May: What to do in the Garden During the Month of Transition

We’ll feel that shift too as the weather is predicted to jump about 20 degrees to the 80’s this weekend! ☀ Your cool weather crops should be coming on strong, and it’s a great time to harden off your summer crops to get them ready for life in the rigors of the great outdoors. The May calendar will help you decide what to do when this month.

My cool weather crops are happy—this weather is their jam. Lettuces are giving and giving, herbs are going crazy, peas are reaching upward, carrots are pushing up, beets are a little more hesitant.

Know who else is happy about this extended wet and cool? Yeah, these little goblins. Slugs are everywhere, big, tiny, and under every crevice are opalescent slug eggs, ready to burst forth and join the hoards. Keep going with your Slug IPM to protect germinating seeds and tender transplants.

Wait to transplant your warmth loving, squash, cucumbers, tomatoes and peppers. They want a soil temp of at least 50 degrees (60 for peppers!), and they do not appreciate being saturated. Keep them warm inside until the weather shifts to drier and sunnier and nights are warm-ish. Be sure to harden them off, (even those you buy at the Farmers’ Market) and keep them fed with a nitrogen rich fertilizer in their water. If they are looking too big for their pots, up-pot them into gallon containers, if you can. Be gentle with your squash and cucumbers, they have sensitive roots. The others benefit from having pot bound roots broken up.