February is a busy month for the kitchen gardener. In a number of spaces, indoor and outdoor sowing and planting is underway. Some gardeners already have seed throughout the flooring. Throughout the coldest spaces, where there may be snow on the flooring, February is still the time for making plans and making able for spring. Listed here are probably the most the most important actions you take this month to get your garden emerging:
Plan and design. Plan the spring and summer time garden on paper. Cartoon a base plan. Consider the location of space, garage, shed, fences, walls, and large timber that can cast shadows across the garden. Vegetables require no less than 6 hours of sun each day to thrive. In finding your garden with reference to a water provide. For those who’ve grown a vegetable garden forward of imagine new crops this three hundred and sixty five days and plan out succession plantings. Search the recommendation of garden books for guidelines. If this is your first garden, observe your planting area and map where the snow melts first, the ones it will likely be excellent spots for planting early crops. Consider the light, water, and nutrient needs of every crop and crop family. Plant crops with similar needs or crops from the identical families close together.
Consider your time and effort. If your time and space is particular, select six types to broaden this three hundred and sixty five days. You’ll get necessarily probably the most for your money and effort from tomatoes, snap beans, carrots, and greens corresponding to lettuce and chard.
Succession and partner plantings. Succession planting (emerging one crop after each different throughout the emerging season) takes benefit of on a daily basis throughout the emerging season. Plan succession crops by the use of plotting germination and harvest days for every crop and then plan which crop can apply the crop forward of given the length of the emerging season, an example, warm-weather bush lima beans can apply cool-weather peas. Important different cropping suits a fast-growing small crop with a slow-maturing crop, an example, quick emerging radishes planted between slow-maturing carrots, or colour tolerant peas planted beneath corn.
Report protecting. Prepare your garden file protecting device now. Keep practice of dates of varieties, sowing, transplanting, blooming dates, and notes about every crop. Planting and harvest dates can be used for planning succession crops. Make a garden map to stick practice of merely what was once planted where; this map it will likely be precious will have to your garden labels change into misplaced or illegible. The ones data will imply you’ll plan your garden in following years.
Seed orders. Find out about on-line and mail-order catalogs and order seeds and plants for spring.
Garden equipment and frames. Clean and repair equipment early this month. Repair cold frames and hotbeds and make sure they are ready for use.
Seed sowing items. Assemble flats, soil, and power for sowing. Use flats about 5 inches deep for slow emerging seedlings. Use a seed starting mix or a soil mix of two parts garden loam, one section sand, and one section leaf mold or humus. A hand seed-sower may be helpful.
Indoor seed sowing in cold spaces. Check out seed packets to come to a decision the selection of days from sowing to germination. Sow hardy and half-hardy vegetable seeds about 6 to 8 weeks forward of seedlings may also be hardened off throughout the coldframe or underneath cloches throughout the garden–most often 6 to 8 weeks forward of the typical ultimate frost date in spring. Do not get began seeds indoors too early. Sow cool-weather spring corps first: beets, cabbage family crops, celeriac, leaf lettuce and salad greens, bulb onions, parsley, radish, spinach, and turnips. At the end of the month, sow the seeds of refined warm-weather summer-harvest vegetables corresponding to eggplants, peppers, and tomatoes that require 12 weeks or further indoors. When the seeds sprout, place them beneath vibrant lighting. Set seed starting cell packs in water trays with a copper-based fungicide to forestall damping off. Ventilate the greenhouse or hotbed on warmth days to forestall the buildup of illnesses throughout the damp surroundings.
Cold frame in mild-winter spaces. Sow cool-weather spring crops throughout the cold frame in milder spaces: beets, broccoli, cabbage, cauliflower, celery, lettuce and salad greens, onions, and parsley. Make sure that the soil throughout the seedbed is not overly nitrogen rich; this may occasionally most likely reason why succulent growth when early season plants are upper tough and stocky forward of transplanting. Crops that have been started indoors may also be hardened-off throughout the coldframe forward of being planted out throughout the garden. Ventilate the coldframe when the outdoor temperature rises above 40ºF. Close the frame another time forward of sundown. If the soil is dry throughout the cold frame 6 inches down, provide a slow, deep watering immediately throughout the soil on a warmth day. Steer clear of wetting plant leaves
Rhubarb. Plant rhubarb roots in compost-rich soil spaced 3 feet apart. An open, sunny place is very best. Rhubarb likes numerous water throughout the emerging season and is a heavy feeder; apply aged-manure intently and turn it underneath.
Spring onions. Plant small onion gadgets moderately in a flat or box and cover with about 1 inch of soil and provide cheap light for spring onions next month.
Tomatoes. Tomato seed sown in February will result in plants with one truss of bloom for the garden by the use of mid-Would possibly.
Garden soil preparation. Check out wintry climate mulch spherical perennial vegetables, brambles, and fruit timber and add further if sought after. Press frost-heaved plants once more into the soil. Where local weather permits and soil is dry enough to be worked, get able planting beds this month. Turn, spade, or till the garden when the soil is not wet. Add lime if your soil is just too acid. Mow wintry climate cover crops and green manures and turn them underneath if the soil is dry enough to cultivate. Add 2 inches of aged garden compost to planting beds. For those who won’t be planting for 6 weeks, add an inch of well-aged manure to every bed.
Direct seed. Take a handful of garden soil and offers it a squeeze; if the soil crumbles and fall apart, you can direct sow crops. To warmth the soil for early sowing, cover the bed with polyethylene. Carrots, onions, and early potatoes may also be seeded in warmth, sandy soil. Other cool-weather crops that can be sown where the soil is workable are beets, cabbage plants, carrots, cauliflower plants, chard, lettuce, mustard, onions plants and gadgets, peas, Irish potatoes, salsify, spinach, and turnips. Check out seed packets to make sure the types you might be planting are suitable for early sowing. Most seed requires a soil temperature of 45ºF or upper to germinate; use a soil thermometer to check forward of you sow. Extend planting until the soil is warmth another way you risk seeds rotting or poor germination. Be ready to cover plants with cloches, row covers, and plastic tunnels if the weather turns cold.
Compost. Get began new compost bins this month.
Squash packing containers. Make cheesecloth lined frames to put over melon, squash, and cucumber hills to stick out cucumber beetles and squash bugs later this spring. A cover will have to be about 3 feet sq. and one-foot top.
Fruit timber and vines. Transplant deciduous fruit timber and vines throughout the dormant season. Give new transplants numerous water, every at planting time and afterwards.
Prune fruit timber and vines when the weather shall we in: apples, pears, berries, brambles, and grapes. Remove broken and damaged branches. Entire pruning while the plants are nevertheless dormant.
Prune autumn-fruiting raspberries. Decrease vines that fruited ultimate autumn once more to flooring level. Raspberries planted ultimate spring will have to be cut back to about 12 inches above soil level. Tip once more summer-fruiting raspberries to just above the perfect wire and decrease down newly planted canes to about 9 inches. Prune once more the stems of newly planted and two-year-old gooseberries by the use of about one-half. Spray gooseberries and black currants for gooseberry mould.
Spray fruit timber for over-wintering pests with dormant oil spray when the temperature is bigger than 45ºF; this must be completed while plants are nevertheless dormant. Spray peaches, nectarines, and almonds with a copper-based fungicide to forestall peach-leaf curl. Spray apples and pears vulnerable to scab an an infection. Spray fruit timber no later than when buds begin to swell. Practice a second spray to timber susceptible to peach-leaf curl about 14 days after the main application.
Plant fig, blackberries, blueberries, currant trees, raspberries, and strawberries. Fertilize established citrus and tropical fruits.
Mulch all newly planted timber, bush, and cane fruits with well-rotted compost. Mulch grapevines and gooseberries with well-rotted manure or compost.
Regional garden data for February:
Regional gardening guidelines. The ones guidelines are divided into 4 primary geographical areas: North and East and Midwest (zones 2 throughout the northern most areas to 6 along the coast), the South (zones 7 throughout the north to 10 throughout the a long way south), the Southwest and California (zones 7 throughout the coolest areas to 11), and the Northeast (zones 5 inside the most efficient conceivable elevations to 8 along the coast).
North and East and Midwest. Plan the spring and summer time vegetable garden. Power rhubarb and endive. Sow indoors early cabbage, cauliflower, celery, radishes, peppers, and tomatoes. Past due throughout the month where the ground may also be worked, set out asparagus roots, horseradish, onion gadgets, and rhubarb. Elevate over-wintered parsnips. Past due throughout the month, plant early potatoes in hotbeds.
South. Sow or plant throughout the garden where the ground may also be worked asparagus, beets, black-eyed peas, broccoli, cabbage plants, carrots, cauliflower plants, chard, collards, endive, kale, kohlrabi, leek, lettuce, onion gadgets or plants, parsley, peas, Irish potatoes, radish, spinach, turnip. Have in mind to try the typical date of the overall frost in your area forward of setting out transplants. Past due throughout the month in a long way southern spaces where all possibility of frost has passed set out starts: tomatoes, eggplant, and peppers (be ready to offer protection to the ones crops will have to the temperature drop). Sow indoors early this month warmth local weather crops: bush and pole beans, limas, butterbeans, squash, cucumbers, cantaloupe, pumpkin, and watermelons. A large number of those crops will require 7 to 8 weeks of emerging forward of they’re going to be large enough to transplant into the garden.
Southwest and California. Early throughout the month, plant perennial vegetables: artichokes, asparagus, rhubarb, and horseradish while roots are nevertheless dormant. In warmth, sandy soil, plant potatoes. By the use of mid-month, set transplants out into the early spring garden: beets, broccoli, cabbage, carrots, chard, Italian sprouting broccoli, kale, kohlrabi, leaf lettuce, mustard, onion seedlings and gadgets, parsley, Irish potatoes in well-composted soi, radishes, and turnips. By the use of the end of month in all areas, sow indoors warmth local weather crops: bush and pole beans, limas, butterbeans, cantaloupe, cucumber, eggplant, peppers, pumpkin, squash, tomatoes, and watermelons. Do not place any warm-season plants throughout the garden until the night time temperatures stay above 50°F. Avocados may also be planted this month to verify they amplify excellent leaf growth forward of summer time. More youthful timber may also be safe towards trunk sunburn by the use of growing simple colour subject material frame to colour trunks on south and west.
Northwest. Early this month where the soil is sandy and warms further quickly, sow carrots, onion seeds, and early potatoes. Do not plant in cold, wet soil. Where the weather remains cold, make a cold frame or scorching bed. Regarding the third week of the month, get began cool-weather crops: asparagus roots, broccoli, cabbage, carrots, cauliflower, celery, lettuce, onions, peas, early potatoes, radishes, rhubarb, spinach, turnips. By the use of the end of the month make a second planting of peas.
Save Money. Increase Further Vegetables. Click on on proper right here to look our ebook, THE KITCHEN GARDEN GROWERS’ GUIDE
