We had a rough winter here in PA this past year.   It was terribly cold, and the winter storms seemed never ending.   We lost power twice over the winter for several days.   But now we are in full spring mode, lovely cool sunny weather.  This is perfect for getting the spring work load done.

Looking like a great year for my asparagus.  It’s been 2 years of tender loving care and patience to enjoy the results but I am going to say it was worth it.   So the project started 2 years ago – create a planting bed, plant 3yr old asparagus crowns, weed the bed like crazy and let the and let the stalks grow.   Don’t even cut one stalk for the 1^st 2 years, let them grow out to giant ferns.   They will get 5 feet or so tall.   Cut them back to the ground in the fall after they have died back.  Year 3 I am enjoying large tender asparagus already in May.   I will cut and enjoy them until middle of June, then will stop and let them grow out again.   Come late fall cover the entire bed with a rich compost and wait until next spring.

I did a bed of Garlic this year.   Planted the cloves in October and again put a nice layer of compost over the bed.   Plants came up a few weeks back.  In another few weeks a seed head will grow up in the center of the plant.  I will cut this back so that all the energy goes to the bulbs and not the seed head.  Come mid – July when the leaves turn brown and die back and I will harvest the cloves.   Everyone I know will have plenty of garlic for the year.   

For the other vegetables this could turn out to be a very good year.  I was able to put a variety of peppers in the ground in late April, a bit early but I got lucky and there was no late frost.  The plants are thriving now and should have a great early season out of them as their roots will have developed well before the peak sunny days in late June/early July.   We will definitely be doing some canning of the hot peppers come late summer and fall.