2026 Spring Garden Thread

Started prep today and what a beautiful Texas day! Currently have strawberries, onions, brussel sprouts, and lettuce. Planted broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, and some kale today. Plant store had peppers and tomatoes but I’m not tempting God. 20 bags of mushroom compost is ready. Seed potatoes are bought and in the garage. This years project is two raised cut flower beds for my wife.

Had to turn the water back on to water the transplants in. Of course, my fertilizer injector has cracked.

quote:

---

I think the deer would wreck anything I put down there. My soil here is more clay(ish) than our other property which has great soil.

---

I put up a 10’ poly deer fence around ours with 10’ T posts. You lose the mesh when looking across our place. Our soil is extremely sandy. I constantly keep improving it with mushroom compost.

Once they find it, they’ll hammer it.

Last year I started getting seeds from LINK . They are reasonably priced and fairly quick to ship out. I just got a bunch of sweet starter onions that I will be planting in a few weeks. I plan on putting them in five gallon garden bags which will be on a heavy duty wagon. I will have them out in the sun, but I will bring them into my garage if the temperatures get to low. Once the frost danger is gone the bags will be put into one of my garden areas.

I am in the process of fencing in a second area to keep the deer out. This one will have two-four foot rings for cucumbers and cantaloupe. I enlarged and installed another 4'x8' bed for my wife. In the main bed she has two 4'x8' beds, a four foot ring and a three foot ring. There is ample space for other containers if she needs them. This year we are planting some cream peas in one of the larger beds.

Being we are in NW Arkansas we have to wait a little longer. I do the grunt work and my wife does the planting. She plans on starting her pepper and tomato seeds the first of March. These will be under a grow light. She normally buys plants, but she wanted to try seeds.

Last year she had to give away tomatoes and cantaloupes being she had more than what she could handle. Our neighbors love her garden.

ASAP, peppers take several weeks from seed to transplant.

It only takes about a week of increasing sunlight each day to harden them off. They are just not super fast growers. I seeded peppers in cells about a month ago and they’ll be ready to up pot into a 4” container this upcoming weekend. They’ll stay in 4” pots for around 3 weeks before transplanting outside. That’s around a 7 week timeframe from seed to planting outside. I think 8 weeks from seed to transplant is pretty normal for peppers - give or take.

That depends on if you think you are going to get a cold front that takes temps close to freezing. From the internet:

Cucumber plants are highly frost-sensitive, warm-season annuals that do not tolerate freezing temperatures. A light frost or temperatures below 35°F will generally kill the plant, while temperatures below 50°F can damage foliage, cause stunted growth, and create misshapen fruit.

Just tell me when to start peppers, maters and squash. They said there would be no math.

quote:

---

Are you a gambler? Roll the dice and go

---