Jean, At times,you may wish you were back in Texas. Welcome to the zone of extremes! We are in between the cold and warm zones and plants can't make up their minds as the weather changes with everyday. Any barerooted plant can go out as long as the ground is not frozen, which it is not at this time.

That said and if I had what you purchased, this is what I would do. There is no right answer as long as you don't let the roots rot. The fern and toad lily I would go ahead and plant. The clematis and mallow, I would pot up with good soil and good drainage and put under in good light indoors, to give them a head start. Sorry, I am not familiar with carnations, but the smaller sweet william, if I had space-indoors, if not out. Right now I have 4 bare root clematis' under lights and they are taking off like crazy. Sunday, I put bare root hollyhocks in the ground as I am running out of room indoors.

I am pretty sure all of your selections are hardy to your zone, so it really comes down to personal preference. Suz

Thanks, Mandyvilla, for giving such a detailed response. It's really helpful. I am inclined to just go ahead and plant. I have phlox that is starting to emerge & the clematis I see around the neighborhood are starting to show new growth ... but these are established plants. I guess that's the crux of my question-- does it make a difference when you plant new vs. established perennials? I never worried about dividing & moving hostas and mums and liriope when it was still pretty cold, but then you have that extensive root system to keep the plant from freezing. These little guys just look so fragile! :-) Thanks again--Jean

If you're in Baltimore City, you are probably a solid zone 8. I live in a burb outside of the city and when I listen to the news in the morning Baltimore is always 10 to even 20 degrees warmer than where I am 10 minutes away. It's all that concrete and brick. So welcome to Maryland! I'm a transplant too but came from the cold extreme and find this area much more to my liking for gardening. It's so nice to have a genuine spring :) As to your plants, I'm surprised the nurseries are shipping this early. If they survived the trip, go ahead and plant them in a sheltered area, but don't be surprised if you get a serious frost before mid-April and lose the foliage. They should recover though. You can also park them in a cool spot in your basement if you don't have light tables. But don't be surprised if you get a serious frost before mid-April and lose the foliage. They should recover though.

Just to chip in too, I just transplanted some of my wayward toadlilies this past weekend to a shadier spot. Of course, it was GORGEOUS this weekend and may snow any time. Those should be fine for sure. I refuse to one bit more extra work than I have to (moving trees isn't work, mind you) and so I usually have some drifts of leaves handy to mulch around new plants and transplants, it seems to help. Enjoy the spring (brrr!).

All the input is very helpful. I also talked to the people at a local nursery (Greenfields in Baltimore) and they, like you all here, were divided on what to do. I'm willing to lose foliage if there's a freeze (there's hardly any to speak of on the plants right now) & wait til next year for a true explosion of color (ha ha) ... Cynthia, I too am originally from the cold extremes (Nebraska & Iowa & Minnesota) & moved from there to Texas, where I started gardening, & now am here. It certainly is nice here after all that! I will never forget that there was frost on the ground on the morning of my college commencement in MN ... on JUNE 6! And then a month later I was in Austin, TX, and it was over 100 degrees every day for the next 2 weeks! As you can imagine, I really thought I had entered Dante's Inferno.

But back to the subject at hand, I also have noticed that temps here in the middle of the city are a lot warmer than out in the burbs. We moved into town from the Towson area late last summer--& noticed a lot less snow & quicker snowmelt here than at our old place. Since the very small yard we have now is largely ringed in with 6' brick walls & our rowhouse is solid brick, maybe freezing is less a concern than it usually is. The yard has an E-NE exposure so it gets a lot of morning sun. I will definitely plant the toad lilies & the fern & maybe wait a week to plant the others ... they should keep in the basement for that long. Maybe next week we will be "out of danger." Or at least a little farther out of danger.

Jean