My general rule, and it should be yours, too, is to simply let lawns be until they dry out. And then, the next rule: no raking or thatching, and, for goodness sake, no matter how brainwashed you are, do not put down fertilizer. How can you know what your lawn needs until it has had time to recover from the winter? How can some angry Scot who has never been to your yard know?
For many, raking and thatching are “must-do” spring chores. I disagree. Go out and gather any of the fallen tree limbs that are bigger than your thumb. Leave the rest as these thinner twigs contain tremendous amounts of sugars and bacterial goodies and can sustain healthy populations of microbes in your lawn. There they will be working away for you, feeding your grass plants, decaying any remaining bits of leaves, and all those clippings you should be leaving on the lawn.
Obviously, not everyone reads this column and even some who do, don’t follow this advice. This is evidenced by the black plastic garbage bags left at the curb to be picked up and put into a landfill. There, they take up valuable space reducing the useful life of landfills, which are extremely expensive. Those who leave those bags should have to pay extra taxes. And, they violate the Law of Return: “What falls to the ground in a yard is supposed to decay and continue the cycle.”
Hopefully, last fall you put down a layer of mulch on garden beds and left the leaves on your lawn instead of gathering them all up. I can tell you our left leaves are gone now, decayed. Any that remain will be chewed up in the first mowing. As I write this, ours lawns are too wet and spongy to walk on. Let lawns dry out before you start working yours. Doing so negatively affects the all-important mycorrhizal fungi.
Anyhow, those bags are full of gold. I collect as many of them as I am allowed by the other gardener on this property. I hide them behind the outdoor greenhouse and store more next to the tool shed and behind the wood pile. They are full of great mulch material and if I collect enough, I can pile it on thick enough so we don’t have to do much weeding. Of course these leaves are needed to maintain a working compost pile, which has to be at least 3 feet by 3 feet by 3 feet to heat up properly. Finding enough “brown material” to keep the pile going is difficult in the summer. More bags solve the problem.
The big rule: Before you take bags of leaves from someone else’s yard, make sure the yard is dog-free, for obvious reasons. It might even be polite to ask the homeowner if you can have the leaves. The jury is still out on that.
Jeff’s Alaska Garden Calendar:
The Alaska Botanical Garden: Again, way too many events to list, but members get that list sent to them.
Planting: There are all manner of things to plant. Now is the time to calculate. We traditionally put plants in the ground Memorial Day weekend. This year it starts on May 23. Anything grown indoors needs a week to acclimate to sun and wind. You have to harden them off by putting them in shade for three days and then dappled shade for another few. Fail to cover this step and you will have worthless plants. Even nursery purchased plants need this treatment unless bought from an outdoor bench.
Dahlia tubers: What are you waiting for? Know your variety. Make labels. Pinch back to cause branching.
Begonia tubers: Press into soil/compost concave side up. Do not fill, just put soil up to the rim. If you want, limit the number of stems you allow to grow.
Tomatoes: So many choices, but all require a greenhouse or cold frame unless they are of the Polar series.
Nurseries: Might want to drive around and visit a few. I have my favorites and some I no longer support. We are lucky to have choices in this town.
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