My first year too. Many sprouts almost lasted through the last recent freeze (of many). Might have about 1/3 still alive. I am starting over as soon as the new snow is gone (due tonight). I put baggies over the survivors for tonight. I think we are only to get a few inches of snow. I'll keep doing this until I do it right. I need lots of practice. I did notice that the plastic baggies really worked like baby greenhouses. I am encouraged, even if mother nature wants to test us. I even had cucumbers sprout and last until the last hard freeze. Even tomatoes lasted until the last freeze. Hah! I finally lost everything I had planted out (squirrels and last freeze). I bought more seed and even found some I had not seen before - what luck. I hope this nasty weather quits soon. I have lots of plants coming in the mail. I would hate to keep plants in the house for a while. My new seed, once sprouted, will complement them. I will also use chicken wire and chemical spray for those nasty rodents. We (humans) will win. I need some wins to compensate for the tree/shrub/bulb flower loss. Stupid weather.

This is equipment that belong to our subdevision that we use for clean-up ( fall/storms/etc/firedepartment). This chipper gets a work-out from chipping very hard bark. 12 bags from Lowe's makes about 11/2 wheelbarrel full of very nice finds and you have a container leftover of too bigge pieces that could be regrind again.The fines are blown in back of a pick-up truck.

Thanks Joe. That is in line with my thinking as well, but I wasn't sure how the two (Dimension and Milorganite) would go and the timing of each. I typically monitor my lawn at mid-yard and a few feet from the sidewalk with a meat thermometer looking for about 50 degrees. When the sidewalk area hits close to 50, I figure I'm good to go. I would have liked to add fertilizer in the late fall, but couldn't pull it off. Hopefully, things will rebound this spring. Thanks again for your input.

Amy, I don’t do anything when tree’s are dormant, nothing, let the tree stay dormant. Come spring you can do just about anything you want to do with them. You going to hurt the tree more by messing with them, root rot!!. With a decent container mix you don’t have change your mix maybe after 3 years.