*I have had some comments asking questions about when to plant and for some reason, it is not letting me post my own comment so I thought I would just create a new post and answer your questions.
As soon as the soil can be worked, you can plant peas and lettuce and radishes and arugula and turnips and cabbage... Get the idea? :)Nearly all of these can be planted from seed. They will take longer to mature so choose one that has a shorter time til harvest. I will talk about some of those varieties later this week, so stay tuned. If you plan on sprouting them inside at this point I would just go to the nursery and buy them. They will have plants that are weeks ahead of yours. This doesn't mean you can't plant starts for your warm weather crops now. They will still be ready for your later round of planting.The ones I have found somewhat better success from plants rather than seeds are broccoli, cabbage and swiss chard. Radishes and any leafy greens will do better straight from seed, as will peas, both ornamental and edible. The snow will not hurt your seeds one bit unless you get a REALLY hard freeze, which is unlikely. Plus, if your garden is situated where it should be, it will be in a sunny place where the snow won't last long anyway.
Okay for all you Utahns out there buried in snow... 5"+ can be a lot for little seedlings to survive. If you have seeds in the ground, but no sprouts yet, you should be fine. The snow will actually act as an insulator for the seeds. In the future, if you have sprouts poking their heads out and you know snow is imminent, put mason jars over the seedlings and they will be alright unless it snows and snows and snows. That's just how it spring goes in Utah!
Let me know how your planting is going. Anything popping up yet?!
Ciao!
Question for you. You mentioned placing mason jars over the plants to protect from frost. Would that work to protect them from the Quail, too? We replaced our tomato plants three different times last year (that's all we planted) because the Quail went to town on them. By the time the birds were gone and left the plants alone it was so late in the season. We didn't get our huge harvest until mid October. Thank goodness for the late cool weather last Fall. I still had so many big green tomatoes that froze on the plants though. Any ideas for that? Thanks in advance! Your blog has been so helpful already!
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Do you happen to have any ideas for drought resistant plants for flower beds? My neighbor and I are trying to add a little something to our empty beds, and aren't sure what does well in Utah. I told her about your beautiful flower beds. When she told me about what she was trying to do with her flower beds in front of her house I thought about you instantly. Her home even faces the same direction as yours did!
ReplyDeletemy peas have sprouted, my beets are doing nothing so far. The strawberries are starting to grow again after I pruned then a couple of weeks ago. That's all I have in the ground this year. My tomatoes are about 3 inches above the dirt in my window sill. FUN FUN FUN! I love the anticipation of it all.
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