The weather here has been quite nice for the past few days and it is so tempting to plant marigolds, petunias, and cosmos. I must restrain myself though, because we will still get hard frost and I am too lazy to bring in sprouted containers...and too forgetful to cover up plants that have sprouted. I just can't risk it. So I will wait until early April here before I do them...although it is so tempting. You could probably still do hardy annuals...alyssum comes to mind readily. I'm sure there are lots more if you check the faq's for your zone. Good luck with your planting!

The weather here has been quite nice for the past few days and it is so tempting to plant marigolds, petunias, and cosmos. I must restrain myself though, because we will still get hard frost and I am too lazy to bring in sprouted containers...and too forgetful to cover up plants that have sprouted. I just can't risk it. So I will wait until early April here before I do them...although it is so tempting. You could probably still do hardy annuals...alyssum comes to mind readily. I'm sure there are lots more if you check the faq's for your zone. Good luck with your planting!

The weather here has been quite nice for the past few days and it is so tempting to plant marigolds, petunias, and cosmos. I must restrain myself though, because we will still get hard frost and I am too lazy to bring in sprouted containers...and too forgetful to cover up plants that have sprouted. I just can't risk it. So I will wait until early April here before I do them...although it is so tempting. You could probably still do hardy annuals...alyssum comes to mind readily. I'm sure there are lots more if you check the faq's for your zone. Good luck with your planting!

The petunia can be sown any time now. The marigold I will hold it till second week of April in your zone. After germination I would take them in the house at night if you happen to have very cold nights, even with +2 degree at night it seems to be too much for marigold. I think cosmos seeds, people sow them direct on the ground at the same time with morning glory, when the soil warms up enough. That's my try to answer your questions, hope it helps.

Thanks for your input-I did WS the petunia on the weekend - I already have some well underway inside under lights, but was rethinking about the marigolds etc. when I saw them listed on a database on the wintersown.org website, (I believe this is the name of the site) which stated they could be WS in March.

If you are doing Marigolds from the Tagetes series, those are OK to do from now on. Others I'd wait until mid-April. In terms of the Cosmos, I wait until all the hard frosts have gone through - unsually the end of April here in Prospect Bay. You are a bit more inland so I'd wait to the start of May. They grow pretty fast.

Thank you Tiffy, good to get advice from someone nearby!

We had such nice weather the last few weeks, it was so so so tempting to get carried away, now we are under an inch or two of SNOW!!

I am hoping this is winters last blast!