Wisconsin Yard and Garden Tips

By Sharon Morrisey, Consumer Horticulture Agent, Milwaukee County UW-Extension

If you need more space to garden, contact your county's UW-Extension office about rental garden locations. In Milwaukee County, call (414) 290-2405.

Prepare for starting seeds indoors by gathering supplies and equipment. The three most crucial elements for successful seed starting are using sterile media, supplemental light and bottom heat of about 70 degrees. Be sure fluorescent fixtures and bulbs are compatible since the newer low-wattage tubes will overheat in old fixtures. (463)

Plan to get your children into the garden this year. Start with projects indoors like a pan of grass for their Easter baskets or oats for the cat. Start a sweet potato or an avocado pit. If you have supplemental lighting, plant a tub of lettuces and garlic cloves and herbs.

With two weeks left until Valentine's Day, its time to start forcing those spring flowering bulbs you've been chilling. The little bulbs like crocus, hyacinth, and scilla should have received 8 weeks of cold. Larger bulbs require 12 – 14 weeks. (356, 425)

Cloves of garlic can be planted in pots indoors to sprout for zesty seasoning.

Sow seeds indoors for impatiens, begonias, petunias, nemesia, dusty miller, and snapdragons.

Fresh cut Valentine's bouquets should be placed in warm water with floral preservative after having the stem ends re-cut. Wash vases with soap and water every time you replace the water. Remove any foliage that is below water level to prevent rot and clogging of stems. Place vase in a cool location (down to 35 degrees) for at least one hour or overnight so that they can re-hydrate before bringing into room temperature.

Drooping roses can be revived by completely submerging them in warm water and re-cutting the stem ends while under water. Leave them in the water to re-hydrate for a half hour before returning them to the vase.

Start garden woodworking projects like coldframes, trellises, arbors and benches. A makeshift but functional coldframe can be set up using a few bales of straw on which an old wooden storm window is propped. Slide back the window to vent heat on sunny days being certain to close it again before sundown.

You can also delay pruning of spring flowering plants like forsythia, lilac, flowering almond, pussywillow, quince, cherry, Corneliancherry dogwood and crabapple until after bloom if you can't bear to lose the flowerbuds you prune off. (820)

Otherwise, prune anyway and bring in the cut branches from these early spring flowerers to force flower buds open indoors for your enjoyment.

Seed of larkspur, nigella, and poppies can be sown directly in bare ground to germinate as soon as the snow melts away.

Keep feeding the birds until spring bloom since they have come to depend upon you for food. Even greater success at attracting birds to your property can be assured by providing a fresh source of water at all times. This must be kept free of ice and available until spring thaw. Stake up a discarded Christmas tree near a feeder to provide some protective cover but far enough away so that dogs and cats can't hide there to ambush your feathered friends at the feeder. (592)