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Farming and Gardening Notes for February and March

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  • FEBRUARY FARMING AND GARDENING NOTES

  •      Seed bedding plants and vegetables that produce their fruit above the ground between new and full moon. In California, put out your oats and spring barley. In Texas, plant corn. Sow alfalfa and then cut hay in Arizona.
    Plant a row of peas, onions, potatoes, radishes, rutabagas, asparagus crowns, spinach, turnips and carrots on milder afternoons under the dark moon. In the Southwest, put in the last of the potato crop. Then take cuttings to propagate shrubs, trees and houseplants; experiment with forsythia, pussy willow, hydrangea and spirea. Trim back ornamental grasses.
  •     If you have been having problems with potato scab and nematodes on your potatoes, try spreading pig manure on the potato patch this spring. If you don’t have a pig, just check the soil’s pH. A balanced pH can help remedy scab and nematodes almost as well as a hog.
        When earthworms cross roads and sidewalks in the rain, pastures are starting to grow again in your location. If you hear spring peepers (they sound like “peep-peep”) or wood frogs (they sound like a flock of ducks), then you really know it’s almost time to let the livestock out to the driest, greenest piece of ground.
        If you need a guard animal for your goats, consider getting a cow. If raised with goats, a single cow will think he or she is a goat and should keep dogs and coyotes from threatening the herd.
        Don’t let your pigs—especially your piglets and weaner pigs—get caught in late-winter drafts. Wind chill can kill a young pig. And pigs, like people, can catch cold if exposed to radical temperature changes—the kind of changes that occur quickly in late February and early March.
        Order browse-garden supplements now for goats and sheep. Think about roses, hawthorn, raspberry, tansy, hollyhock, peppermint, thyme and chamomile, all herbs that are thought to fight abortion in your flock and herd.
        Castrate and dock livestock as soon as they strong enough to handle it: a couple of days to a couple of weeks old. And lunar lore suggests that you wait until the moon’s fourth quarter for those activities.
        Be sure to drench your sheep before you let them out into lush new grass. Of course, conduct all your feeding changes slowly, and watch for bloat.
        Apply fertilizer to trees and shrubs as far north as the Ohio Valley, and up the Pacific coast all the way to Vancouver. Also put in your bare-root plantings, prepare your container garden, and check the pH in your lawn. Cut back the roses and remove the disease-spreading debris.
        Sap should flow as the weather warms, and the period between the 15th and the 24th could bring some of the mildest days of the winter, accompanied by nights below freezing—ideal for gathering maple sap along or below the 40th Parallel.
        Spray fruit trees when high temperatures climb into the 40s. Prune fruit trees and shrubs just before bud break during the moon’s third or fourth quarter. Before spring growth begins but when high temperatures climb into the 40s for a day or two, treat ash, bittersweet, fir, elm, flowering fruit trees, hawthorn, juniper, lilac, linden, maple, oak, pine, poplar, spruce, sweet gum, tulip tree and willow for scales and mites.
        Make the first rhubarb pie in the Deep South. In the lower Midwest, the knuckles of this year’s crop can be pushing out of the ground.

MARCH FARMING AND GARDENING NOTES

Lunar lore suggests that you plant seeds for flowers and vegetables that produce their fruit above ground as the moon is waxing. Following that tradition, gardeners in the South would sow their pastures as well as plant their corn, cotton, greens, squash, tomatoes, celery, beans and peas before full moon or after new moon. If you are supporting your family with tobacco, you can plant that crop also under the waxing moon. Along the 40th Parallel, seed the oats, set out cabbages, kale, collards, lettuce, spinach, and Brussels sprouts plants as conditions permit. Along the Canadian border, frost-seed the pastures where the ground is still freezing and thawing on a regular basis.
From North Dakota to Maryland, there is still time to add fertilizer to maximize your grazing and hay production. Plant barley in the West. Get ready to put in spring barley and spring wheat in Minnesota.
Tradition suggests that you put in your root crops as well as all your landscape plantings between full moon and new moon. That will also be the best lunar time for vaccinating livestock, trimming feet, shearing, docking, and clipping wattles on the young goats.
Pasture season has started in the South and moves north at the rate of about ten miles a day. Drench sheep a week to ten days before turning them out to graze. Make sure salt is available as your flock moves out to graze, and keep backing soda on hand for bloat. Animals given dry hay before being let out to new pastures tend to gorge themselves less and develop bloat far less frequently.
Begin worming every seventeen days in warmer parts of the country in order to reduce parasite egg counts. If you till and replant your pasture, the incidence of worm larvae ordinarily declines significantly.
Try to have enough hay on hand in case animals are kept out of the fields by rain or snow for an extended period. Don’t risk foot rot and ruined pastures by letting your flock or herd into areas that are too wet.
As your animals move to pasture, they will have a higher energy need than when they were pen-fed. And excitement or stress caused by traffic or other animals can also increase feed requirements.