It’s all speeding up now; the days start earlier and end later. Each day the sun climbs faster north on the eastern horizon, rushing on towards the equinox just as anxious for spring to start as we are. So even though the weather is still wet it’s time to get out in the garden on those nice days and start getting seeds in the ground.

If you didn’t plant it last fall there is still some time to get garlic in the ground, but do it soon so it has time to size up. You don’t need special seed garlic, organic grocery store bulbs will do. Non-organic bulbs may have been treated with an anti-sprouting chemical so stick to the organic. As always, with planting anything, the work is in the bed preparation. Garlic likes a nice rich sandy well-drained soil loosened up to a depth of 8 to 12 inches. Weed the area well, you will be sorry later if you don’t and your garlic crop will suffer. We like to add kelp meal, bone meal or high phosphorous bat guano and some alfalfa to the soil while we prep the bed; just dig it in a bit so it’s incorporated into the soil. Separate the cloves from the bulb and plant each clove pointy side up about 2 inches deep, with a spacing of 4-6 inches between cloves.  Spread a layer of straw or leaves over everything to keep the weeds down and watch it grow.

Now is a great time to plant potatoes, prep your bed as described above only leave out the alfalfa, potatoes do not like nitrogen. Again, you can use organic potatoes from the store or check out some of the many specialty varieties available. Seed Savers Exchange has a bunch; Irish Eyes does too, as does the Maine Potato Lady. They all have web sites with tons of cool information about potatoes. To plant them we dig a 6 to 8 inch trench and drop a potato or a piece* of potato every 15 inches down the trench. Cover these with 2 or 3 inches of soil and once they sprout up continue to back fill the soil leaving 3 or 4 inches of stem until you are back at ground level. You can space trenches 18-24 inches apart.  They should be ready to raid as the first peas are coming on. That is you can steal a few early potatoes by gently digging a few from each plant but leaving the rest to mature.

It’s time to seed carrots. Carrots, these easy to grow veggies were my nemesis, but not anymore! Not sure what changed other than my dogged determination to get a carrot to grow, anyhow, we just finished up the fall sown carrots a week or so ago and I got some early carrots in during that nice weather back in late January and early February that are coming up nicely. Carrots like nice loose sandy soil; I don’t have that, but have kind of created something close by growing them in raised beds. If you soil is rocky and raised beds are not an option, choice of seed variety will help. Don’t even try growing an imperator type; those are the long narrow type you find in the store. Try a Nantes type, they are a bit shorter and blunter and can deal with heavier soils. There are also some really cool old-fashioned varieties that are shaped like small baseballs that would work well in heavy soil. By the way, these baseball shaped carrots are delicious in soups and stews with really rich carroty flavor.

When seeding carrots is good to have a light hand since it is really easy to sow the tiny seed too thickly. I have read about various trick people use to help with this like mixing the carrot seed with sand and then sowing it or using a saltshaker. I have never tried these ideas but they seem like they could work. I sow very lightly, gently shaking the carrots out of their package into a very shallow trench that I make in the soil with the butt end of a hoe. You want this trench to be really shallow, barely a half an inch deep. Once the seeds are sown, I very carefully just barely cover them. Some people cover them thinly with sand or vermiculite. The idea is to make sure the soil covering the seed doesn’t form a hard crust that can’t be penetrated by the tender young seedlings. Be sure to keep them well watered; it’s easy for them to dry out and die since they are planted so shallowly. I sometimes use boards over the row to keep the soil moist. Be sure to check under the boards every day and at the first sign of seedling emergence remove them. No matter how careful you were when you sowed your seed you will have to thin them out. You are aiming for 2inches between seedlings…oh and the chickens love the thinnings.

* If using large potatoes you can cut them up into several pieces, just be sure to include 2 or 3 eyes in each piece.