What to do in Your Garden this month

Gardens around Mendocino County are abuzz with Spring! As things warm up, it's time to plan and plant your garden. Don't let things you want and need to get in the ground now slip by! Timing does matter (things will still work if you don't time them great. They just won't work as well).

Below are things to do in your garden during the next month. They come from the 'Planting Chart for Mendocino County' in Mendocino County's Local Food Guide, and Peter Huff and Kate Frey's Monthly Planting Calendar for Inland Mendocino, which you can download here at the 'How To - Grow Food' page on The Gardens Project website. It is more straightforward there than us retyping it all below.

HERE ARE THIS MONTH'S GARDEN TIPS AND TASKS:

During February, these are plants you can sow directly outdoors: spinach, radishes, carrots, turnips, beets, peas, asian greens, cilantro, and garlic. In early March, you can plant all those as well as lettuce, broccoli, fennel, potatoes, scallions, amaranth, dill, and parsley.

During Feburary, these are fruits, vegetables, herbs and flowers that are good to start from seed indoors: artichokes, cabbage and collards, celery, eggplant, onions, lettuce, brassicas, kale, chard, peas, leeks, Asian greens, fennel, dandelion, shallots, raddichio, mache, hollyhocks, scabiosa, calendula, gaillardia, centaurea, helenium, viola, yarrow, rudbeckia, columbine, agastaches, and lavender.

During March, you can start indoors from seed: artichokes, onions, lettuce, brassicas, chard, kale, tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, cucumbers, melons, zucchini, basil, summer squash, and pumpkins.

Flowers and herbs you want to start from seed indoors in March are: Lobella, Alyssum, Limonium, Zinnias, Amaranth, Petunias, Marigolds, Cosmos, Tithonias, Ageratum, Strawflowers, Calliopsis, Cleome, Celosia, Sanvitalia, Morning Glory, Nasturtiums, Dahlia, Heliotrope, Gomphrena, Geraniums, Sunflowers, Impatiens, Nicotiana, Thunbergia

During February, you can transplant the following outdoors: asparagus, rhubarb, strawberries, cane berries, grapes, fruit trees

During March, you can transplant: artichokes, kale, brussel sprouts, lettuce, leeks, onions, brassicas, peas, Asian greens, and parsely.

Some garden maintenance tasks you will want to take on in February include: plant bare root fruit trees, plant asparagus, plant new strawberries, add compost to existing strawberries, repair tools, mulch bare soil w/straw or chips, compost and mulch asparagus beds, prune deciduous trees and apply compost, cane berries and grapes, check irrigation systems and repair, etc.

In March, you will want to: repair tools, mulch bare soil w/straw or chips, check irrigation systems and repair, etc

See you out in the garden! Yeehaw!