It’s still very early in the spring, but there’s plenty that Northern Virginia home gardeners can be doing to make for a bountiful growing season.
Kirsten Conrad, of the Virginia Cooperative Extension for Arlington and Alexandria, says the weather is entering prime time for cool-season produce, such as peas, lettuce, onions, and carrots. If they’re not already in the ground, Conrad says, plant them in your garden right away.
It’s still a little too early for warm-season produce, such as tomatoes, peppers, beans, and corn; even though it’s “increasingly unlikely” that there’ll be another frost, she says, you’ll want to wait until two weeks after the last frost threat to start planting such crops — probably sometime in the first half of May.
“People need not worry that they’ll get their plants in too late,” Conrad says; “We’re blessed with a long growing season.”
Flowering trees such as dogwood and redbuds are just beginning their season, Conrad says, while the cherry trees are phasing out but still here. “It’s a beautiful time of year,” she adds.
Summer-blooming flowers, including roses, can be pruned now if they need trimming, Conrad says; they’ll recover in time to flower. If you haven’t done any pruning of plants that generally bloom before June 1, she says, wait until they’re done.
While Conrad says lawns are “not the best use of space,” she advises those who want to use fertilizers and pesticides on their grass to get a low-cost soil test through the Virginia Cooperative Extension, both to minimize any effects on drinking water and to find out what types of products are most likely to work.
Spring is also a good time to deal with any invasive plants such as bamboo or various types of weeds that threaten your plants; Conrad says the spring rains loosen up the soil, so pulling such plants out roots and all is much easier now than it will be in the summer.
For more information on gardening throughout the year, Conrad points gardeners to various resources from the Extension Master Gardeners Program, including live and recorded Zoom classes, a help desk in Arlington’s Fairlington Community Center that’s staffed weekday mornings and answers questions about plant identification and other issues, clinics at four farmers markets in Alexandria and Arlington, demonstration gardens, and a lot more. You can go to the master gardeners’ website, email [email protected], or call 703-228-6414.
“We want to encourage people to grow their own food, for fun and self-sufficiency, but also to donate to food pantries,” Conrad says. You’ll have to check with your pantry of choice, she adds, but most of them are happy to take home-grown food.
Feature image, stock.adobe.com
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