Spinach Failure

Spinach hates heat.

For the most part, we've had an unusually cool and moist spring here in the District of Columbia. Intermittently, temperatures have climbed into the upper 70s and even surpassed 80 degrees. Well that apparently was enough for our spinach to throw in the towel. We planted it March 4, and lately it has been focusing most of its energy on sending up seed stalks.

Yesterday I called our spinach done. I dug it up, collected the leaves for our salad mix and composted the rest. Where the spinach had been, I worked a little more compost into the soil and planted cranberry beans. In other words, we are already into the summer rotatation.

As best I can tell, the cure for spinach in this part of the country is to plant it in the fall and let it overwinter in the garden. We'll try again later in the year. Any other suggestions from you gardeners out there?