Spring Garden
by Carol Lee

At last, the calendar says March 20! Just the thought of spring delights the spirit. The first sign of buds elicits undivided attention, as though this unfolding never occurred before. Yet it happens every year, and still I am spellbound. The whole landscape stretches and wakens. Like me, it yearns to embrace the sun and warmth, the gentle rains, and all the brighter days that spring portends. Of course, two years ago it snowed a few inches on May 18th, setting a record and destroying the local farmers' apple crops for the entire season! And last spring snow covered the ground until late in April, after some three inches fell on April 7, adding to the thirteen inches of snow that had fallen in March, and not yet melted. When the snow stopped, the rain started.

A friend reminded me that all the scheduled bike rides for the Mid Hudson Bicycle Club were canceled last spring due to rain in May and June and even part of July and August! After three years of drought, the reservoirs rose to capacity and we were once again allowed to water our gardens. Who needed to water?

But it is officially spring, and I have already begun to garden—in my sunroom—by sowing seeds. It's nature at work, but I am at the controls! No frosts, floods or flukes of nature. To get growing indoors, all I need are seeds, trays, starter mix, light, warmth and water. The "mix" is a sterilized combination of vermiculite and peat moss, available in stores as "seed starter mix." I put this mixture—moistened—in seed starter kits or flats, but people claim to have success with peat pots or even egg cartons. A tray underneath catches any excess water. I insert the seeds into the mixture to a depth equal to the size of the seed. To keep them moist, I water from the bottom tray only.

Seedlings grow leggy from insufficient light, but they'll do well in a room with a south-facing window so long as they're rotated a half-turn each day to keep them from growing toward the sun. A friend has tremendous success growing seeds using a fluorescent light instead for fourteen hours a day. Another places the seed trays on top of the refrigerator (where it's warm) to promote germination, but once sprouted, the seedlings are moved to better light conditions.

The seed flats in my sunroom are covered with plastic wrap or covers until the sprouts appear. Warmth speeds germination, and if the seedlings are ready to transplant outside, but the weather is too cold, they can be transplanted into individual pots and kept indoors. If you can't be bothered starting from seeds, Jane and Doug Santini of The Northern Dutchess Botanical Gardens will grow your seeds for you in their greenhouses. You supply the seeds and then purchase them as you would other young plants in flats, in May or June! (Think heirlooms, if you like!)

This year I'm sowing State Fair, Cut'n Come Again, and California Giant zinnias. Grown, they're over three feet tall and drought resistant, with sturdy stems and enormous single, double or pompon flowers, three -inches across. They make great cut flowers, too, which is an essential element of my garden. (The more I cut, the more they bloom!)

March is a good time, if there's a dry spell, to clear debris from the garden and prepare the soil. Also to cut back my lavender, buddleia and ornamental grasses to within a foot of the ground. This will prompt them to grow, and is an act of sheer faith on my part that, soon, I will be gardening outdoors!

If the soil is still saturated, I'll do something else until the ground dries, like consult my garden journal from last year. It's nothing fancy, but it does give me lots to go on. With even the sketchiest notes, I can remember what grew well, or poorly, and why. Here's a good one: "Photograph my plants when they're young with large identification tags, for my journal, so that I can identify them when they sprout next year."

When the ground is safe to work, and I've cleared the debris—before designing, digging or planting—I want to identify those plants worthy of keeping in the garden. The markers have faded or broken over the winter, and seedlings have sprouted far from their parents. Are these oriental poppies (Papaver orientalis)? Are those coneflowers (Echinacea purpurea)? Is that black-eyed Susan (Rudbeckia)? The best guidance so far: if the leaves have a hairy underside, odds are they're weeds, and can be pulled. But, still, what are these others? So goes my yearly identity crisis!

Once the plants are identified and the ground is dryer, the beds can be dug in with a spade, eight inches deep, and I can add organic matter and fresh soil. Here's where my dahlias, which are just emerging in pots in the sunroom, will be planted. But not until it's consistently warm outside. If, then, a wayward frost is forecast after they're planted, they can be covered with sheets to keep them safe.

Soon, the long-awaited daffodils will emerge. (As in recent years, if they suffer a hard frost, they may not bloom, but will bloom the following year.) Then, like a billboard, forsythia in full bloom signals my last opportunity to prune the rose bushes. The Thorndale ivy (Hedera helix 'Thorndale') growing on my stone wall needs replenishing. I'm trying to duplicate the look of old stone walls where the ivy has taken over, growing abundantly over and in between the stones. Too many years of drought have hindered mine, but with last year's record precipitation, maybe now the new plants will flourish. I'll propagate my own.

After the snows melt, the ivy can be dug up and divided or, soon after new leaves develop, I can cut some stems and root them in my sunroom. By removing the bottom leaves, dipping the stems in a rooting powder and then planting them in individual pots filled with moistened seed-starter mix, they'll take root and be ready to plant before the summer begins. (That is if I remember to keep them moist!)

As the days grow warmer, I can see if the peonies, lilacs and hollyhocks I transplanted outside the garden gate last fall survived. . . or if they are merely salad bars for the deer. (If so, there's a number of deer repellent remedies that will work.) Deer Away, Deer Off, or Bobcat Urine are mentioned by the Dutchess County Cornell Cooperative Extension. Another, Bobbex, works for me, and a friend pees in a bottle and swears by its success! He has the garden to prove it, too!

Of course, I'll be purchasing lots of new plants at the nurseries in May, but just because the plants are available doesn't mean they can survive errant weather. Used to be Mother's Day was safe to plant, May 20 this year . . . but heed the ten-day forecasts. This is where those innocuous conversations with strangers about the weather really pay off!

As bluebirds set up house like giddy newlyweds, and early spring flowers paint landscapes of inspiration, the urge to garden must be reckoned with. Soon, I'll have no time to work out at the club, opting instead to hurl pickaxes at unwanted tree roots, shovel stones and small boulders, lift and tote hundred-pound weights of topsoil and fertilizer to create new garden beds. The lengthening days won't be long enough to accomplish all I want to do. But then, if spring is here, can summer be far behind? In summer there will be time for everything... picking flowers for bouquets throughout the house and, especially, to marvel at the kaleidoscopic mural that surrounds me.