APRIL
Now the rush is on! Plan your work, and work your plan. But do not yield to the temptation to plant more than you can look out for later on. Remember it is much easier to sow seeds than to pull out weeds.
The Frames. Air! water! and do not let the green plant-lice or the white-fly get a ghost of a chance to start. Almost every day the glass should be lifted entirely off. Care must be taken never to let the soil or flats become dried out; toward the end of the month, if it is bright and warm, begin watering towards evening instead of in early morning, as you should have been doing through the winter. If proper attention is given to ventilation and moisture, there will not be much danger from the green plant-louse (aphis) and white-fly, but at the first sign of one fight them to a finish. Use kerosene emulsion, tobacco dust, tobacco preparations, or Aphine.
Seed sowing. Under glass: tomato, egg-plant and peppers. On sod: corn, cucumbers, melons, early squash, lima beans.
Planting, outside. Onions, lettuce, beet, etc., if not put in last month; also parsnip, salsify, parsley, wrinkled peas, endive. Toward the end of this month (or first part of next) second plantings of these. Set out plants of early cabbage (and the cabbage group) lettuce, onion sets, sprouted potatoes, beets, etc.
In the Garden. Cultivate between rows of sowed crops; weed out by hand just as soon as they are up enough to be seen; watch for cut- worms and root-maggots.
Fruit. Thin out all old blackberry canes, dewberry and raspberry canes (if this was not done, as it should have been, directly after the fruiting season last summer). Be ready for first spraying of early- blossoming trees. Set out new strawberry beds, small fruits and fruit trees.
MAY
Keep ahead of the weeds. This is the month when those warm, south, driving rains often keep the ground too wet to work for days at a time, and weeds grow by leaps and bounds. Woe betide the gardener whose rows of sprouting onions, beets, carrots, etc., once become green with wild turnip and other rapid-growing intruders. Clean cultivation and slight hilling of plants set out are also essential.
The Frames. These will not need so much attention now, but care must be taken to guard tender plants, such as tomatoes, egg-plant and peppers, against sudden late frosts. The sash may be left off most of the time. Water copiously and often.
Planting, outside. First part of the month: early beans, early corn, okra and late potatoes may be put in; and first tomatoes set out —even if a few are lost—they are readily replaced. Finish setting out cabbage, lettuce, cauliflower, beets, etc., from frames. Latter part of month, if warm: corn, cucumbers, some of sods from frames and early squash as traps where late crop is to be planted or set.
Fruit. Be on time with first sprayings of late-blossoming fruits—apples, etc. Rub off from grape vines the shoots that are not wanted.