After a weekend of snow flurries and frigid temperatures, I’m talking gardens. Nothing like keeping you looking ahead, right?

Today, I want to outline my ’3 Steps to Garden Prep’. These are a couple of things you can do (and I’m about to do) before the temperatures rise and soils thaw.

1. Check your USDA Planting Zone: I’m a 6b! What are you?

http://planthardiness.ars.usda.gov/PHZMWeb/

The USDA Plant Hardiness Zone Map breaks the US into ‘zones’ based on average minimum winter temperatures. Enter your zip code on this website to find out yours. Why does this matter? Because many plants can only survive the winter down to certain temperatures. That is, even though a plant may survive a New England frost, it may not be able to live through an Alaskan winter! Most plant catalogs and nursery plants are labeled as to which zones they are hardy within, letting you know the coldest and warmest climates a species can live year round. This is especially important for expensive species you want to keep going, such as large bushes and trees, but can also be important for edibles that need certain temperature ranges to induce the growth cycle (like artichoke and garlic, for instance). So, find your zone and commit it to memory. It will come in handy!

2. Sun map!: Find your inner cartographer

http://www.thegardencontinuum.com

Plants need sun, everyone knows that, but do you know where the sun is in your garden? Now, if you have a wide open space to plant your goodies, you can disregard this step and consider me jealous of you. If you’re like me and have a maze of deciduous trees, shrubs and neighbor’s houses blocking parts of your garden from the sun at any given part of the day, you’re gonna want to map out which patches get full sun, partial shade, part sun, and shade (and when, i.e. afternoon/morning). What you map out isn’t going to be a steadfast rule for your plants (I, for instance, have little to no full sun areas of the garden, but still manage to get some production from full sun plants such as cucumbers and other veggies), but it will help in your plan to figure out what should go where. I have made a sun map for my garden in the past, but with the snowstorm in October breaking trees like toothpicks around here (and hopefully clearing the way for more sun on my patch! Hello, silver lining!), I need to make an updated version. This website gives a great tutorial.

3. Seed Starting Calendar: You gotta plan for those good times!

http://www.yougrowgirl.com/2006/03/31/the-lazy-gardeners-seed-starting-chart/

Making a seed starting calendar is integral for those of us wanting to start long-growing-season-annuals (like hot peppers!) from seed even though we live in an area with a short growing season. It is also helpful in planning earlier harvests (starting tomatoes indoors will give you fruit much earlier than if you plant the seed right in the ground when the soil is warm enough outdoors). The seed starting calendar uses your region’s average last frost date (the last day temperatures usually drop to freezing at the end of the winter/spring) to calculate the day you should sow the seed and the day you should plant outdoors. I know I’m explaining this poorly, but download the excel file here and you’ll get what I mean. They also have a .pdf that explains the math, if you want to calculate the dates for a plant not listed on the chart. To find your last frost date, go here and use the closest city to you. (My last frost date is around May 9th, less than 3 months away!) Plug in your frost date on the excel sheet and viola! You’ll have sowing and transplanting dates. Then you can start counting down the days until it’s time to turn on those grow lights (not that I do that or anything).

So there ya go, a few tidbits to tide you over until it’s time to get some dirt under our nails. What are you doing to prepare for the gardening season?