The weekend brought a fair amount of snow to the lowland areas of the Puget Sound, but there was still enough breaks of sunshine and warmth to think about starting your vegetable garden.

This is a great time to plant some cool season crops, or vegetable plants that are best suited for cooler temperatures, an average of 50 to 65 degree F. Cool season crops include beets, lettuce, collards, radish, peas, leeks and spinach and others. They’re grown in the spring or fall, and often don’t thrive during the warmer summer months (they’ll bolt, which means they’ll go to flower, leaving you with a bitter crop).

By contrast, warm season crops shouldn’t be planted until later because those crops require warmer temperatures to thrive. These crops includes tomatoes, potatoes, cucumbers, squash and corn. In the Puget Sound, warm season crops generally shouldn’t be planted until mid-May. If planted too early in soil that is cold and damp, these seeds won’t grow well and may not set fruit for a long while.

I recommend growing vegetables in raised beds, wherever possible. Your bed could be as simple as a large mounded pile of soil, or as fancy as one made from cedar boards or, as pictured to the left, made from RomanStack blocks. Raised beds help drain water better and warms the soil up quicker so that you can extend your planting season. It helps keep weeds out of the bed, and prevents your soil from becoming too compacted from excess foot traffic. Ecoyards has made several lovely raised beds for clients, including the one pictured at left.

The soil in my cedar raised beds is much warmer than elsewhere in my landscape, so I went out this afternoon, added organic matter to the beds (compost and a little alfalfa meal) and dug it into the soil. I was ready to plant. I planted peas (‘Cascadia’ and ‘Sugar Snap’) spinach (‘Olympia),  radishes and a gourmet blend of lettuce from seed. I also transplanted some collards and broccoli that I picked up at Swanson’s Nursery.

Here are some cool-season crops that you can start outdoors from seed: radish, swiss chard, beets, mustard greens, onions, parsnips and spinach. Here are the cool-season crops that do best when started indoors and transplanted (or you can pick up vegetable starts at a local nursery): cauliflower, broccoli, brussels sprouts and celery.

Western Washington University Extension has some great resources for all aspects of gardening.

You’ve seen these topped trees in your neighborhood: trees that branch out into the sky, only to be unceremoniously hacked across the top, a headless shell of its former shelf. Or trees with absolutely no leaves or no branches, or ones whose amputated branches are replaced with a broomstick mess of sprouts. Not only is topping trees ugly, it can also greatly reduce tree life and health.

Plant Amnesty, a non-profit based in Seattle, has worked tirelessly to inform the public about the pitfalls of topping trees. It’s ugly. It’s expensive (you have to keep it up). And it could be dangerous. If you aren’t convinced, check out Plant Amnesty’s photo gallery, a pruning horror show. The captions are hilarious, including our favorite: “put your hands up,” for a tree that looks like it’s surrendering.

Read rest of story…

While the weather is still fickle in March, the days are starting to feel longer and the temperatures are starting to warm up. There’s lots yet to do in the garden.

1. If you haven’t completed pruning your roses, this is is the month to do it.

Tulips are coming!

2. It’s also a good time to divide overgrown perennials and rearrange and move existing plants.

3. Thatch, aerate, top dress and over seed your lawn from late March to early April.

4. Plant native trees, shrubs and ferns as temperatures warm and rains are consistent.

5. Overgrown forsythia can be cut to the ground.

6. Cut back dead fern fronds.

There’s bad news for gardeners this spring, especially those who look forward to Zoo Doo compost.

The Woodland Park Zoo has canceled the sale of Zoo Doo compost because of it contains high levels of an herbicide called clopyralid in the manure.

Dan Corum, of the Zoo, told the Seattle P-I: “We deeply regret that Zoo Doo will not be available for many loyal users.”

As the P-I explains: “Zoo Doo is a composted blend of manures mixed with straw bedding, grass, leaves and wood chips. The manure comes from nonprimate herbivores, such as elephants, hippos, giraffes, zebras and elk.”

The zoo sells about 1 million pounds of this stuff a year.

Zoo officials traced the source of the herbicide to hay, and says it plans to switch to organic hay. It expects to sell the stuff this fall.

Read more from the Seattle PI: http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/402355_zoodoo06.html

Proper lawn maintenance and lawn care is one of the best ways to keep your lawn healthy and green, while minimizing weeds. This means assessing the condition of your lawn, and deciding whether de-thatching, aerating and overdressing can help improve its condition.

De-thatching. Thatch is a dense layer of dead and living organic matter that separates grass from the soil surface underneath it. A 1/2-inch layer shouldn’t be a problem, but any thicker than that and thatch can keep air, water and fertilizer from reaching the grass roots. Thatch is usually a mixture of grass stems and roots that accumulates because they’re building up faster than they can break down. Over-watering and applying excessive nitrogen fertilizer can lead to thatch buildup. And contrary to what many people think, leaving grass clippings on the lawn, or “grasscycling,” does not cause thatch buildup. To de-thatch a lawn, Ecoyards will bring in a motorized de-thatcher and remove the thin layer of thatch buildup on your lawn. Then we’ll over-seed (basically add lawn seed) so grass can grow to thicken the lawn in bare areas. 

Aerating. Sometimes your lawn may feel compacted under your foot. That’s because over time, your lawn has become compacted through heavy foot traffic from kids, pets and other activities. Soil compaction essentially squeezes out the pore spaces in the soil that normally holds airs. Roots need oxygen to grow and absorb nutrients and water. When your soil is too compacted, it reduces your lawn’s ability to take in water, nutrients, air and fertilizers. Spring is a great time to aerate your lawn, and Ecoyards provides this service as part of our natural lawn care program. We’ll use a power aerator to remove small plugs of soil from your lawn to improve root development. Left on the lawn, the cores of soil will also help decompose excess thatch layers in the lawn.

Top dressing and over-seeding. After de-thatching or aerating, we often recommend top dressing the lawn with a thin layer of mature compost and planting new grass seed to encourage thicker lawns. Over time, the top dressing benifits the lawn as it builds up the quaility of the soil.  For over-seeding, we use a grass mixture that is blended specifically for the Northwest. Thick lawns discourage weeds by crowding them out.

February is  a tough month for gardeners in the Northwest. We have our share of sunny, blue-sky days, but rain, snow and perpetual dreariness can sometimes make getting out in the yard difficult. February is a good month to get started on some yard chores that will make the rest of the year easier, especially weed pulling.

Here are 8 things you can do in your yard this month.

1. Pull winter weeds. The Ecoyards motto is to pull weeds early and pull them often. That seems to be the only way to keep on top of weeds if you want to take a natural approach to weed control. In February most weeds are babies, so they are much easier to pull.

2. Mulch landscape areas where soil has become bare.

3. Inspect trees and shrubs for damage after storms.

4. Prune evergreen and deciduous shrubs.

5. Cut back or rake out ornamental grasses.

6. Cut back dead fronds on sword ferns.

7. Prune roses when buds appear.

8. Time to conduct major cut back on hedges.

There’s an old saying in the Northwest that says you should  plant peas by President’s Day. But if you haven’t gotten around to it, March is a great time to do it. (April is fine, too, but by then try to plant virus-resistant varieties. Peas grown in warmer weather are susceptible to pea enation, a virus transmitted by aphids that appear once the weather warms up).

Peas are a cool season crop that, for me, signals the start of the active vegetable gardening season. They thrive in the Northwest — provided they get sun and are planted in well-drained soil.

Sugar snap peas are a given in my garden. I like “Cascadia” snap peas, an enation-resistant variety developed at Oregon State University.  (Read more here). The peas grow on short vines and produce thick, juicy, sweet pods. “Sugar Snap” is another favorite variety of mine, but since they grow 6 feet tall, they need a strong trellis system. The pods are especially sweet and taste great plucked right off the vine. (Territorial Seed Co. in sells both varieties, and their packets can be found at most Northwest nurseries.

Read more about growing your own peas and beans here.