Spring is here, but it’s too soon to get out and plant

Spring is basically here at last with crocus blooming, grass greening, and that fallow garden looking enticing. But it isn’t planting season yet, give or take a few onion and garlic sets, and it can be a real temptation to rush the season and plant before the ground is ready. It’ll be weeks yet before you dare to chance lettuce and radishes, and more yet before it’s time to try such warm loving plants as zinnias, sunflowers, green beans, melons, and other garden provender and flower bed inhabitants..

Nurseries and supermarkets like to sell such things as tomato plants, green peppers, etc. well before it’s safe to plant them, so hold off on these until the weather truly warms and don’t be fooled by a couple of nice weekends. If you simply must buy such vegetables early, at least put them in a cold frame and let them harden off instead of dropping them directly into the garden where they’ll likely shiver and go into shock.

Another mistake that many gardeners make is planting seeds too close together. My own sister-inlaw did this once, planting green beans less than an inch apart, then wondering out loud why they were so weak and spindly. To retrieve her crop, I had to pull most of the seedlings and add more fertilizer. It worked eventually. Check your seed packets to see how far their contents should be spaced apart, and if you intentionally plant them too close, at least don’t forget to thin them. I often plant onion sets too close, then remove every other one for green onions, allowing the remainder to grow into storage bulbs.

While there’s still time before planting, you might take a day or two to improve your garden soil. This never hurts, always helps, and the time spent hauling a load of manure from some friendly farmer or the local county fairgrounds, spreading the lot, and tilling it in will always pay dividends for months, even years to come. You might till in rotted leaves too, grass clippings (nonsprayed), compost, anything available in your area. The materials will not only add nutrients and “tilth”, but allow the soil to hold more water and let roots grow with less effort.

When planting time comes, don’t forget to fertilize appropriately. I still remember the lady who called and asked why her garden was doing so poorly. “I got good crops for several years, but now the plants hardly grow at all.” she said. I asked what kind of fertilizer she was using. “Fertilizer?” A good rule of thumb is to use a high nitrogen fertilizer when the plants are actively growing, then when they start to fruit or flower, switch to a low nitrogen, high potassium-phosphorus type. Organic fertilizers are always good, but a good, long lasting granular type will work, too.

Have you ever heard the famous words, “When all else fails, read the directions.”? It works when you’re planting spring seeds, too. Some vegetables can be planted early, others are better for mid-or even long season. Plant them at the wrong time and you could come up losers. Pumpkins are a classic example. There are both short season and long season types, and if you’re planting some to use on Halloween, make sure they’ll be ready then, and not decaying in the field long before they can be sold.

Finally, now is a good time to plan your whole year of gardening. Plant seeds that will mature early here, then be ready to replace them with a late season crop. Plant those that take long to grow there, and just leave them alone until ready to pick. If you make good choices, you’ll have crops coming on from mid-spring until late fall and utilize your garden to its fullest.