Early spring here was cooler than normal and wetter. It has warmed up a lot, in the 70s now. This is more normal for us. More annuals are sprouting.

I have been planting out hardy things. I have held off planting out the tender stuff like zinnias, but I'll get them in the ground soon. Most zinnias have true leaves and the forecast is warm temps and a good chance of rain for days. I have poor germination on on profusion zinnias so far (seeds from Park's), but the rest are doing well. If I don't get more sprouts in the profusions within a couple of days I'll sow some more. I think I have just a few more seeds.

Husbands are indispensable for covering and uncovering containers when necessary.

Karen

I've been thinking that I need to do the same thing here. There is really no shady spot for the containers, so I think the tops are going to have to come off of everything, even the ones that haven't germinated, or I'm afraid of baking the seeds. The problem is that it's so much harder to keep the top of the soil moist for germination with the lids removed.

Karen, I got my Profusion Zinnia seeds from Jung's, and I had 100% germination. Now if I can just time the planting out, so that they don't get zapped by a late frost, I'll be excited.

Bonnie

Tiffy: The weather here in Ontario has been maddening. Back in April, we had about 3 weeks of above average temps.- up to 26 one day and we were all in shirt sleeves. Then there was a drastic change: we have been having temps. hovering around freezing overnight - and I lost some of my zinnias. I am glad that my beds were not ready or I would have planted out and lost more. I had to go out tonight and cover my annuals and last night I had them in the garage. Some of them are very well-developed in their containers because of that warm spell, but I believe we'll have to wait until the usual Queen Victoria weekend to plant out.I was looking forward to a longer than average growing season, but no such luck!!
Northerner.

My profusion zins from Parks are the only ones not germinating. As of yesterday I only had one sprout. I'll check them soon, it's starting to get light out there.

I also planted a few Dreamland coral, Floridale, California giants, Purple prince, Swizzle zins, maybe others. All are doing great, except those profusions.

Last summer, in awful heat and drought, my profusions were the only zinnias not affected by powdery mildew. I bought some potassium bicarb the other day, hoping just having it in the garage will ward off mildew.

Karen

Karen, is potassium bicarb something you buy in the garden center. It sounds like something you take for indigestion, LOL. I had horrible mildew problems last year, and would love to know how to combat it. Someone last summer suggested a diluted milk solution, but I couldn't tell that it did much. Oh, and can that be used on veggies? I'm trying to stay organic if possible.

Bonnie

Bonnie: I try to stay organic, too. This one seemed better than most to me. I bought GreenCure, but I think there are other brands out there. It was expensive, I hope it will be worth it.

Karen

Here is a link that might be useful: GreenCure

Karen,
I had a fry-fest with the huge near 80 warm up we had, then I had a flood-fest when an unpredicted forceful, night-long, steady rain came and flooded my bins of containers before I could soldered holes in the bins.

I soldered holes in the containers the next day, let the water drain out, then dumped the muddy sludge onto the end of a garden bed, covered it up to keep the animals from digging there. I'm hoping I'll still get some sprouts out of there. But really upset that I lost my Prunus tomentosa :-(

Linda

Things are still very warm, another hot spring day coming tomorrow. Again, I'd rather the cool stuff, but that's OK, the sprouts are doing fine so far. The Amaranthus showed up yesterday. Hoping I can keep these going!

Bonnie,

Try to make sure the air is circulating around your gardens. That will improve the condition a lot.

Since we raise Monarchs and other butterflies here we have gone organic as well. Also, I firmly believe that gardeners should feed the soil so as to feed the plants. The better your soil, the less pests and diseases. I make my own compost year round for the gardens. The only commercial thing I use is Organic Bone Meal. I mix it with alfalfa pellets and corn meal in a small bucket, apply to the soil around the plants, and then mulch with compost made primarily from used coffee grounds (filters included), shredded leaves, seaweed, banana peels, and grass clippings. The soil here has gone from a light brown colour to a dark rich colour in a few years and we have very few problems.

just move your contaners to the north or east side of your house.That will keep them from getting fried, and I do this successfully all summer.

Everyone's situation is different, but here at my house, in addition to having no mature trees for shade, the east side of the house is right next to the children's sandbox - NOT a safe location! The north side is really more like northwest and gets fewer hours of sun, but it's that blazing hot, late afternoon sun. Plus it is not fenced in on that side, so they would have no protection from deer, rabbits, etc. The good news is that we are planning to build a pergola over the patio in the next couple of months (as soon as the town approves our permit application), which should provide some dappled shade for next year's containers. If I could just find a good temporary solution for this year, I won't be tempted to dump all of my ungerminated containers out of frustration, LOL!

Bonnie

I actually had the ideal spot for ungerminated containers. It was at the edge of the woods in the backyard where there was sun in the early am to warm them up and then great dappled shade the rest of the day.

Hurricane Juan came in late 2003, and took down a few trees, but things were still OK. Yet this past fall tropical storm Noel went through and took down even more trees which had been weakened at the base by Juan.

So this year is most certainly a challenge along with this nice weather. The containers get the am sun, then dappled shade, then return to half hour spells of full sun for the rest of the day. Nothing has leafed out yet either.

Like I said, so far so good. It sure is strange watering containers before July though. Haven't done that since I started this in 2002! :O)

Linda, I learned a similar lesson last night. After moving the ungerminated containers to that northwest side of the house, we had a huge downpour last night, which is very rare for us here. What I had forgotten about is that the roof there is not angled like the other area I keep my containers, and we don't have gutters. So all of the containers that were furthest away from the house in the crates, were directly in the dripline off the roof. Half of the soil completely washed out before I could bring them into the garage. If I had put the tops of the containers on, the water might have just bounced off. I'm trying to decide whether to resow, or just leave them as is, and see what happens.

Bonnie

Bonnie,

I feel for you!! If it was me I'd be curled up in a fetal position crying. (Just joking. :O) Since they hadn't germinated, it might be a good thing to leave as is and see what happens.

Right now it's raining and the wind is strong. I was out there before it started this morning and thought of covering, but didn't. There's some teeny tiny sprouts in those containers, the smallest being Lobelia Cardinalis. You need a magnifying glass to see them. Hope they make it.

Rain has always been good for new sprouts, but in pounding form it's questionable.