Cool season ornamental vegetables jazz up the garden fall into spring. Ornamental cabbage, kale, red mustard and pak (or bok) choy are all members of the brassica family (Brassicaceae). Ruby and Bright Lights Swiss chard (Amaranthaceae family, related to beets) both light up containers and the garden. I have found mostly the ornamental cabbage and kale to be cold hardy in most of our Amarillo winters, and Swiss chard often root hardy when well mulched over winter. If you've never tried them before, when the weather cools, buy a few and mix them along with pansies,violas and snap dragons in containers and borders. Create a fall display with pumpkins and gourds.

Cabbage and kale are susceptible to damage from the catarpillar of the white cabbage butterfly. Once the weather cools down by mid October, I've not noticed problems. But until then, I check the underside of my plant leaves often for the little eggs and catarpillars and remove them. They usually don't bother the chard and mustard. In a recent winter, a single ornamental kale plant made it through. I let it flower and set seed, and saved the seeds -- they put off thousands! All the ornamental kale I've grown from seed came from that one plant and have proven to be cold hardy. Let your plants flower in the spring for early nectar -- they are bee magnets! Waiting until the flowers set seeds takes patience. I pick my seed in mid June. Plant seeds in mid-July for fall; they readily germinate even in our summer heat, but a cool greenhouse with plenty of sun works best.