Garden Goals for April: Preparing for Spring

Garden Season Prep Goals:

• Complete one last inspection of your garden tools and make sure everything is repaired and in good working order.   You don’t want to find out that your hose has a hole, or your shovel handle is about ready to break. 
• Remember those goals you made last year to start a new bed or decrease the size of your lawn? Start prepping those areas so they’re ready for planting soon.
• Do a quick run-through on your irrigation system.  Turn on each zone. All heads should be operating properly, and the timer set for your new watering schedule.

Garden Chore Goals:

• Stay on top of weeds. They like nothing better than to bask in the warm sun and take up space.  Don’t let them get out of hand or your new seedlings will be choked out.
• Start transplanting your seedlings. All of those veggie and flower seedlings that you lovingly tended in the cooler months are ready to go.  Check with your local garden center for recommended times for transplanting them in the garden.
• Get your veggie garden going. If you didn’t start your own veggies from seed, go ahead and buy transplants from the garden center. Follow your area’s planting schedule closely, always keeping an eye on the weather. Tomatoes will have difficulty setting fruit if they are planted too early or too late in the season.
• Continue pruning with a purpose. It’s easy to get caught up in Spring Garden Mania, but please resist clipping just for the sake of clipping. Pruning should always be done with a purpose in mind.  Remove suckers or dead/diseased growth, to control shape, or to encourage healthy growth and flowering.  Wait til after spring-flowering shrubs they’ve bloomed to do any light pruning.
• Be prepared to cover and protect. Have row covers, freeze cloth, clothes, tarps, or sheets on hand for those late season cold snaps. Where we live, we almost never get a freeze after March 1, but this year, surprisingly, it happened. Consequently, we quickly protected our tender tropical plants with no freeze damage.
• Watch out for garden pests and diseases. Aphids, beetles, thrips, and cutworms can do quite a bit of damage seemingly overnight.  Accordingly, at this time of the year, it’s good to do a garden inspection every couple of days to identify possible problems.

• Schedule your first lawn fertilizing. Most areas of the country can apply their spring lawn fertilizer around the middle of April.  However, hold off if you live in a colder growing zone. Basically, the soil temp should be 55 degrees or warmer before new grass growth emerges. Also, use a fertilizer with a higher first number (for nitrogen) on the package, such as a 20-5-10 mixture.
• Turn your cover crops. If you planted winter cover crops, be sure they are turned into the soil 2 weeks before planting time.
• Plant your patio container gardens. Use high-quality soil specially created for containers, and plant spring-blooming annuals.  Hence, annuals like petunias, violas, pansies, alyssum, snapdragons, gerbera daisy, impatiens, and dianthus. The annuals you plant now will vary by region and growing zone.  Further, in my area, pansies are a winter annual, but in cooler zones, they are a spring bloomer.
• Replenish your bird feeders. Invite feathered friends to your garden by placing bird feeders and bird baths nearby. Set up your hummingbird feeder as well and remember to put a fresh mixture in every 5-7 days.

Garden Chill Goals:

• Host an outdoor gathering to herald spring’s arrival, with your garden as the backdrop. Invite family for a BBQ or, if it’s still a bit chilly where you live, light a fire in the fire pit.  Have neighbors over for happy hour. Don’t forget holidays and long weekends, perfect timing for a friends and family garden party!
• Color affects your mood, so remember that when you’re shopping for seasonal color at the garden center. Hot colors (red, bright pink, yellow) uplift.  Cool colors (purple, lavender, soft pink) soothe.  High contrast colors (orange/purple, blue/yellow, or any color with white) energize. And Monochromatic colors (all shades of any one hue) calm.
• Sit back and enjoy. Sure, we know it’s a crazy busy time in the garden, but what’s the garden for if not to feed our souls? At the end of a hectic gardening day, take a moment with a cold beverage and enjoy what you’ve created.

Source:  kellogggarden.com