The Tribune

By Gardener Jack The month of March is a time to think ahead. Crops like sweet peppers, eggplants and tomatoes, if sown from seed now, will be harvested in June when conditions will be very much warmer. Peppers and eggplants in particular are warm weather lovers and those sown in March will almost certainly grow more vigorously than those started in autumn. Cool weather crops are becoming marginal and any lettuce and spinach sown in March is likely to have a tough time. Too much warmth causes lettuce to become bitter and seed faster. March is one of the best times to sow cantaloupe melon seeds. These melons are not happy with our humid subtropical conditions and if they ever produce ripe fruit they tend to be much smaller than the seed packet promised. A better bet is watermelon. We are in a dry time of year and watermelons need a lot of water and a lot of sun. If you can keep your plants well watered you can be enjoying watermelon in May and June. Winter and summer squash and cucumbers all do well in springtime. If you were disappointed in your autumn crops, try them again. During March there will be a 'rising of the sap' in the garden. Shrubs that have been semi-dormant will put out buds and new shoots, and there will be a general spurt in growth all round. You will also notice birds starting to build their nests. That makes March a wonderful time to do some pruning. Flowering shrubs that are misshapen can be corrected and those that are perfectly shaped can be lightly pruned all around to increase flowering. Our roses may be looking rather leggy after their winter session. They can be pruned back drastically in March or April to have strong new growth ready for the much warmer weather coming. Apply plenty of compost or manure after pruning to encourage the new growth. Do not prune any fruit trees except to remove dead branches. The preparation for flowering and fruiting in plants is a complex process and pruning may cut away materials necessary for flowering and fruiting. Just as a woman may be several months pregnant without showing, so can a tree be in the early stages of production without any outward indication. We have reached the latest time to plant bulbs, rhizomes and tubers. Your nursery may even have bulbs that have begun to produce foliage. Buy them and in few weeks you will have their flowers to enjoy - and for years afterwards. Gingers grow from rhizomes very readily but you must take care in your selection. Some gingers propagate themselves very readily and a single plant can turn into an impenetrable mass. Shell ginger is one of the culprits here. Heliconias are also colonisers. Grown from rhizomes or offshoots from a parent plant, heliconias can take over whole areas of a garden. Most Bahamian gardens have the same flowers in summer because these are the ones that have proven themselves capable of surviving our forbidding summer heat and humidity: marigolds, cosmos, vincas, Mexican sunflowers and zinnias. They can all be planted now, along with petunias that will do very well until about August. Whenever European friends ask me the best time to come and visit I always suggest March or April. They have returned home with happy memories of blue-sky days and warm temperatures the equivalent of their summer months. We are entering the Chamber of Commerce time of year and I am looking forward to it. gardenerjack@coralwave.com