Meet Mike in Fredericksburg This Weekend
Mike will appear at noon, 2 and 5 p.m. on Saturday March 14, and at 12:30 and 2:30 p.m. on Sunday at the Fredericksburg Home and Garden Show at the Expo Center in Fredericksburg, Virginia.
Start a salad garden this weekend
Spring allegedly arrives Friday, March 20, but our soils are still much too cold to sprout any kind of seed, and they’re much too wet to work in without messing up that soil for the season. (Never work wet soil!)
What’s a winter-damaged, horny-for-horticulture gardener to do?
Treat yourself to some nice, big, brand-new containers (make sure they have excellent drainage holes in the bottom — if they don’t, drill them yourself). Fill them with a mixture of high-quality, soil-free potting mix (aka “professional mix,” seed-starting mix, etc.) and compost — none of your crappy weed-ridden, freezing cold garden soil.
Place the filled containers outside in your sunniest spot, water them slowly and well until the container mix is saturated, then adorn them with already-growing salad greens and pansies from the local garden centers that are just now emerging from their winter hibernation.
Again — seeds won’t sprout in this weather, but cool-temperature-loving plants such as lettuce, spinach, pansies and peas love it. They can even survive nights that flirt with freezing.
How to plant your “lucky peas” on St. Patrick’s Day
Traditionally, St. Patrick’s Day — this Tuesday — is considered to be the “lucky” day to plant your peas — unless, of course, you stop to consider the freezing temperatures predicted for Wednesday. In fact, the soil is almost always too cold on March 17 to follow this garden imperative, so how did it begin?
One: It probably started in the UK, where winters are milder and spring-like weather arrives much earlier.
Two: Peas are a true cool-season crop that curl up and fry when the weather turns hot, but it takes a good 60 to 75 days before seeds sown (in warm soil) produce their first tasty little pods. So to have a bumper crop of June peas, you pretty much need to plant by April Fool’s Day.
So: What’s a potential pea-picker to do? Cheat! (Cheaters always win.)
Fold some gently moistened paper towels around your pea seeds of choice (I stick with the easy-to-grow, bush-style snow and snap peas — the ones whose plants only grow a few feet high) and slide them into a plastic bag on St. Patrick’s Day. Don’t seal the bag or subject it to direct light — just normal indoor kitchen counter warmth.
Check the seeds daily, mist them if they seem dry, and when you see sprouts appear, plant the sprouted seeds an inch or so deep in a container filled with potting soil and compost and water them well. (Be sure to add a tall trellis if you’re growing full-size “pole peas.”) When the sprouts get to be a few inches high, take them outside into good luck — eh, I meant good light — and you may well be picking the entire merry month of June.
Deer, deer, deer…
We got a lot of clever comments at the ‘TOP website about last week’s bits on the plants that deer eat last.
“Cyberstalker” suggested using an electric fence — with one wire strung about two feet high and another about four feet off the ground. “Once the deer get a few shocks,” says Cyber, “they’ll leave your plants alone.” Well, the Stalker is correct. The harmless low-level shocks these devices deliver really do get deer to avoid that area, making electric fences a great way for farmers and gardeners to protect a dedicated area of plantings. But I’m not sure they’d be very practical — or even legal — around a suburban yard filled with Bambi’s buffet.
Famed Dudley Do-Right foe “Snidely Whiplash” (love the avatar, Snides!) suggested the deliberate planting of arborvitae as a lure for the deer, with the eventual result being donated to local food banks. (And no, he’s not suggesting the food bank clients eat arborvitae.)
And it seems that famed Virginian “Patrick Henry” is still orating. The Founding Father noted that there are only three types of plants: “The ones that deer like to eat; the ones they will eat; and the ones they’ll eat if they have to.” This explains why he named his Virginia farm “Leatherwood.”
Rumble in Rockville: Moms vs. Monsanto!
The great debate in Montgomery County rages on. Later this month, in two separate sessions in Rockville, committees will consider arguments on whether to ban most lawn pesticides.
On one side, we have the incredibly well-funded lobbyists of the turf chemical and lawn care industries.
In the far corner (wearing, one presumes, the green trunks) we have Safe Grow Montgomery, an — ahem — “grassroots” coalition including several Interfaith organizations, the Sierra Club and the wonderfully named Mom’s Clean Air Force.
Ah, but neglected in the middle of the ring is the simple horticultural reality that lawns need no toxic spreads or sprays of any kind if they’re cut, fed and watered correctly. In fact, 15 years of your listener emails have clearly shown me that most applications of pesticides and herbicides make lawns look worse.
Of course, we’ll follow this intriguing political conflict as it unfolds. But perhaps more importantly, we’ll teach you how to dodge the punches by having a great-looking lawn without any kinds of toxins — all this spring on ‘TOP!
