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For those of us who live in climates where the winter is normally mild in comparison to the harsh winters of the Northeast and Midwest, planning for our gardens begins immediately after we put our gardens to bed for the winter.

As a gardener, I feel incredibly fortunate because I live in a climate that makes it possible to garden for at least seven months out of the year. Although our winters are normally quite mild, sometimes it is hard for us to know when the danger of frost will be gone, but I think it is safe to say that gardening begins in earnest for us at the beginning of March.

This is when the hummingbird migration begins, and sometime between the middle of the second and third weeks of March, the first of spring appearances will be recorded. For those of us who live in Texas, this is also the time at which wildflowers will begin to appear.

For early gardeners, cool weather crops usually be grown all winter long. There is no need to sow seeds indoors because they will do just fine outside. We can plant a crop of lettuce at the end of September. By staggering plantings, we can continue to have home grown lettuce until the weather starts to get hot in April.

When it comes to growing many other vegetables , it's necessary to start seeds for things that are going to go outside, whether in pots or in the ground, no later than January 1st. One important thing to consider when planting most vegetables is that some things need cooler night time temperatures to set fruits.

Tomatoes , for example, will not bear fruits if the night time temperatures never dip below 70 degrees. That's a common state of affairs when it comes to Texas heat. The only way to deal with this situation is to look for and plant varieties that have been hybridized to tolerate extreme heat.

For many vegetables, in a climate where gardening begins as early as ours does, it makes more sense to sow the seeds directly outdoors. The practice of winter sowing generally involves sowing the seeds in some sort of container, and then keeping it in some sort of protective house. It might be a greenhouse, a cloche, a cold frame, or under plastic sheeting.

As long as the vegetables can tolerate cool temperatures and an occasional night where the temperatures dip below freezing, sowing seeds like this will undoubtedly produce earlier crops. It's important to keep the seeds moist during this time. It is often thought that when the soil is moist, the moisture can provide a protective barrier against the cold.

Because the vegetables are going to be planted at least two months earlier than it would be in less temperate zones, it is necessary to prepare the bed well enough in advance. The soil should be tilled . If you have a compost heap, add the compost to the bed. If you have other organic material that you can add to the bed, that should be added prior to tilling.

Be sure that the layout of the garden is planned before you go to plant it. Make sure that every crop you plant is being planted in a different place than it was the year before.

When it comes to annuals, earlier gardeners will often attempt to expedite the growing process by trying to propagate some annuals from cuttings . If they are successful, this will eliminate the need to start things from seed, and they will have more mature plants ready to plant either in containers or in the ground.

With summer bulbs, because it isn't necessary to dig them up for the winter, the only thing that was necessary to prepare them for winter was to cover them with a layer of mulch. Some people cut down the foliage before the first hard freeze, but others just wait. Elephant ears tend to begin coming up before cannas and other summer flowers.

Wildflowers begin to bloom in March, depending on whether or not there was sufficient rain over the course of the winter. Because wildflowers bloom so early, it's necessary to plant seeds early in the fall. The wildflowers that are more drought tolerant may be able bloom even without adequate rainfall.

Rainfall is necessary for the healthy growth of other things, too. The health of azaleas, magnolias, camellias, oleander, crape myrtle and other early flowering trees and shrubs is also related to adequate rainfall, or in the absence of sufficient rain, the water we provide.

For those of us who can begin our gardens early, a garden season can last seven months or longer. This makes it possible to have multiple plantings of things. Cool weather crops like lettuce, spinach, peas and radishes can be planted from February to early April. Then, depending on what the summer weather is like, it may be possible to plant these cool weather crops again at the end of September.

Under the most ideal conditions, these crops can be grown all winter.It may also be possible to plant multiple plantings of tomatoes, beans and other crops. There is, of course, the obvious need to know about hybrids that have been adapted to withstand really hot temperatures.

It is both rewarding and challenging to be able to have a garden for so many months. The moment a hard freeze forces things into dormancy, the time has come to start planning for early spring planting. Because this doesn't really happen until early December, if then, there is no real break for us. We start seeds for our vegetable gardens just after Christmas.

For most of my life, I lived in a place where cold and harsh winters really prevented us from having as long a gardening season as I have now. Even though I often have to face the challenges of extreme heat or drought, the rewards of being able to plant so early and have such a long gardening season far outweigh any of the drawbacks. I wouldn't trade this for the world!

Learn more about this author, Theresa Rose.
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