GARDENING TIPS: Early Planting

Hi welcome back to another year of Garden Report. We've got lots of things in store for you this year. We're going to be talking about lawn care, flowers, what to do in the vegetable garden, and the pests that show up in our garden unwelcome.

So today, though, I wanted to talk about early planting, and there are some things that can be started now. You don't have to wait until June 1st for everything.

But anything that is planted from seeds, doesn't have a problem, it’s in the ground, it is protected.

But I still wouldn't plant beans because they are a warm season vegetable, and they really like warmer temperatures.

How do you know what your soil temperature is? Well you could use a soil thermometer.

Potatoes could be planted, and as the soil warms up to about 40 degrees, and you want to use about a 2 inch seed piece, about this size, and when you have potatoes that are larger, you can cut them but you always want have a piece with the both.

So this one could be cut in half. With onions, we've got lots going on. Onions should be planted from plants, so here we have onions that were started locally from the greenhouse. Here's a bundle that is 50 to 75, and they look about half dead, but they're really quite the bargain and they will grow.

Because onions are a crop that flowers in the second year, you don't want to put in sets. The sets will make a flower and then you're not going to get a nice big storage onion like you will if you use plants.

So join me next week and we are going to be talking about how to make your lawn beautiful.