Cool spring allows slower plant growth

I am thinking spring. Of course, I have been thinking that thought for a month now, but Mother Nature has had other ideas. Hopefully by the time this column publishes, she will have changed her mind and started warming up our spring.

Gardeners have been quizzing me about how this cold "spring" will affect what has already been planted, and how will it affect the normal progression of events for the remainder of the spring, so here is my take on what will be the effects of our recent weather on normal spring activities.

If you have planted cole crops, potatoes, lettuce, or spinach in your vegetable garden, don't worry. They can take cold weather in early spring. In fact, they prefer to grow in cooler temperatures. When it gets warm, they don't do as well. The same goes for pansies. I have seen them bloom all winter long.

Grass seed planted in late winter has started the germination process, but emergence won't happen until it warms up. The speed of the germination process is controlled by temperature. The cooler it is, the slower the process proceeds.

If you have planted trees or shrubs during the last one to two months, again don't worry. Plants adapted to our climate are used to the unpredictability of spring. They may begin to break dormancy when temperatures climb in the late winter, but they are programmed to slow down the process when the mercury in the thermometer drops in late spring.

The cold wet spring actually proves to be a good thing for procrastinating gardeners like me. I didn't get a lot of things done earlier, but no matter. Since the cold temps have slowed down a lot of the temperature related processes, I still have plenty of time to do what I should have done a month ago.

Normally I would have applied crabgrass preventer to my lawn by now. Since it has been so cool, the soils haven't warmed up to the 57 degree mark, so I can still get my crabgrass preventer down before crabgrass seed germinates.

You can still go to a garden center, purchase a blooming tree or shrub such as a pear, cherry, redbud, dogwood or forsythia and get it home before it blooms. You can plant it, and then sit back, relax, and watch the blooms open.

If you want to put up a new purple martin house, you still have time. The martins heard the weather forecast a month ago, and decided to wait a few more weeks before migrating north.

Normally gardeners plant rhubarb roots and strawberry plants in February. The cool weather will still allow you to do that now and get a good start on a crop for this season.

It is really cold today, the day I am writing this column. Today, I can still look forward to spring even in view of the fact that I haven't finished all of my spring chores. Thankfully, because of the cold temps so late this spring, I am still up to speed.

Send your gardening and landscape questions to Paul Schnare at P.O. Box 699, Cape Girardeau, MO 63702-0699 or by email to news@semissourian.com.