Frost Alert!

This spate of good weather so early in spring has us aching to get into our gardens. I have primrose blooming and azaleas and daffodils, as well.

In anticipation of the rain that was forecast, I fertilized my lawn on Friday. Now is a good time to put down fertilizer with a pre-emergent weed control, to prevent crabgrass and other annual weeds. If you are an organic gardener, corn gluten makes an excellent weed preventor and fertilizer. When the corn gluten becomes wet it forms a gelatinous mass that smothers the newly germinated weed (and other) seeds.

It’s still too early to plant, tho a quick look through the garden centers last weekend showed forsythia and azaleas for sale. If you just can’t wait, and remember Countryside’s annual flat sale is coming up in a couple of weeks, there is a new product out protects tender plants from frost damage. It is called Freeze Pruf and it is from the Liquid Fence people. Freeze Pruf acts like anti-freeze for your plants. It is a spray on systemic that lowers the freezing point of the plant by 2-9 degrees or the equivalent of half a hardiness zone. It doesn’t make all plants hardy to 32̊ but if the plant is hardy to 40̊ it will lower that to around 38̊ to 31̊. Or if the plant is hardy to Zone 5, it will make the plant hardy to zone 4B. Once applied it will last 6-8 weeks. Freeze Pruf will not protect an impatien from a hard frost but it will keep pansies flowers from frost damage. So use it with caution, but here is another tool to help extend our growing season.

Other things you can do to prevent frost damage, keeping in mind that our last average frost date is around the middle of May, is to cover your plants with a sheet or towel or even a cardboard box. Don’t use plastic as this will transfer the cold to any leaves or flowers that are touching the plastic. You could even use a tomato cage as a frame and hang the fabric over it to protect your plants.

Don’t forget that Kim Hartmann and Ann Larson will be giving presentations at Garden Fest this coming weekend at McHenry County College. Countryside will also have a booth and will be able to answer any questions for you.

Hope You Didn't Get Frost Bit

Just a quick post about last night's frost warning. We were very busy at the store last evening bringing in our tender annuals-- the celosia, marigolds, dahlias, etc. When I got home I covered my caladiums and hypoestes that I had planted behind my pond last week and put a bucket over my tomato, when a certain co-worker proclaimed all frost possibilities passed. Thankyou very much, Micheal! We all get a little too eager to plant when the weather finally improves and we are no different. It was 45 at my house this morning, so I think we dodged the bullet. My neighbor, Susan, was busy yesterday covering her plants. Notice she used sheets and towels to cover the plants, not plastic sheeting. You can check out some previous postings about frost damage if you did get frost last night.

If you missed our seminar weekend in April, I have uploaded Kim Hartmann's perennial slide show to a web site called Slideshare. The link is at the bottom of the blog page. There is also a link to the vegetable seminar also given that weekend. It is on a different server at the moment because of the size of the file. This is still a learning process for me and as I figure out how to work out the bugs we will make the appropriate changes to the site.

If you have any questions or would like to make suggestions for future blog topics please post a comment or e-mail me at leslieross@sbcglobal.net