://www.iceagefarmer.com is a great place to learn about the upcoming Grand Solar Minimum. Hey, if it doesn’t happen, it is always wonderful to learn how to grow in the cold!

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This article from http://www.grandsolarminimum.com has extensive information on how to grow food during extreme cold. I particularly am drawn to the idea of growing potatoes as a staple because they are super nutritious and fairly easy to grow.

“The best bet for a homegrown staple crop in cold climates is the trusty potato. Potatoes can be planted directly after seeding, and are hard to beat when it comes to yields and energy content. If you grow them in costales, bags, or containers, you can carry them indoors at night if it’s really cold outside.”

This tip also was helpful:

“Turnips, parsnips, and carrots are definitely worth considering, especially in light of their energy content. These vegetables grow well in colder climates, and even in below freezing temperatures. The cold autumn and early winter temperatures actually help them sweeten, because the increased sugar content the cold induces makes them less prone to freezing, i.e., plant sugars are a natural antifreeze.”

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Jerusalem artichokes are a little-known food that are especially useful because they can be left in the ground throughout the winter in a natural root cellar, and harvested when you need them. They are also super hardy, pest resistant, and they are self-seeding and thus easy to grow. This article from http://www.askaprepper.com is very comprehensive. Here is an amazing list of the nutrient value of this plant.

“These tubers have a significant protein value but less starch than potatoes. Sunchoke tubers contain a substantial amount of inulin, a prebiotic fiber that is commonly found as an ingredient in all-natural home remedies. This probiotics may help increase the growth of bifidobacteria – a good bacteria that may prevent destructive bacteria from forming and might aid in the reduction of some carcinogenic enzymes.

These tubers also produce a significant amount of trace minerals, iron, electrolytes, copper, fiber, and potassium. Sunchokes may help lower blood pressure by essentially counteracting the impact sodium has on the human body.
The tubers from Jerusalem artichokes actually boast a higher protein content than corn, soybeans, beans, or wheat. Both the stems and leaves on sunchoke plants contain roughly 28 percent protein – that figure is twice the amount of protein found in corn.

They also contain smaller percentages of folates and other B-complex vitamins, such as thiamin, pyridoxine, riboflavin, and pantothenic acid.”

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I was pleased to find that hugelkultur gardening adapts well to the cold.

I found this in the Permies Forum:

I have a friend from Denmark that travels around the artic circle. His folks have some deep raised beds. They used lots of birch wood, bark, roots etc and made their beds 1,5 to 2 meters high. They continually stuff in a legume as they build their beds. They have artic milkvetch http://www.luontoportti.com/suomi/en/kukkakasvit/arctic-milkvetch where they are and use it quite a bit. They get wheel barrows of it and blend it in about 1/2 and 1/2 with soil as they fill in gaps between the limbs and brush. So, under the face of the final soil their beds are about 60% birch, 20% milkvetch and some kind of clover as well, and 20% soil. They water the hell out of it as they make each layer up. It obviously takes some real mass and a little nitrogen to get it going. They also make defacto cold frames on the south side by laying a log frame on the south side of their beds, a log at the bottom, one on the peak, and one on each end. They then spike some old scrap wood doors with big windows onto them in order to start driving heat into the pile when they finally see more than a couple of hours of sunlight. 

If that vetch is local to you, it looks like it would be a nice companion crop to put nitrogen in the surface as well.

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This article from Permaculture News has some great suggestions. This tip was especially helpful:

“In any of these cases, a thick mulch does a lot of good, as it too protects the soil from freezing and provides additional warmth for the plants, all the while doing all the other things mulch does. In the cold frames and hoop houses, the warmth created by the decomposition helps to keep the air inside just that little bit warmer.”
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I thought this was interesting also:

“I’ve recently being reading Four-Season Harvest by Eliot Coleman, a year-round grower in Maine, and he believes that, once these simple measures are in place, it’s hours of sunlight, rather than temperature, that is the more limiting factor in a winter garden. Of course, that is taking into account that we are attempting to grow cold-hardy crops rather tomatoes and peppers.”

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In this video, the author of the Ice Age Farmer website shares specific varieties of summer crops that are best for short growing seasons and cold weather.

This play list from the Ice Farmer is chock full of education about how to grow food in the cold weather.

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Do you have tips on how to grow food in the cold? I would love to hear them.