Planting Day 2020: Starting The Growing Season

The warm weather brought by Memorial Day weekend marked the beginning of the growing season in upstate New York.

This year has been exceptionally cold, and the long gray spring held on until late May. I’ve been watching the cold-loving, native perennials I have around the garden come back, like asparagus, current, raspberries, blackberries and Egyptian walking onion; however, it was too cold to plant the sun-loving summer crops we love. Fortunately, Memorial Day brought warm weather with it and finally allowed for planting annuals.

This year I reduced the variety of vegetables I planted, so I could concentrate on better learning and better understanding the particulars of taking care of the varieties we really enjoy. I have devoted an entire bead to potatoes, and another to pepper plants, and a third to mostly tomatoes (except for peas and garbanzo beans). The final raised bed is a mix of beans, carrots, radish, and other varieties.

This is the first year I decided to concentrate on planting flowers too. I first discovered my love for tending to flowers last year when I planted two rose bushes on the perimeter of the garden. I enjoyed the blossoms and bees they attracted to much that I decided to expand into raising other varieties of flowers this year. And of course, I also planted sunflowers, they have been a staple in my garden for years. I harvest their seeds every season and plant them again in the coming spring. With all the new annual flower varieties I added I can’t wait to see the new color they bring to my garden this year.