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| My white crocus from 2010- no rainy pictures please |
It is raining today as I write this. We have entered the time of spring rains, and after the inundations of last month added to the heavy snows, there are flood warnings as steams and rivers rise. Spring has definitely reached her watershed mark, and winter will reign no more. Even if spits and spurts of unsportsmanlike winter storms lash out. Winter is like that in Ohio.
There is no mistaking the change of the atmosphere, however, and spring is here.
I still have time to start some tomato plants, although my eye surgery proved more complicated than I anticipated. Not to worry though since the most important spring crop for me is the lettuces and spinach. Those will be direct seeded as soon as the ground cooperates. It is a spring like this, where the ground is wet and slow to warm, that proves the wisdom of having some raised beds in the vegetable garden. That is where my 2011 lettuce crop is going to be planted. Among the 2nd year strawberry plants, which I should check for heaving.
As I looked out the window this morning to check on the state of the weather for today, I could see the water droplets hang heavily on the twigs of my Jane magnolia. Like little crystal orbs they are attached along the underside of craggy brown branchlets, magnifying the world through their miniature lenses.
The past few days the ponding fields have had small lakes that shine in the moonlight and ripple during the day. Ponding is common in this very flat terrain, but the streams were rushing in wild madness that spoke of the heavy influx of the past few rains and the melt. It can only become higher, wider, and more powerful in the predicted rains of the weekend.
Gardening chores will remain a thought and a dream while this weather prevails. There was no midwinter break dry enough to prepare fields or gardens this year, the gardener and nature are both filled with pent up anticipation of the new growing season.
Starting To Think Like Spring
Start Seeds
Propagation
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© 2010 written for Ilona’s Garden Journal. Copyrights apply.