Time to start gardening

It snowed last night, not much, just a white dusting, but as February winds down it's time to get the garden going. Some years ago the Phactor acquired a 4 x 6 foot cold frame (only about $70), sort of like a small greenhouse composed of a plastic tent over a frame so it can be easily assembled and disassembled. The greenhouse effect even in such a small structure is sufficient to get cold-tolerant garden plants growing. It works best when using planter boxes and a potting mix because they heat up faster than the soil beneath. Leaf lettuce, mesclun mixes, green onions, and spinach work particularly well and this is the route to some early salads. Leaf lettuce seedlings can also be grown for transplanting out of the greenhouse later to grow into those huge heads that they like to show in the catalogs. OK, this always produces way more salad than we can eat, but there are really only two amounts: enough and not enough. None of my neighbors are going to complain about receiving my over production, and because they wonder, too much asparagus is just a theoretical concept. Now to find the best bargain on potting mix and get things started.