Be Daring! Start Your Garden In March
How would you like to avoid mud season and begin gardening earlier in
the spring? It's possible. I've been doing it for years. First
choose an area of your garden that is not prone to getting waterlogged
or having water puddled up. I use raised beds with no sides. Plan,
based on your crop rotation, where you will plant your spring garden of
cool weather crops such as lettuce, radishes, spinach, early cabbage parsley,
onions and beets.
In the fall, after I've pulled the existing plants from that area of the garden, I cover this area of the soil or beds with a 6 millimeter opaque plastic sheet used as mulch. This cover will help maintain soil moisture for the spring garden. Secure the plastic to the ground with rocks, dirt or wood so that it won't blow away. Secure both the perimeter and the center.
You can prevent the soil from freezing if you cover the plastic with 12 to 24 inches of leaves, depending on your planting zone. The leaves act as insulation. If you've ever overwintered carrots or beets in the garden with a heavy mulch like leaves (using no plastic) then you know that you can pull back the mulch, even during the winter and dig up some root crops in unfrozen soil.
Come springtime, or at least two weeks before you want to plant, remove the leaves and the rocks. Test the soil if you need to, and add nutrients as recommended. Actually, fall is a good time to test your soil and add lime as needed. You'll need to wait until spring to add fertilizers. You can have your soil tested by the UNH Analytical Services Lab. Call them at 862-3210 or download the form. For $15.00 you will get nutrient levels, your soil pH and fertilizer recommendations.. Next cover the soil back up with the 4 to 6 millimeter plastic to begin the soil-warming process. Clear, black, red or brown plastic have also worked well for me.
Set up a clear plastic row cover over the bed. Under the clear plastic row cover, on top of the plastic mulch, place one-gallon milk jugs, 7/8 full of water (approximately one milk jug per 3 to 4 square feet of growing area). The soil will begin to warm; the air in the row cover will warm during a sunny day, helping to warm the water in the milk jugs. The thermal mass of water in the jugs will help reduce heat build-up during the day, lessen the heat loss during the night, and buffer the temperature on sunless days.
In about one week, test the soil temperature. When the soil reaches the proper temperature (cool weather crops require 50 degrees F), you can remove the milk jugs and the plastic mulch that's on the soil.
If you want to plant cool-crop seeds, plant normally, keeping seeds back from the edge where the plastic cover and the coldest temperatures will be. Water seeds, and then cover with clear plastic. Place the milk jugs back under the clear plastic row cover with the plants. Be sure to remove the plastic cover shortly after germination. Alternatively, you can use polyester row covers. Polyester doesn't give quite the heat buffering advantages of plastic and milk jugs, but you can leave it on after germination until the plants begin to push at it.
You can also transplant properly hardened cold weather plants at this time. Again, keep plants away from the perimeter of the row cover. It is imperative that the plastic row cover not allow cold air to leak under. As the weather warms up, you will want to vent your row cover during the day. Make sure you seal it back up at night. Making the sun work to your advantage will give you cool season crops to eat earlier in the spring and it helps winter seem just a little shorter. In my book, that's always a good thing.
Call the UNH Cooperative Extension's Family, Home & Garden Education
Center 's Info-Line toll-free at 1-877-3984769 for "Practical Solutions
to Everyday Questions." Trained volunteers are available to answer
your questions Monday through Friday from 9 am to 2 pm .