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Danger Lurks in the Spring Garden - Page 4

© Carol Wallace

We need to rake out all the debris that has accumulated in the beds over the winter. IT makes sense to wait until we have cut and sheared and pruned so we can then do one giant raking instead of several small ones. And then, we need to figure out what to do with all that raked debris. I solve that by turning it over to my husband who will run it through his beloved chipper/shredder to make more lovely mulch for the newly cleaned beds. (Although I will use the shredded debris from my fall clean-up first since it has already become compost. This new stuff is merely compost-in-waiting.)

All of that accomplished, it would seem that we can now leap in and do the fun stuff - planting. But wait! Do you notice anything in your beds that is amiss? There may be some bare spots that appear to need filling, but you may want to consult last year's planting records (if you have any). Some plants go dormant in winter and take an extremely long time to emerge again in spring. That bare spot may not really be bare.

This, of course, creates feelings of anxiety in the gardener. But these can be overcome. Because while you are waiting for the possible plants to emerge you will be extremely busy weeding. Now is the time to eradicate all the unwanted visitors from our already crowded beds, quickly. The root systems may still be small enough to be easily manageable. If we're quick, we can get the early blooming weeds out of the bed before they can bloom and go to seed and make more.

At the very least, we will emerge from this tired. Most of us will end up with aches and pains in muscles we forgot that we had. We will no doubt emerge with blisters and scratches and insect bites as well. Nothing life threatening, usually - although we do want to be watchful of ticks. We also want to be mindful to the approach we take to our tasks so as to minimize the damage.

But some of us may find that we suffer more than just general "welcome to spring" achiness.

The Eager Over-Doers Disease.

There are two distinct strains to this particular virus. The first is when the gardener gets over-eager and rushes the season. So what if the average last frost date is May 15th? It has been warm for five days running so surely spring is finally here! So we rush to put in some flats of annuals, and then because they look so nice we go ahead and plant the dahlias and other tender perennials as well.

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