May Gardening Advice for Manchester

Editor’s note: Manchester resident, Jennifer Fairfield, owns and operates the Garden Mill in Chelsea, serves on the Manchester Community Garden Committee and volunteers with the school gardens at Klager and the MECC.

photo courtesy of Jennifer Fairfield

by Jennifer Fairfield

Do April showers really bring May flowers? Maybe it will be May showers bringing the flowers, since we really didn’t see a whole lot of rain last month. Of course, a lot of my April flowers are only just now in full bloom since it took so long to start to heat up. I am grateful that we are starting to see some warm weather finally, since it has allowed me to begin to get some things done in my garden, which always makes me feel good. Are we out of the freezing temperatures yet? It is Michigan, so I don’t think I’m going to bet on it!

The best advice I can give you for dealing with May is to be flexible, as this month can bring so many ups and downs for gardeners (and non-gardeners too!). You take chances with almost any outdoor activity you might hope to do, because the weather can change seemingly instantly. Do you remember last year? We started out the month with highs in the 80’s and then had lows in the upper 20’s over Memorial Weekend, with daytime high temps throughout the month ranging from 50 to 90! So plan to get some gardening and other yard work done this month, but have a back-up plan, too – napping is my favorite fall-back!

Lets get gardening!

We have a long list of things to do in our yards and gardens this month:

• The first order of business this month is to assess the damage done by our really hard winter, if you haven’t yet. Take a walk around your yard and really look at your trees, shrubs, flower beds, and lawns. Some things you might find are plants that were suffocated by the heavy snow and aren’t coming back to life, wind burn damage to evergreens, and damage to trees and shrubs from hungry deer and bunnies. If your plants are in bad shape, it might be time to visit your favorite nursery for replacements. I know I have a few things that fall into that category, including my cotoneasters that were a favorite food of the rabbits this winter.

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  photo courtesy of Jennifer Fairfield

  I have seen lots of wind burn damaged boxwood and dwarf Alberta spruce in my travels around the area lately. If the damage on your dwarf Alberta spruce is extensive – more than 40% – you might want to consider replacing the shrub, as the damage is probably permanent. If it’s not too bad, wait a little bit to see if you get new growth starting. If so, take a really small pair of clippers (my favorites are Dramm’s Compact Shears) and clip off the brown needles, taking care not to clip off the new growth. Over time, the new growth might be able to cover up the bare spots. This approach can work for other needle conifers too, but it will take quite a bit of time and patience, and your plant may not fully come back to its former beauty.

• Similarly, extensively damaged boxwood is probably best replaced, but some can be saved. The Missouri Botanical Garden has a good article on dealing with winter-damaged boxwood here:
• Lawns may also have suffered a lot from this past winter. If you are seeing bare spots in your lawn, you might need to do some reseeding. Luckily, the MSU extension just put out an article on this subject you can read here.

Once you have assessed all of the winter damage and come up with a plan of action, you can get to work on the usual things to be done in May!

• Now is the time to divide and transplant late-summer and fall-blooming perennials that may have outgrown their allotted space. Wait to transplant spring and early-summer bloomers until after they have finished flowering (best to do it in the fall). If you transplant when the plants are not in bloom or getting ready to bloom, they can put all their energy into leaf production and putting down roots in their new homes. Flowering takes a lot of energy, so you could be stressing your plants out if you ask them to try to get established in a new space at the same time they are trying to put out flowers.
• This month is generally the time to put new mulch down, too. There’s a trick to getting the timing right, though– if you do it too early, you can delay the soil warming up, which is what gets your plants growing. There is also a trick to getting the depth right – if you put too much mulch down, the roots of your trees, shrubs, and flowers won’t get the water and air they need. Conventional wisdom usually says to put down about 3 inches of mulch, which is OK, as long as you are not using too fine a mulch. Fine mulch tends to matt down easily, which doesn’t help with getting water and air to the soil, and therefore the roots of your plants. So, if you are using fine mulch, such as shredded leaves or grass clippings, don’t go any deeper than 2 inches. If you are using really coarse mulch, a depth of up to 4 inches is OK. ​​
• ​Before you put down new mulch, use a garden fork to fluff up old mulch. All the snow we had this winter is sure to have compacted that mulch, and piling new mulch on top will only help to compact it even more, which will keep water and air from reaching the soil and roots (am I sounding like a broken record yet?).
  

  photo courtesy of Jennifer Fairfield

• The forsythia in the area has really been blooming in the last week or so, which is a sure sign of spring! Once your forsythia are finished flowering, they can be pruned. If you let them go too long without pruning, forsythia will get very woody and you’ll have leaves and flowers on the ends of long branches, instead of a bushy plant with blooms and leaves throughout. Other spring-blooming shrubs should also be pruned after they have finished blooming.
• In Southeast Michigan, our average date of last frost is around May 15th. It’s safe to plant your annual flowers after all danger of frost has passed, but that’s hard to predict. If we get a surprise late frost after you have planted annuals, you will want to make sure you have row covers or some other protection for them so as not to risk losing them to the cold.
• In your veggie garden, early in the month is the time to plant cabbage, broccoli, kale, Brussels sprouts, cauliflower, radishes, spinach, and lettuce. Onions and potatoes should go in early as well. With onions, for anything other than green onions (or scallions), it’s best to start with sets or plants rather than seeds, to be sure that your bulbs will have enough time to mature. If you are growing potatoes, don’t just use potatoes from the grocery store – you can’t be certain that they are not carrying disease that will prevent your crop from thriving. Be sure to get certified disease-free seed potatoes instead. I shared an article about growing potatoes from Organic Gardening Magazine last year at this time, but it’s worth sharing again, in case you missed it: here.
• If you are starting your own plants from seed, start summer squash and cucumber inside now so that they will be ready to go into the garden at the end of the month. At the end of the month, once there is no longer any danger of frost, and the soil has warmed up to at least 60°(use a soil thermometer to check the temp), you can plant those summer squash and cucumber as well as other warm-weather loving veggies and herbs, like tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, and basil.
• ​If you are buying vegetable plants for your garden, look for ones that don’t have any flowers or fruit yet and are shorter and stockier rather than taller and leggier. Plants that are flowering or bearing fruit before being planted are showing signs of stress, and will not do as well once they are planted. Tall, leggy plants tend to be weaker, and may not produce as well.

For the birds:

• May is also a great time for birding. It’s time to welcome back many of our migrating birds now, including hummingbirds and Baltimore orioles. Others are only passing through on their way farther north. So, get your nectar feeders out for the hummers and orioles, and keep your seed feeders out a little longer, too. Make sure to get out bird baths now as well.
  

  photo courtesy of Jennifer Fairfield

by Sara Swanson

Sara Swanson is an editor, writer and a founder of the Manchester Mirror.