FREE: Okra Seeds 15+

The listing, Okra Seeds 15+ has ended.

Hand Harvested / Organic Seeds/ 15 per pack

Cultivation

Start okra from seed - it does not transplant well. The seed should be planted directly in the ground outside about 2 weeks after all danger of frost has passed.

The basic rule is to keep plants separated from each other by about 15 inches. I plant in beds that are four feet wide by about twenty feet long. I make three rows, and plant seeds about 18 inches apart within each row. Okra seeds are relatively large and easy to handle. They also germinate well if the soil is warm enough. I plant the seeds about half an inch deep, about three seeds at each spot. In most cases all three germinate, and when the plants are about six inches tall I thin them to only one plant every 18 inches.

Okra needs warm weather to grow well. This means that in northern climates you may not have much of a crop some years. The main thing you can do to help is to keep the bed weed free and mulched as much as possible. Watering is only needed occasionally.

Most varieties will start yielding about 60 days after planting. The flowers are large, pale yellow and fairly ornamental (see pictures below). Each flower blooms for only one day and eventually forms one okra pod. Pick the pods when they are approx. 3 inches in length. Picking the pods while wet may darken the skin, though the taste is not affected. Typically it grows quickly, so you need to harvest every two days or so. The plants can eventually grow quite tall (5 feet or more), but will stop growing as soon as the temperature starts dropping down below 50 degs. (F).