Addressing the Seasonal Gardening Questions: PART 1

Every year about this time if not earlier, the Internet and especially gardening/homesteading groups blow up with questions. It makes sense, I guess, as we start hitting the pile of seed catalogs that began arriving even earlier than usual this year. I am excited to see so many new gardeners, and at the same time I get a bit sad and frustrated. So many of us, it seems, did not keep any of our "research skills" which I hope are still being taught in school. With the Internet at our fingertips, finding information is much easier than in the "go to the library, hunt in the card catalog and then search the stacks and hope" days of my youth. But with the plethora of information, it is easier, now, to become confused if you do not have any background beyond possibly folk sayings and local traditions. And as mobile as we are, tracking down true local traditions and not ideas imported by folks moving from different climates, produces more challenges. So once (and hopefully finally, since I will be able to reference this blog post in future years) here are all of the questions I regularly answer, answered. 

NOTE: this will be long and if you are a southern climate gardener with no frost/freeze season, much will not apply. I do write from a Northland perspective. 

Meet your County Extension Agents

Yes, you have them, even if you do not live in a rural area. "Extension provides non-formal education and learning activities to people throughout the country — to farmers and other residents of rural communities as well as to people living in urban areas. Based in each state's land grant university, they extend the knowledge and reach of their services into communities across the state, with local staff ready and willing to answer your questions about gardening, food safety, and a myriad of other topics from a base of scientific research. The Old Farmers Almanac has a current (2023) list of links for each state. They should be your first "go to."

Hardiness zones, their meaning and relevance

htps://planthardiness.ars.usda.gov/

This map of hardiness zones (you can search by zip code on the government web site) is often misunderstood. It codes your climate based on average annual minimum winter temperature, divided into 10-degree F zones. It is very relevant if you are choosing perennial plants, especially fruit trees and other fruiting crops that you expect to survive and produce food year after year. It does not speak to the length of your growing season, first or last frost or truly anything for annual plants — those you plant from seed or seedlings into your garden in the spring, harvest during the year and remove to compost or till in late in the fall.

Catalog and online sites selling perennials should indicate a range of hardiness zones in which each plant variety can be expected to thrive. As always, taking note of the plants and if you can, the varieties growing in your local area will help you become familiar with your "micro-climate." An open, unprotected area may challenge a tree that would otherwise be suited to your zone, and likewise, if your land has some protection from the winds and storms, you might be able to successfully grow a variety that would prefer to be a bit farther south. My land here sits on what is locally known as "storm hill" but I have a small area that is somewhat protected and am trying a hardy northern variety of peach, which is a decided gamble.

last frost date map, Maine

Average frost dates

These are the important dates you will use to plan your garden. They will tell you when to start various seeds in the house, when to transplant them into the garden and when to direct seed other crops. Coupled with the "days to harvest" info from seed packets, they will also clue you in to the fine art of succession planting, and help you make sure that you pick vegetable varieties that will actually ripen a crop in our northern gardens. The farther south you live, the longer the growing season, in general. In truly frost-free or nearly frost-free locations your challenges will vary, as you will likely find you have 2 different garden seasons: a "winter" garden season which favors cool season crops like lettuce, spinach, peas and the brassica family and a "summer" garden season for corn, beans, tomatoes, and okra. This will require irrigation and mulch is recommended.

The average Last Frost Date in the spring is the first one to consider. There are a myriad of sources out there on the web, but I have always used https://www.plantmaps.com/interactive-maine-last-frost-date-map.php and have found it accurate. If you are NOT in Maine, you can copy the URL and replace "maine" with your state, hyphenated if it is a two word name. Once in, you can look at a color coded map like shown above, and even zoom in to pinpoint your exact location, which I did because my "town" covers a large geographic area. Or you can scroll down and search by town name, where the average range is listed numerically on a background of the associated color code. Write down the range, you will need to remember it. 

The average First Frost Date in the fall pretty much determines the end of our garden season. I say "pretty much" because the "killing frost" or even the threat of it, sends many of us scurrying to the garden with baskets, boxes and carts to harvest tomatoes, both ripe and ripening, at the very least, if not also the last of the beans, zucchini, cucumbers and maybe even the winter squash. But the late spinach, if we planted any, the remaining lettuces and the brassica will probably be fine and the Brussels sprouts and Swiss chard will even welcome the nip of cold weather. They allow us to get to them later, after we deal with the mound of produce that frost warning generates. https://www.plantmaps.com/interactive-maine-first-frost-date-map.php will give you a heads up on when to begin looking for that frost, and when compared with your last frost date, will give you a good handle on what we typically consider the growing season.  Make a note of that date range also, as it will be useful to know in the future.

In the next installment, we will find powerful online tools to pair with these two frost dates and meet three of my favorite local seed companies.