Welcome to the northeast! First of all, before seedlings, you can already plant seeds for those cold-weather vegetables: chard, peas, lettuce, spinach, kale. And a few others. As for actual seedlings, wait a bit for the hot-weather veggies such as tomatoes & peppers. Cabbage family (broccoli, cauliflower, etc.) seedlings (not just seeds) can be planted now.

Depending on where you are and your particular exposure, the last frost date in this area ranges from ~10 May thru the end of May. Memorial Day weekend is the big time for planting most seedlings

What they all said â plus more:

If you are direct-seeding, def wait til at least after the last full moon in May (17th).

If you are a winter sower (see that forum here at Gardenweb), you can start them all now in containers (outside!), including your tomatoes and others. I just sowed my beans & squash this weekend, peas have been in since early March (and ready to be planted out), and toms I'm just waiting for them to sprout (you can actually do toms earlier via the winter-sowing method.)

Welcome to New England!

Here is a link that might be useful: Winter Sowing forum

I transplanted 5 week old lettuce seedlings today, and sowed radish. Very late, for me (normally a cold frame gardener.) Garlic (fall planted) has been up for over a month, as have other onion-y perennials and rhubarb. My tomato seedlings are 4", as are the leeks. Seedlings ready to go out now:

leeks, sweet peas, wallflowers, broccoli, cabbage, parsley. All will tolerate some frost. Cilantro and dill I would protect; also thyme and rosemary.

Soil temperatures are still pretty chilly... sorry I don't have a number for you, but the compost heap was 45ish. This is rte 3 x 495 area, maybe colder than the original poster's location.

I've always planted on May 31 (the old Memorial Day.) The year they changed the holiday, some of my seedlings were frost tinged, so I reverted back to the traditional date for planting. (I am in northern NE.)

Of course the early vegies, like lettuce and peas, can go in sooner.

Welcome to New England, and may your garden grow well.

It has been a cool, cloudy spring. I planted peas early this year, on March 19th, here in my zone 6 garden. I waited and waited for them to come up but they must have rotted. I finally sowed another packet of seed. I see them starting to poke their heads up now. It seems really late to me. I'm hoping that it won't be too hot for them when it's time to produce pods.

I wintersowed veggies and that has also been very slow this year. I would normally have larger seedlings by now. I just transplanted out tiny lettuce, and cabbage yesterday. I have broccoli and other brassica seedlings but they are just not growing. I tried transplanting broccoli seedlings a week ago but they were too tiny and they have barely settled in. I transplanted Bok Choy at the same time and they are just settled in too.

I did direct sow spinach and beets maybe around the first of April. They started showing about a week ago and don't even have true leaves yet.

As for warm season vegetables. I winter sowed tomatoes and pumpkin. The tomatoes have not germinated yet, which is surprising not to have one yet. Luckily I decided to start some under lights this year and I have a few that are ready to go in the ground. I am hoping to put those out this week with wall of waters to help them along. I already put down black plastic to warm the soil some, but there hasn't been much sun. The ws pumpkin has actually germinated just this week. I started eggplant and peppers under lights too, but I am going to wait until it's much warmer to put those out.

I believe my last frost date here is around May 15th. I think everything in my garden is between 2-3 weeks late this year. I hope we have seen the last of the cold nights at least. Good luck with your vegetable garden this year and welcome to the forum! :-)

My daughter (13) is the vegetable gardener in the family. Her peas, lettuce, and arugula are up, and she has planted beans. She'll have tomatoes, basil, and peppers in containers on our deck and we're growing one tomato variety indoors from seed; the rest we'll buy as seedlings. She's also started squash and cucumber seeds indoors--we'll see how that goes.

I've had cabbage, kale, swiss shard, bok choy, brussel sprouts in the uncovered raised beds since Apr. 15th (Southern RI) and they seem to be doing fine (minus a couple of loses due to deer and slugs)but if I told you, there's amazing growth going on, I'd be lying.:) Everything, except for cabbage is just sort of sitting there.
2 days ago I've let some nightshades sit on the porch a little too long (7 pm) before bringing them in for the night and there's been some cold damage, especially noticeable on eggplants and some tomatoes. Peppers seemed unaffected.
I have all my herbs without covers at this point. They are growing well, especially tarragon and things in the mint family. In terms of flowers, I've started putting phlox, pansy, petunias and impatients in the ground last weekend and they are taking it well...even, surprisingly, impatients.
But I do worry - my seedlings are smaller than those last year and this spring is a bit colder than last year (judging by wunderground weather history reports...seems like last year daytime and nighttime averages for the same dates were about 10 degrees higher). Sigh, there goes early start.

I am in the Metro Boston area, Nadej, so you are warmer where you are, I assume. I have had the same experience though with early vegetables. The bok choy, broccoli, lettuce, spinach, beets, have been out for about 3 weeks. The bok choy and lettuce are finally starting to grow, but everything else is just sitting there too.

I've had my pepper, tomato, squash seedlings out for over a week and they seem to be doing fine. I cover them with glass at night and so far it hasn't been so cold that I've considered taking them in for the night. We are supposed to get down into the 40s one night soon, and I will be taking them in for the night for that.

I'm semi-happy with the start I've had but already making plans for how to do it better next year. (g)

prairiemoon2 - I am technically in zone 7, but I heard that urban areas are warmer than very rural locations,which is where I am. Not sure if that's just an ....ahem "urban legend" :)))
I am also thinking about things I would do differently next year. I've recently read about introducing mild mechanical stress to seedlings, like shaking trays, brushing them with a duster, or running a fan, because apparently they start adapting to "harsher" conditions right away and the hardening-off process can safely be started a week earlier than usual.
As I'm typing this, something buzzes by so loudly and scares the crap out of me. I looked up and it's a hummingbird, on its way to the blossoming nectarine...ahhh...the spring is finally here!
Good luck with your plants and wishes for more warm sunny days! :)

Hey All! Thank you for your responses. I planted out some lettuces, carrots, turnips, and radishes last weekend. Looks like I might have to buy tomatoe plants though as my seedlings died, not sure that I have enough time to restart them now. Oh well, there's always next year. I found a pretty neat website too that might help others, gardeningri.com

Nadej, when I grow plants indoors, I always keep a fan running on them. It made a big difference not only in the sturdiness of the seedlings, but kept any mildew or other problems from developing.

I'm planning on making some cold frame covers for some of my raised beds before next season. I think that will give me a better chance at starting the season early.

HoHum, I do think it is probably a little late to start tomatoes from seed. Yes, always next year.

My tomato plants will go in about the middle of May. Lettuce seeds to be sowed this weekend. This is in easternmost RI near the sea. Still quite cool there, and windy.

Carol