Hey folks,

Let’s face it, it’s been warm this winter and we may be able to plant early this year without problems. Our usual average early crop planting date is around March 17th when we can start early crops without the threat of freezing our seedlings, but it may be sooner this year. Why not give it a try?

Here’s a few tips for starting your season off right:

1.) Find a good source of seeds and plants. Cheap seeds can often result in lower quality plants and produce which have a higher threat of disease, cracking, or pest susceptibility. A list of organic seed companies are in a previous post below. These are trusted companies with high quality organic seeds. For plants, buy them from a trusted retailer and make sure each one is healthy and strong. If you buy and plant a diseased or pest-infested plant, you may have problems all season long.  Talk to the retailer about their sanitation methods and how to pick a healthy plant.

2) Sterilize your tools, planters, stakes, etc. I can’t stress the importance of sterilization enough!! If you want to prevent disease spreading:  clean everything that touched last year’s soil that will be touching this year’s soil. Wooden stakes especially harbor disease from year to year.  Because of how wet things were last fall, this is particularly important this year.

3.) Prepare your soil. Now is the time to prepare your soil even if you’re not planting yet. Spread some organic compost and let it sit until you are ready to till or plant.
Note to 2012 Community gardeners: we will be purchasing a new tiller this year for you to use. I will send an email with more info soon.

4) Start Seeds indoors. Have you ever tried it? Now’s your chance. Here’s an article from Organic Gardening.

5) When to plant what?? Overwhelmed by all the veggies and when to start it all indoors or out? This is a great, quick resource I use all the time by Mother Earth News: What to Plant When.

If YOU have any questions, or would like to write on a certain topic, send me an email and we can add a post.