I don’t care what vegetable, flowers, and bulbs they have out at the big box store. Resist! Our soil is still cold. Still, in my area in fact, in the low 50s’. Think about it: would you want to be pulled from your warm kitchen, coffee mug in hand and covered in cold mud?

I do it. I work in cold mud. It hurts.

Summer flowers and vegetables need to planted when our soil is rapidly warming. When it is 60. At least. For most of the South, that is another two weeks away. If you want to be really certain, you can always track your soil tempature at the National Water and Climate Analysis Network Map.

Otherwise, the little plants, fresh from a greenhouse, just sit there. Roots cold, even open to pest problems. Caladium bulbs will rot in the cold. So wait to plant transplants.

Cold Hardy Annuals for Mud

But you plan plenty of things that like the cool. All of the annuals below will come up, flower and look great until it gets really hot. They all like the cool soil.

In the past week, I’ve planted:

Nasturtium seeds: they’ll come up, flower, make great leaves and die when it’s hot in July.

Radish seeds: I planning to have radish to eat on Mother’s Day weekend for our first summer lily farm event.

Flowering Tobacco seeds: I started these in a small pot, stashed in a warm spot by the shed.

Onion sets: Those little thin, bare root onion plants they have at garden centers now. Yes, you can mix them into flower beds.

Australian Peas: It may warm up too quickly for you to get pea pods, but with these, sugar snaps, and other cool peas you get two important things. 1. Edible pea shoots and 2. Roots that help enrich the soil with nutrients.

And of course, this is a great time to plant perennials, shrubs and trees. I planted lots this week including one of my absolute favorite shrubs—Jasminum mesnyi ‘Sun Glo’™ a brilliant golden leafed shrubs with sweet lemon yellow flowers. Last fall, I planted one in a blue pot for a friend and she says it’s been pure joy all spring.