Dawn,
I haven't noticed anything for certain here yet. We normally have geese hang around most of the winter. They only move south before a bitterly cold spell. But this year with not much around to eat most stopped over a few days and moved on. Have noticed a large flock that has moved in the last few days. Not sure if they came from the north or south. North of us not far has been a lot colder. Hopefully we will get a more normal spring and not the late cold spells we've had the last 3-4 years. I'm going to start things early. Protect what I can and gamble with the rest. Have onions sprouting under the light shelf as I type. And have sacrificial tomato plants growing there also. Will start my practice grafting in 7-10 days. Will be planting more onions today and some more tomatoes to practice grafting on. I plan on starting my early plants either the end of this month or the first week of Feb. A good 4-6 weeks earlier than normal. I have acquired lots of trays and several 4-8 inch containers. I will pot up to them the first time and maybe pot the early ones on up to gallon size containers later. Hopefully I can get some early tomatoes this year. And if the weather allows I will move some to the garden in WOW's ect.I don't plan on fighting the heat as much this year if I can get a good early harvest. If the heat doesn't come I will still be ok. If it does at least I will of somewhat planned for it. I keep looking at the long range forecast. I did see where a NWS long range forecaster said he felt we would be overall warmer this winter with a few cold blasts but not the sustained cold we've had before. If the temps they are predicting for next week hold we will be rid of the snow that fell the Monday before Christmas. In an average winter we would of had snow cover till at least the 2nd week of Feb. So very thankful for the warmer weather. And hope you and I talking about it doesn't bring on the bad weather. He said he felt rain fall wise we would be dry through mid spring. With a moderation developing for us starting in late spring and early summer. He said he didn't see it being as dry as last summer. Although he doesn't see a lot of rainfall till late spring he said he feels our area could see some more beneficial snow falls. Anything helps as long as it doesn't blow into drifts. Jay

I just walked into Walmart through the garden center and they have plants out! Cabbage, broccoli, onions, even strawberries. I wonder if they realize it's January.

I picked the first early daffodil stem the other day to open in the house. This plant is on the south side of a large oak tree and the reflected heat always coaxes it out early.

I bet your geese will turn around and fly back south. It's just too early for them to go north. It's only been a month since we saw them heading south here.

I had to get busy and weed the greenhouse beds though because the henbit was starting to bloom.

I am out and about getting ready for the garden season. I saw seed displays out in Walmart and the works. I have some seeds starting and I am thinking of taking a gamble and moving everything up a bit and invest in frost blankets.

I am too excited and antsy to wait anymore!

Jay, I hope we aren't jinxing spring too by talking about it. We do have some ducks and geese that overwinter here, especially a little bit east of us at the Hagerman National Wildife Refuge, and you'll see those those birds out flying around a little in winter, but these today were travelers who were flying high in the sky. I was thinking they were making a beeline straight from our place towards yours. Of course, they can only fly as far as they can find food, so they may not make it all the way to Kansas just yet.

I believe I feel an early spring coming "in my bones" just like last year I was feeling drought headed our way. Let's hope the feeling is reliable and that we'll have an early spring and a mild, prolonged one.

I might start tomato and pepper seeds tomorrow or Monday because I am getting such a good feeling about spring. I hope to transplants tomato plants into the ground in March this year, with row covers to keep them warm, assuming it isn't snowing or something. Every time I think I'll put tomato plants in the ground early, it tends to snow and ruin my plans.

Some of our plants, like the purple wintercreeper, are putting out new growth and it seems a little early for that, but now that they've started, I doubt they'll stop.

Leslie, I saw the same things in our local Wal-Mart (with local, for us, being in Gainesville, TX) on Monday. I even bought two bundles of onions to plant early, but then it rained so they are sitting on the back porch waiting for the mud to dry up a little bit. Last year, this same store had tons of early vegetables in the Garden Center, and had to move all of them inside when a big cold front arrived, and I think that was closer to the end of January. We also had tomato plants at this store the first week in February, whereas in past years it was usually the first week in March. It seems like they're pushing the plants earlier and earlier every year. I don't mind them having plants in January, but when they start putting them in the stores before Christmas, that might tick me off a little. : )

Dorothy, I was thinking that myself. We've been really warm here on most days, with plenty of days in the mid- to upper 60s at our house and I think we hit 70 once already this year. That's a lot warmer than usual, and I hope it isn't making the geese think it is a good time to head north. The nights are still plenty cold.

I am happy to see the henbit blooming here. It makes it seem later in the year than it really is. I don't think I have any bulb foliage up yet. I hope the summer didn't cook them to death. My daffs are in an area where they have to live off rainfall and never get any supplemental irrigation. Henbit starting blooming before Christmas which is not completely unheard of here if December is fairly warm. Bees and a few butterflies are out and about every day, which is nice to see.

Oh, and the skunks are up, out and about. If that doesn't say "late winter", then nothing does.
Dawn

I started to buy some broccoli because they had Packman and that's what I'm going to plant but I don't have seeds yet. The plants were all Bonnie and I think I'll wait on onions until Atwoods puts out Dixondale.

When I saw the plants, I hoped that meant the inside garden center would actually have garden stuff in it, but it's still full of Christmas stuff. I need some new gloves since my old ones have a hole in the tip of one of the fingers and I can't even find them at Atwoods yet. Maybe stores stocking garden gloves is a sign of Spring that's yet to come.

Leslie

Leslie, I planted Packman plants too early last year and regretted it. I will follow the lead of some of the pros on here. I planted around the first of the year and we had some very cold weather after that.

Larry

Our Wal-Mart stores are rapidly pushing the Christmas clearance into an ever-smaller space and putting out more garden stuff daily. The first garden gloves I saw in a store were in Home Depot a day or two after Christmas. This week, while at a CostCo down near D-FW Airport, they already had 4-packs of garden gloves out on the shelves, although except for fertilizer and some sort of weed-n-feed product, they didn't have anything else out yet that is gardening-related.

Broccoli doesn't like cold temps and can form button heads (tiny heads the size of a button) when exposed to cold temps, which is very frustrating and you won't know it is going to happen until it just happens. I plant broccoli a full month later than I used to (in March instead of in Feb.) and get a better harvest. When we moved here, I tried to pretty much plant everything at the same time here that I planted it in Fort Worth, about 80 miles south of where we live now. For a couple of years I got away with it because we were having warm winters, but then reality started catching up with me and I started planting later and later. I don't like it one bit, but I do get better harvests when I am patient and wait for the weather to warm up a little.

It is 65 degrees and gorgeous beyond belief here right now with almost no wind---just the kind of pretty winter day that gives me spring fever. However, looking at the 7-day forecast, I can see that a few days from now we'll have a day where we barely get into the 40s and we drop into the mid-20s at night, so I certainly can't let myself lose control and just start planting stuff right and left.

I'm ready to plant now, but the weather still says "no".

I was in a Wally World around here last weekend and to my surprise they had a lot of gardening supplies out. The shelves were full of seed starting supplies. The garden gloves were out and some of the other items. I would say 30-40% was out. Usually they don't put much out till early Feb here. So maybe everyone is feeling something in their bones. Jay

Thank you all. If I'm crazy, then I'm in good company.

Last Friday evening, DH & I were standing in the front yard looking south across the road. DH asked me if I saw a green ting to the large, old cottonwood trees in the pasture and sure enough...it looks like they're budding out.

I'm cautiously optimistic. The Farmer's Almanac says we should have some snow around the 4th of February, but my plants won't be ready to go in the ground by then anyway. Yes, I too and going to start my peppers and tomatoes this weekend.

And speaking of row covers, I snagged one today at sam's. I've linked a it below. I will also add that the store price was less than $10.00.

I'm a novice on this, but it seemed a good deal to me. I'm going to cut it in half lengthwise and sew it together to allow for more of a tent over one of my raised beds. If it doesn't last but one year, I'll know what NOT to buy next year and it was only a $10 lesson

Paula

Here is a link that might be useful: Frost Blanket/Row cover

I just bought two 12' X 10.5' for 13 bucks each. You got a good deal! I figure if I go out there and get bed ready by putting up some pvc "arches" then if we get the real cold stuff I could clamp it down.

I am concerned about soil temp this early...may black plastic mulch it first if the temp is too cool...

Dawn while out doing chores the geese left the pond and headed out in 2 flights. The first one at 5:38 and they returned at 6:23. What this tells me is that they are getting plenty to eat somewhere close. I imagine that some of the wheat grew a bunch under the snow. I've noticed some in my travels that grew quite a bit but it was so small to start with it isn't real tall yet. But with these warm days it will come out of dormancy and start growing again. We hit 52 today and supposed to be low to mid 60's tomorrow. Our temps are starting to catch up with those around us now. The snow cover kept the temps 10-15 degrees lower than places 45-60 miles from us for a while. These geese are staying here for the time being. I will watch for them to leave and see where they head. We only had small bunches till now. I would guess 4-6 hundred now. Not near the 1500- 2,000 of last winter but still more than we've had up until the last 3-4 days. They might be coming in from the south. I will know when they leave as they tend to leave just at daybreak when they head out. And they will leave early to feed the evening before and come in late. Guess they fill up so they don't have to make any pit stops at a super field, ect. Jay

Jay,

Our Wal-Mart even has bulbs, tubers and corms! Is anyone in the mood to plant some dahlias, glads or cannas in January? Some local feed and seed stores have seed potatoes already. It is a little early for them here, but not terribly early.

Paula, I'm glad it is not just me who is seeing the fuzziness as trees get ready to bud and flower. It is very obvious on some trees here and I was starting to wonder if I was imagining it. Maybe the trees are just as happy as we are to see a new spring and new growing season. No matter what happens in 2012, you've got to think it will be better than 2011.

That sounds like a pretty good deal for a frost blanket that size. I bought a serious roll of floating row cover fabric last year: I think it was 10' wide by 500' long. About half of it hasn't even been used once yet. I hope it will last a good long while. I covered up every planted bed in my garden during the first week of May last year because we were going below 32 degrees and I didn't think the tomatoes and corn, in particular, would like that freezing and frosty night. Since I was covering up those rows, I went ahead and covered up the snap peas, broccoli, onions and cabbage just becasuse I could, whether they needed it or not.

Ezzi, Our soil temps are quite a bit warmer now than they were at this time last year. I hope that's a good sign. Still, they probably drop down pretty low at night when we're in the 20s or 30s. I'm not out there at night with my thermometer checking the nighttime low soil temps so I am not sure how low they go, but when I go out and work in the soil, it is still in the 40s at 9 or 10 a.m. I can tell because my fingers get cold.

Dawn

Dawn - I am just reeling from the warm winter we are having.

Where did you find a 500' frost blanket?

Dawn,
I'm not sure how accurate it is but I just went to one of our local co-ops weather sites and looked at the soil temp for here and then also they have a large map of soil temps for this region. Supposedly they have a probe that reads and transmits the temp at 4 inches at certain times. It said our temp at 6 am was 35 degrees at 4 inches. The map they show for your area shows 40. I do know the local corn farmers say the local temp shown by the co-op is usually close. Like we have discussed many things including micro climates can influence that. Our soil temps have actually dropped since the snow cover has melted by 3-4 degrees. It always does. The wheat, ect grew some under the cover. I knew we had lots of wind with the snow but didn't think about that when shoveling snow from the drifts over my flats. I've done it before with no problem. I've had a lot of weeds germinate in the flats I've planted. It will be ok. I'm going to move all of the flats and trays either into my utility room or the lean to and let them warm up and will pull everything that germinates. The onions aren't a real problem as it is easy to tell them apart from the weeds.
Dawn I'm planning on trying a frost blanket and maybe a few low tunnels this year. I haven't done a lot of research yet. Do you have any suggestions?

Last year one local Wally World have potatoes and onion sets in by Feb 1st. I saw some Dixondale transplants in one store by the 10th of Feb and I usually don't transplant here till mid march. By the time to plant here many weren't in good shape. Moving them into a warm building with lights trigger many plants to grow.
I'm not as concerned about the temps and weather swings now as I am from mid March through mid May. That is when the cold spells have hurt me so bad the last 2-3 years. Jay

Oh, good gravy, you guys are killing me. I can't even find potting soil here yet.

*sob*

I made myself feel a little closer to spring by finally placing my first seed order (Tom Wagner's store) this weekend. Also got some seeds in the mail from Martin this weekend. Need to figure what's left to get and whence to buy it.

I need spring!

Diane

What does it mean if I'm still bracing for winter? I feel like we've barely gotten out of the high, high temps...!! It just hasn't been cold enough and long enough for it to already be spring...for REAL?!?

wow...Sharon

I noticed that my photinias had their new red buds leafing out when I was pruning them today. They're usually one of the first things here to show any sign of spring, but I don't recall them putting out new growth in January before. I mean, I know they're evergreen and all, but they're usually stagnant until it warms up a bit more.

I'm going to wait until the first or second week of February to start my tomatoes and peppers. I'm going to be out of town the last week of January anyway, so I might as well wait until I'll be around to take care of them. My cherry tomatoes last year did not like the cold nights at all and barely grew at all until the temperatures were consistently warmer, so I'm not in too much of a hurry to get them started this year, especially since I don't have any row covers to protect them.

Jay, I would love to have big flocks of geese to watch. Most of the ones that overwinter here go to the Hagerman Wildlife Refuge across the river from us in Texas, but sometimes small flocks hang our around our neck of the woods.

This afternoon I saw a cedar waxwing. I think I normally see them in February. He was sitting in a possumhaw holly looking, I think, for berries, but he was in a male bush and he hasn't yet found the female that's covered with berries. He needs to head down closer to the garden where I have a 20' tall holly covered with berries.

Forty sounds about right for our soil temp. Despite some very warm afternoons, it isn't very warm yet and when I dig in it I feel like it is in the low 40s most of the time, sometimes a bit warmer and sometimes cooler. The upper layer of soil will heat up a little bit more tomorrow when we are supposed to hit a lovely 77 degrees. Then, it will turn a lot colder when we hit the low to mid 20s a couple of nights later. We are on the mild January remperature rollar coaster, but even when we have lovely warm afternoons, the temperatures plunge after sunset.

I started out with one frost blanket rated to give approximately 6 to 8 degrees of protection. Then I bought a second one. Each of them covers one long bed. I then bought a larger roll of the somewhat lighter medium-weight material that gives about 4 degrees of protection. On very cold nights I double that material. I don't know that a double layer exactly doubles the protection to 8 degrees, but it works pretty well.

Last year when we were forecast to have an overnight low around 32 degrees during the first week in May, I covered up every single plant in the garden, whether they needed it or not. I covered up tomato and potato plants that were almost 3' tall, sweet corn that was almost as tall, onions, broccoli, cabbage, sugar snap peas, etc. and the only damage was in one isolated spot where the landscape fabric pin pulled out of the ground and left two tomato plants partially exposed. They had mild frost damage but bounced back quickly.

Most of that fabric was pinned down to the ground with U-shaped landscape fabric anchor pins like you use when putting down a landscape mulching fabric that will be covered with some sort of mulch. In some long beds, I laid green t-posts on top of the fabric along the edge of the bed so they wind wouldn't lift the fabric and whip it around. With the caged tomato plants I wrapped the fabric around the whole row of tomato cages and used clothes pin to close it at the top. Imagine if you had a row of soft drink cans on a table lined up like a little row of soldiers, and you wrapped Saran Wrap around the whole row along one side, then back around the other side of the whole row, then folded over the Saran Wrap on top and sealed it closed. That's what I did to quickly wrap rows of up to 20 individually-caged tomato plants as quickly as possible. The other alternative is to not cage the tomatoes until all danger of frost is past. Then I could put hoops across the bed and put the row cover over the hoops. That would work as long as the tomato plants didn't get taller than the hoops. Some folks here wrap each individual tomato cage in plastic or in row cover material and leave them wrapped until the frosty weather is over. I've done that, but it is pretty time-consuming and if you use plastic, there's no wind flow.

For low tunnels, I ordered my pipe bender from the same place Carol got hers. I'll link it below. Their price is a little more reasonable than Johnny's, and since they are shipping from Texas to here the shipping should be less than it would be from Johnny's. Some people I know here just use PVC pipe (the gray kind) for low tunnels but I'd rather have EMT because I think it would be sturdier in the event of snow, very strong winds, or even hail.

Since it is a mild year, I'll just use the floating row cover material I have, but the next time I buy some, I'll buy the DeWitt Extreme Frost Blanket which is supposed to give you up to 10 degrees of protection.

Some people use greenhouse plastic on their low tunnels, and I suppose I would do that if severe cold threatened--say anything below about 22-24--with greenhouse plastic on top of the row cover for a double layer of protection. I worry about how to vent that though, so will start out just with the Agri-bon.

I can't remember where I saw the DeWitt fabric but after I find the website, I'll come back and link it.

Here is a link that might be useful: Lost Creek Quick Hoop Benders

Ezzi, You can buy them from many suppliers, including online greenhouse supply websites and agricultural supply websites. That 500' is for a rookie...you can buy them in rolls that are thousands of feet long. I assume only a commercial grower would need thousands of feet.

I bought some of my smaller pieces from Harris Seeds online, and the big roll was from FarmTek's website. Johny's Selected Seeds has various weights i all kinds of sizes, and so does the website I am going to link below for Jay because it has the DeWitt Ultimate Frost Blanket that gives up to 10 degrees of protection.

The insect-barrier type row covers do not give you very much frost protection, but they exclude insects while still letting in plenty of light.

Sharon, It means that you, like me, have lived here long enough to know that winter is going to happen no matter what, whether it hits us in January, February or March, or even in April. The thing I hate about warm winters is that I plant early and get away with it until a whopper of a spring cold front rolls in around Easter. If we don't have good, cold weather when we are supposed to, we'll get it later. I'd rather have it sooner than later.

We're going to have a high temp of 77 tomorrow down here, but then a cold front will roll in and ruin all our fun.

Diane, Hang on, spring is coming! It just will come a wee bit later at your place since you moved halfway to the North Pole. : )

Miraje, That's a sound strategy. I don't put tomato plants into the ground until the soil temp is in the right range, because they don't grow fast in cold soil. They'll grow faster inside for a couple more weeks where they are warmer. By that late in the season, I am carrying them outside in the morning and inside in the evening while hardening them off.

Jay, The one that gives up to 10 degrees of protection is called the 3 oz. DeWitt Ultimate Frost Blanket Thermal Blanket. I just abbreviate it to DeWitt Ultimate. I'm sure if they tried, they might be able to come up with an even longer name for it, but I am glad they didn't.

Don't blame me if you spend money at this website. I'm posting it for educational purposes only, just so y'all will know that such a heavyweight blanket exists. You've got to love any website that manages to use the word "whilst".

Dawn

Here is a link that might be useful: See DeWitt Ultimate Frost Blanket Here

I have absolutely no confidence in what Walmart seems to indicate by putting stuff out to sell. Our first winter here, we had an unusually warm January, and our Walmart toted out tomato seedlings by February. I couldn't believe it. Bet not one of them survived to see the sunny days of May.

I am starting my shallots by seed and have sweet potatoes sprouting now. It's early for sweet potatoes. But our harvest was so poor last fall, that I wanted to get slips going, for fear that one or two varieties might shrivel and die before I could.

George

Oh my, folks, it's still winter!

We drove from Grove to OKC on Saturday and I saw several small flocks of geese but they were all on the ground feeding and the wind would have made it difficult for them to fly. LOL

The wheat is tall enough in some areas that they had already turned cattle in on it. I'm still waiting for winter to come, and the only thing I have planted at this time are leeks, green onions, and I'm taking a stab at celery (because Jay grows it and gave me the seed). I have no plans to put anything outside for a l-o-n-g time.

At the risk of sounding like an eccentric old lady, I didn't tell you the amount of row cover I bought, but since Dawn has admitted to hers, I will tell you I have ordered the same amount, 10 feet by 500 feet. Shipping is expensive so I only wanted to do it once. LOL

In the past, my row covers have been the very lightest weight because I wanted maximum light to reach the plants. On this order, placed recently, I increased the weight a little to Agribon 19 which offers a little more temperature protection and a little less light. I think the available light is 85% with this weight. I am hoping that the heavier weight will make it a little more durable, and that the decreased light will not be a problem.

My row cover is mostly to provide a barrier to insects, not cold, but I have noticed when it is on the plants it does make a big difference in a plants ability to deal with the cold. This is not scientific in any way, but I think a lot of the protection comes from the wind protection it provides. Yes, I have read that only animals feel "wind chill" effects, but this is different. Although row cover protects some for temp control, the cover slows down the wind and the intensity of the wind blast is less.

My daughter and SIL from Utah were here for Thanksgiving week and they were amazed when they looked inside the row cover that surrounded the pepper plants. I wrapped them just before Halloween and on Thanksgiving day they had suffered no damage from the cold. Other plants in my garden had frozen and most had been pulled from the ground. These were peppers, those heat loving plants. I think many kinds of less sensitive plants could be left in the ground for a much longer time if they were covered with row covers. I think the benefit is likely to be on the extended Fall garden, more than on the early planted Spring garden because the ground is too cold in Spring, but does not cool down as quickly in Fall although the air is cold. The benefit I expect to gain in Spring is more protection from insects than protection from cold.

Row cover is not a heavy duty fabric and can be torn very easily. I had some animal do a job on two beds one night. I never knew if it was a cat or a possum, but had seen both in the area that week. The cats were about to drive me nuts about then and I couldn't keep them out of my garden.

In one of my Eliot Coleman books he wrote about using row cover draped over wickets inside his unheated winter hoophouses. Since the row cover was suspended over the crops they did not remove it during the day and the large hoop house collected the heat all day which increased the ground temperature, and the row cover over the plants assisted in keeping that ground heat on the plants at night. He didn't think his plants suffered from light lose because of the row cover. Inside a large greenhouse or hoophouse, the plants would already be protected from the wind and rain, so I would think the covers would last for years. With my heavy rainfall in Spring, I hope to use mine 2-3 years.

I plan to make metal hoops for my beds and stretch row cover tightly over them so the wind will not whip them around. I would think that putting greenhouse plastic over the row cover would be best if it were left loose at the ends where it could be pulled down for cold nights but opened on the ends during the sunlight hours. That way it would not be trapping heat because the heat could still move out the open ends through the row cover.

Because of wind, I would prefer to put a weight on the edges of the row cover rather than put pins through it. You could do this by covering the the edges with garden soil but I don't like that method especially when it rains. Normally I have used bricks or rocks, but I recently saw another method. It suggested that you save your used zip top freezer bags and fill with garden soil to use as weights on the row cover. I am saving them now and will probably just fill them each time I collect a few and stack them in the garden until I need them.

Some people have talked about the wall-of-water type protection. I am not a big fan but have a few. I have a zillion birds and they try to drink from them and I have had many collapse and take the plant down with it. That seems like a very small amount of water to offer heat all night, so the major benefit may be the protection it offers from the wind and the fact that it allows the ground inside to become warmer during the daylight hours and protect the roots with warmer soil at night.

In the past when I have planted in the Spring and cold temps threatened my plants at night, I covered them with row cover or something heavier (not plastic or tarp) and filled 2 liter drink bottles with hot water and placed them under the covers. Since the water is hot, it gives off heat and the cover holds it around the plants. This method would work much better if the row cover was suspended over hoops. Not only have I allowed the ground to heat from sunshine and trapped some of that heat with the covering, but I am adding extra heat with hot water that will cool gradually during the night. This is a bit of work, but I am not one to plant summer heat loving crops extra early, unless it is just a few tomatoes that I am prepared to lose and have the 'second string waiting in the dug-out to take their place'. Since I'm not talking about a huge number of beds, I can handle the extra work, and I have been successful in the past using this method. Since my garden has lights, I can wait until just before bedtime to throw the hot water bottles in. Most of my neighbors can't see my garden, and the one that has a good view of it, only lives here on weekends. They probably would think it odd to see someone placing bottles in garden beds at midnight, but who cares. (To Diane, yes I wear pajamas to my garden, unlike some others I know.) Ba-ha-ha

Sorry, I didn't intend to write a book here, and the information could be termed 'gardening according to Carol', but since some of you are getting interested in row covers I thought I would share my thoughts and observations. You can take it for what it's worth. LOL

I am talking about row covers, not frost blankets. Frost blankets will offer a lot more protection from cold, but couldn't be left in place for long because of the decreased sunlight available to the plants. A few days to get through a cold spell would probably be OK.

I have a problem with flea beetles and those are tiny little bugs. I find it impossible to grow eggplant unless I keep it covered until the flea beetle season is over. I am considering planting bush green beans under row covers in early Spring and not planting my pole beans until later after the Japanese beetles have moved on. They eat all of the Hollyhock leaves, and nibble on the okra, but those plants are normally strong enough to continue even when they are damaged. I need row covers for insect protection on green beans. The JBs don't kill the pole beans but they feed heavily on them and probably slow down production until the plant can recover. They seem to bother Kentucky Wonder more than other pole beans I have planted. Since it is their favorite, and not mine, I will not plant those again.

I will ramble no more, but hopefully I have given you some 'food for thought' to help you make your own decisions about row cover. Carol

I don't know if it's a sign of spring or not, but yesterday we noticed there were robins everywhere, all over our yard and all over the neighborhood too. I've also thought the trees were beginning to look fuzzy as if they'll bud out soon, but wasn't sure if it was just my imagination or the real deal. Just now as I was watching the weather on the 10:00 news, he made the comment about tomorrow that this "looks just like an April map," speaking of the expected high of 70 tomorrow. Of course it's going to cool off again later this week, but this year it seems like the cold spells have been short, then we pop right back up to above normal temperatures again.

Suzie

I still have cilantro (!!!) and today I saw a ladybug in there. :)

Jo

Thanks Carol and Dawn for the info and links. I'm like many who work. I need something I can cover them with and leave as I'm not here to either open the ends or remove after it warms up. Even though I hope to not be traveling this spring I will be leaving before 7 am. I have briefly looked at the slitted coverings some are offering. I've considered low tunnels but again those who I know who have them say you need to open them up after the temps rise. So won't work for me currently. I have used plastic buckets around plants and put Saran wrap or plastic over the top. But even with slits in them they get very warm during the day and I have cooked a few plants. So will read more about the blankets Dawn linked too and read more about the slitted covers and try to find something that will fit my needs. Jay

Its looks like spring to me, when I come back from my long trip and looked at my garden, I see lot of greenery in herbal beds, Cilantro still green and fresh looking, spinach and some Italian green, swish-chard and mustard not affected by this winter. I can also see lot of small seedling cale family (cabbage, Brussels sprouts)which left to seed last summer.

Thank you Dawn and Carol, for the detail info and sharing your experience. This post intrigued me to build couple of hoops over our 4x16 feet raised beds, as carol said, mainly to fight bugs. I just ordered DeWitt 0.5oz Deluxe Seed & Plant Guard Frost Blanket 10' x 500' and I am going to build hoop house with metal conduits (Wheatland 1/2 in. x 10 ft. Electrical Metalic Tubling @1.9) and fix those conduits metal clamps. I ordered conduit bender from Amazon for $6. Will post picture soon i build one in next couple of weeks. My immediate project is to build drip irrigation system for all beds.

Regards -Chandra

PS: Carol, lat time I used wooden pickets for holding frost blanket, that work just fine. One of my neighbor replaced couple of wooden fence panels destroyed in the storm, I burrowed those pickets for use in garden. Don't forget to remove all nails.

I have been picking daffodils and bringing them into the house to open for a week or so now, but today I saw the first one outdoors opening up. I'm not sure that qualifies as spring since they always bloom in late winter here--from mid-Feb on, but this is definitely an early year for them.

As if I needed a reminder that it's not actually spring yet, all of those plants at Wal-Mart that I mentioned earlier are all dying/dead now. The forecast keeps saying the low temp is going to be above freezing and they keep being wrong. It was 24 degrees when I went to work this morning.

This is probably the worst time of year. It's so nice outside right now, but it's still way too cold at night to do anything.

Leslie

I live on Grand Lake and the pelicans are starting to arrive. Are they confused, or just hungry....or is it really Spring? Neh...not yet?

I am enjoying seeing the early signs of spring, but still waiting for winter to get here and then leave. It was 79 degrees at our house today. The bad thing is that the plum trees are getting ready to bloom now because we've had so many warm days. Once they get started down the track to blossoming, you can't stop them.

Sounds like another year without fruit.

Was in Guymon last evening and my pu just turned in at Wally World as I was leaving. So being I was in the parking lot went in to see what they had put out over the last week. Almost everything was out inside the store now. Just a few bulbs though and didn't see any seed potatoes. They had a lot of boxes stored just outside the doors in the outside area. I didn't go out to see what was there. This year they have a large Ferry-Morse seed display and a fair sized display with organic seeds from Seeds of Change. The FM seeds were very reasonable. Not sure if someone put the wrong price on the SoC seeds or not. They showed $5.49 a pack. Which I consider very high. Didn't buy anything but looked through both racks. They had all of the usual potting and seed starting mixes and supplies out. Last week they had a sale on plastic containers which I bought a few of and using as flats for onions, leeks, ect and wanted to buy a few more buty they were all gone and the area full of garden/lawn/Bar-B-Q items. Just 2 years ago I couldn't find any seed starting mix or potting mix anywhere before Feb 1st. So since I've kept at least a partial bag and some potting soil for insurance and both years the stores have had it out in mid Jan. More geese have moved in from the south over the last week. Notice a few more flocks moving north during the week. Everyone that is talking about it says it is due to little water and food south of here. They say the ducks/geese that use this fly way can go clear to the Mexico border and not find many water/food combinations. So not sure if them moving north is a good indicator of an early spring or just an indicator of hungry birds. I would say the numbers here have climbed to over a thousand now. The wheat is growing and some fields that they didn't even cut must have a little grain down on the ground as I've been watching them feed in them. They don't stay out feeding over an hour which indicates they are getting plenty to eat without a lot of work. Which somewhat surprises me. My two youngest apple trees just lost the last of their leaves a week ago and are showing signs of the buds growing now. The older one has buds I'm afraid won't wait long enough to bloom out from the way they look. I remember in the late 80's a winter like this. The last day of Jan it started raining. And then turned to ice and snow. Then the cold set in for around 2 weeks. Hope that isn't the case this winter. I keep telling everyone not to store their coats away yet. The good thing is the longer we go without a severe cold spell the less likely we are to have a prolonged extreme cold spell. But I've seen really cold weather through the 15th of Feb so not getting in too big of hurry starting too many seeds yet. Jay

I have tree's budding and shooting leaves already.

Wow. I went out today and noticed my tulips are coming up. That's atleast a month early for me. Crazy!

Mike

Many daffodils in bloom now and this morning I noticed the flowering quince is showing color. Also saw a couple snow crocus. I'm worried for the fruit, but no blooms out there yet. The almond tree is always the first to bloom.

Haven't noticed any flowers yet. Not sure any bulbs survived the last year of drought. Geese continue to move through headed north. A small flock of snow geese moved in today. They are so pretty. When they came in they circled the water several times. Each time getting a little lower. They were flying 30 feet or so right over my head. Has me feeling like it is spring. I'm going to be starting a few seeds to have in case we get an early spring. Also going to start a few of the dwarf's I'm growing and will pot them into five gallon pots I can leave in the lean to of a night and move out on warm days. Hoping to get some early maters. Jay

Dorothy, So far the cold nights have kept the fruit trees from blooming, but just barely. They sure are ready though, and we have more highs in the 60s and 70s coming up this week.

I have a verbena bonariensis that is trying to bloom. It never even froze back completely this winter and had just sat there a sort of dull green all winter. If it succeeds in blooming before frost nips off the buds, that will be its second blooms of this winter. Some of the Laura Bush petunias suffered frost damage a few days ago but are trying to form blossoms now.

The Iris are up, and by up I mean they are at least 8-12" tall.

The honeysuckle is forming flower buds.

This is all ridiculous. Whatever happened to winter?

Jay, I have serious doubts about a lot of my bulbs too. I guess time will tell.

I have been starting tomato and pepper seeds for a week now, just a little here and there. I can't seem to sit still for longer than 15 minutes, so I sow a row or two and move on to something else, and then sow some more another day.

Songbirds are everywhere every day. They are all over the property eating, singing, carrying on. It sure sounds like spring, but I wonder if the February weather will put a halt to all this early spring nonsense.

Coyotes, skunks, raccoons and possums are out prowling every night and sometimes during the day. At night the coyotes are so close it sounds like they're sitting in my garden. (These are not some of my favorite signs of spring, especially the skunks.)

Our stores have all the cool-season plants in now...veggies, herbs, containerized roses, bare root roses, bare root fruit trees, seed potatoes, onoin sets and onion plants, shallots, asparagus, flower bulbs, pansies, etc. At Sam's Club last week, they had boxed blueberries, blackberries (2 plants per box,basically bare root in peat moss), crinum lilies, garden amaryllis, lily of the vally, daylilies, hostas (bare root and I think 9 plants per box), etc.

I wish we could trust the warmer than average weather would last. I sure don't want for colder weather to return and nip back everything that is budding so early.

Dawn