If you want to get the ultimate head start on your spring garden, and I know it sounds a little too early to think about that, well, get into this world of pre-seeding. So what is it? How are we going to do it? Why should you do it? Let's talk about it today. As the name

would imply, pre-seeding just is planting seeds in late fall even early winter to prepare for the spring.

So think about it in nature. It is what happens. This is how many plants actually propagate themselves. They produce

their seeds at the end of the season, those seeds are dispersed in some way, and then

they lay dormant until the ground and the temperatures are at a point which

germination proceeds. So why should you do it? Well you get earlier germination of plants that don't need to be

acclimatized. They're already hardened off because they're growing and

germinating in the environment in which they're going to remain. Let's talk

then about how to proceed. Let's imagine we have a simple 4 by 4 raised garden bed.

You'll want to clear off that area.

Then you'll want to work in some compost, some amendments. You can just place it right on top if you'd like to do the no dig method.

You can even place autumn leaves on top. I actually would recommend some kind of cover on top of the compost.

If you have autumn leaves all the better. I don't really have that so I might put straw on mine if I was going to do this method.

After the air temperature drops below freezing but before the ground is freezing then you

want to direct so at the depth that you would normally direct so at if it was

you know spring and you were planting right in the garden.

So most vegetables that are cold hardy can be preceded or early sown.

For example, things like beets, carrots, kale, leeks,

lettuce, onions, peas, radishes, spinach, they will all work.

You can do things like tomatoes or beans,

but they won't work as well. You want things that naturally would

tolerate this method and our classic summer crops do not naturally tolerate

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