Here are some gardening tips to get ready for the season from “The Yolo Gardener” Spring 2010 Newsletter–a quarterly publication by the UC Yolo County Master Gardeners, by Master Gardener Laura Cameraon. Thank you Laura for this great information!

March and April are good months to start cucumber seeds in a greenhouse or other protected area.

The sun is back [sort of!], our new bare root fruit trees are budding and it’s time to plan and plant spring vegetables.

When choosing which vegetables to plant, consider the size of your garden, available sunlight and what you like to eat. Be adventurous and try one new vegetable each season. Vegetables need 6-8 hours of sunlight a day so you need to be aware of what parts of your yard have adequate sun. If you are planting climbing and ground plants, carefully determine placement so your 6’ tomato plants don’t shade your row crops. For example, squashes tend to cover a lot of territory, so if your yard is small you may want to steer away from them. You can also consider sharing your vegetable garden with a friend or neighbor. We consult with our neighbors and each plant something different and the bounty is shared. Our households are small so this works out perfectly for us; we each have a wider variety of vegetables to eat.

While most vegetable garden designs follow traditional linear pathways don’t let that stop you from planting vegetables anywhere in your garden that gets the sun load needed. Our neighbor’s vegetable garden is a small traditional linear plot that works out perfectly for their yard and their dog. Our back yard was recently transformed to an esthetically pleasing “mound” that mimics the Himalayas. Base Camp One had tomatoes, Everest was covered with squashes and melons and K2 is the current home of last year’s swiss chard. Anywhere there is a spot in your garden that meets the sun and water requirements of your vegetables will work out fine.

Dr. Robert Norris, UCD Department of Plant Sciences, has created a vegetable planting guide for the Sacramento area. We also have included the planting guide in The Gardener’s Companion available for purchase at our office at 70 Cottonwood in Woodland. Dr. Norris’s guide lists not all vegetables but a goodly number of them that do well in our area.  Basic vegetable garden design and plant rotation plans as well as other valuable information regarding gardening in California can be found  here .

March and April are good months to start seeds in a greenhouse or other protected area: Lettuce, tomatoes, carrots, beets, peppers, eggplant, cucumbers, celery, corn, broccoli, cabbage, cauliflower, chard, kohlrabi, peas, potato eyes, radishes and summer squash. March is also a good time to transplant seedlings or purchased plants of lettuce, tomatoes and chard.

April is a good time to start seeds in a greenhouse or other protected area: melons, squash, green beans, and spinach. In April you can also directly seed carrots, cucumbers, corn, green beans, melons and squash into the designated growing areas as well as transplanting seedlings or purchased plants of lettuce, tomatoes, peppers, eggplant and cucumber.

As always, weather can change your planting and harvesting dates. As you pick through varieties, note that some seeding and transplanting dates may vary.

Enjoy choosing, planting and eating the vegetables of your labors. I enjoy looking at my circle of lettuce and waterfall of squash plants. Be creative in your plantings and enjoy your own new tradition of vegetable gardening.