Malabar spinach · Tongchuan, Shaanxi, China
When to plant malabar spinach in Tongchuan
Main outdoor window
17 Apr - 8 May
The window this page is built around.
Timed from last spring frost
3 April
In Tongchuan, on your chosen risk.
Ready to pick
1 Jul - 31 Oct
If you plant at the start of the window.
The average last frost. Half of all years are later than this.
Step by step in Tongchuan
Each window is a range, not a single day. Earlier in the range buys you a longer season; later in it buys you a safer one.
Start indoors
20 Feb - 13 Mar
Six weeks before your last frost, under cover or on a windowsill.
Plant out
17 Apr - 8 May
Two weeks after your last frost.
Harvest
1 Jul - 31 Oct
Malabar spinach through the year
Against the frost risk in Tongchuan
Why these dates
Start indoors six weeks before the last frost and plant out two weeks after it, against a support. Growth is slow until nights stay above 20C and then becomes rampant.
Growth stops below about 10C and the plant is damaged at 2C, well before an actual frost. In cool summers it never really gets going.
Seed packets and extension guides express timing as weeks either side of the last spring frost, because that is the only reference point that travels. Malabar spinach are timed from 6 weeks before that frost for an indoor start, with planting out 2 weeks after it, and this page simply resolves those offsets against the frost date computed for Tongchuan.
The median frost-free season here is 213 days, against 60 to 80 days to maturity for this crop counted from planting out. That margin is what decides whether a late sowing is worth attempting.
Also in Tongchuan
Other vegetables to time
Growing malabar spinach in Tongchuan
When should I plant malabar spinach in Tongchuan?
Aim for 17 Apr - 8 May in an average year. If you would rather not gamble on the weather, wait until 1-22 May - by then frost has finished in nine years out of ten.
When will malabar spinach be ready to harvest in Tongchuan?
Expect to start picking around 1 Jul - 31 Oct, based on 60 to 80 days to maturity from the planting date calculated for this location.
How much frost will malabar spinach tolerate?
Growth stops below about 10C and the plant is damaged at 2C, well before an actual frost. In cool summers it never really gets going.