Why it's too soon to dig up your garden

It might feel like it's time to plant your garden, but before you do,Calgary garden guru Kath Smythhas two words for you: too soon.

Smyth, of the Calgary Horticultural Society, dropped by the Calgary Eyeopeneron Monday to talk with host David Gray. She delivered a message that stressed slow growing and getting ready to hit the thawed ground running.

The catch, Smythsaid, was that there's still a lot of ground that's far from thawed.

"It's getting time. I even succumbed the last couple of days and have been out there, trying to find the bottom of thepile of the dead leaves I've left, to see what the soil temperature is," she said."Still not warm enough, and my compost thermometer that I put in my compost bin only went down about sixinches and then it hit frost," she said.

Smyth even warned Gray against his desire to get the rake outin order to clean up his front lawn of all the detritus that accumulates on a lawn over the course of a winter, such as in Gray's case a squirrel's tail, minus the squirrel.

Although Smyth did concede that Gray ought to remove the squirrel tail as soon as possible, she still counselledpatience.

"You're going towalk aroundon grass," she said. "The grass is going toget compacted, and if you rake, you're pulling all insulation off baby grass, and as grass starts to grow, it will get a bit frost-damaged."

Vegetable garden

While her enthusiasm for starting gardenwork this early was a bit frosty,Smyth was encouraged by her other go-to measuring stick.

"I have a raised garden and it warms upfirst. I was checking becauseall my baby spinach is [already] upthat I planted last fall. It's up about twoinches. It's looking really good," she said.

Basically, Smyth's advice for summer gardeners as April breaks out everywhere is to take your green thumb indoors for a few weeks longer.

"Your tomatoes should be potted and ready to start," she said, adding thatpeppers should be potted, too.

"You should be seeded and up about twoinches by now, and have formed their first set of fresh leaves," she added.

Which tomato?

The first task she added, is to choose which tomato you're going to grow.

"I personally like to choose whether they're a bush tomato or binding tomato. I want a better yield I want a cherry tomato and a bigger tomato," she said.

Whether you choose heirlooms or cherry or something heartier, like a beefsteak tomato,the process is the same, she said.

"You put your seed in and you get them in a bright sunny window and you just watch them and water them," she said.

The next step is to make the judgment call every prairie green thumb agonizes over every single spring.

"You start them inside," Smyth said,"and you wait for a sign from nature that it's time to move it outside."

Maybe that's in May. Maybe that's after Victoria Day.

For Smyth, the best growing advice she could offer Gray was to hurry up and wait.

"In Calgary, June 1st is usually best rule of thumb, although with the longer seasonwe're getting more and more frost-free days, so we're able to grow some pretty fantastic tomatoes."

With files from the Calgary Eyeopener.