Heirloom · Open-Pollinated · 70–80 days from direct seeding
cool-season · especially well suited to warm climates
Grows well in
Raised Bed ✓
In-Ground ✓
Container/Pot ✓
Grow Bag ✓
Meet This Plant
Georgia Southern Collards is big, productive, and one of the most weather-tolerant greens you can grow. The leaves are blue-green, tender, and mild with an earthy depth that gets noticeably sweeter after a frost. Most greens tap out in summer heat or hard frost, but this one likes to hang around.
What it tastes like: Earthy and mildly bitter raw, with a depth that mellows and sweetens when cooked. After a frost the bitterness softens noticeably and the flavor becomes sweeter and so southernly delicious.
How to Grow It
Sun
Full sun preferred. Tolerates partial shade better than most brassicas, which helps in warmer zones.
Water
About 1 to 1.5 inches per week. Keep it consistent, especially during hot weather. Dry spells make leaves tough.
Sowing Details
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Depth¼–½ inch
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Spacing18–24 inches
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Row Spacing24–36 inches
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Thinning18 inches. Thinnings are edible.
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Germination5–10 days
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Days to Maturity70–80 days from direct seeding
When to Plant
For spring, start indoors 4–6 weeks before your last frost. Transplant out 2–4 weeks before your last frost when daytime temperatures are consistently in the 40s to 50s°F.
For fall, direct sow or transplant 10–12 weeks before your first fall frost or once daytime temperatures begin dropping below about 75°F. Fall collards are almost always better than spring ones.
Zones 7–8
Start seeds indoors in late summer and transplant once daytime temperatures start dropping below 80°F, typically 8–10 weeks before your first fall frost. This is where Georgia Southern earns its name. Spring is possible but fall is almost always better.
Zones 9–11
Fall is your strongest window. Harvest before temperatures climb. Established plants tolerate heat better than most brassicas, but the best flavor and longest harvest come from a fall planting.
Grow Friend Tips
Frost makes it sweeter. So does patience.
Georgia Southern is genuinely heat tolerant, but the best flavor comes after cold weather hits. If you're in a cool zone, hold off on heavy harvesting until after a frost or two. The difference in flavor is real and worth the wait.
Always harvest from the outside in
Take the lowest, outermost leaves first and leave the center growth intact. The plant keeps producing from the top, so as long as you leave the crown alone, one plant can feed you for months.
It gets big. Give it room.
Georgia Southern grows 2–3 feet tall and nearly as wide. Crowded plants produce smaller leaves and invite disease. Spacing matters more with this variety than with most greens. Give it the full 18–24 inches and it'll reward you for it.
It tolerates poor soil but thrives in good soil
Collards are more forgiving of tough conditions than most brassicas. Rich soil with good organic matter produces noticeably larger, more tender leaves. Side dress with compost a few weeks after transplanting if you want the best harvest.
Row cover early, watch for worms later
Put row cover on at planting and don't lift it until plants are established. Flea beetles move fast and they will find your seedlings. Cabbageworm shows up later in the season, so check undersides of leaves weekly and pick them off by hand. Bt works if things get out of hand.
Companion plants
Dill
Nasturtium
Marigold
Garlic
Onion
Beets
Celery
Harvest & What to Do With It
When it's ready
Leaves are ready when they're 7–10 inches long with a deep blue-green color that looks substantial but not stiff or woody. Baby leaves at 4–5 inches are more tender and work great raw. Full-size leaves are what you want for cooking.
How to harvest
Snap or cut the outermost leaves at the base of the stem. Don't take more than a third of the plant at once. Leave the crown alone. This is a cut-and-come-again crop and one plant keeps producing for months if you harvest it right.
Yield
Two to three plants per person is plenty for regular harvests. A full packet at good spacing gives you more collards than you'll know what to do with.
Short-term storage
Wrap unwashed leaves in a damp paper towel and refrigerate. They keep better than most greens and are good for up to two weeks.
Long-term storage
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Freezing: Blanch 3 minutes, ice bath, dry well, freeze flat then bag. Keeps up to 12 months. Holds up better than most greens in cooked dishes.
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Pressure canning: Collards pressure can well. Follow current USDA guidelines for safe processing times and pressures.
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Dehydrating: Blanch first, then dehydrate at 125°F until completely crisp. Crumble into soups and stews. Keeps 6–12 months airtight.
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Water bath canning: Low-acid vegetable. Not safe on its own.
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Pickling: Technically possible but the texture doesn't hold up well. Not recommended.
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Root cellaring: Doesn't hold up outside of refrigeration.
What to cook
The Southern classic is long-braised with smoked meat, a splash of vinegar, and time. That's still the move. But younger leaves work raw in salads, and the whole plant holds up in soups, stir fries, and grain bowls where something sturdy is exactly what you want.
Seed Storage & Saving
| Variety |
Georgia Southern Collards |
| Type |
Heirloom · Open-Pollinated |
| Seeds per packet |
~150 seeds |
Storing unused seeds: Keep somewhere cool, dark, and dry. Viable up to 4 years.
Seed saving: Collards are a biennial, so they set seed in their second year. They cross freely with other Brassica oleracea crops. You need at least half a mile of distance from any flowering relatives to keep the variety true. In year two the plant bolts and flowers in spring. Let the seed pods dry completely on the plant, then collect, thresh, and store seeds somewhere cool and dark.
