Expand the categories below to learn more about what you need to do this month.
Vegetables
Continue to plant heat-loving herbs including basil, Mexican tarragon, and rosemary. Pinch back basil and tarragon regularly to prevent flowering and enhance branching.
Make trellises or use stakes for tomatoes, cucumbers, pole beans and other climbing crops.
Keep an eye out for stinkbugs, leaf-footed bugs, bean beetles, tomato and tobacco hornworms, tomato fruitworms, flea beetles, corn earworm, cucumber beetle, and squash vine borer in the garden.
Harvest onions, garlic and potatoes from the spring crop. Check your tomatoes and other susceptible crops for blossom end rot on the fruit as it begins to form. This is usually an indication of calcium uptake issues complicated by uneven moisture and possibly other factors. Contact the Master Gardeners at the Hall County Extension Office for advice on how to deal with this disorder.
Use bird netting as needed to help protect ripening tomatoes and strawberries from hungry birds and other critters.
Monitor and treat garden fire ant nests as you find them. Use a spinosad-based bait, drench or a combination (add bait and then drench in a week or two). Spinosad is a natural insecticide and is safe to use around vegetable plots and other edibles.
Some planting times for more common vegetables:
Cantaloupe – March 20 – June 20
Melons - March 20 – May 1
Okra – April 1 – June 1
Pumpkins – May 15 - Jun.15
Southern peas – April 1 – August 10
Sweet potato – April 15 - June 15