The clocks are turned forward, trees budding, early bulbs blooming, noses running. Ahhhh… Springtime! Seed catalogs have been dogeared and stained with coffee and wine. The sketches of the garden have been drawn, erased, and redrawn many times as we try to maximize our space. We pull out seed packets from last year, only to find that the mice found them first. Grab the seed catalogs, dogear more pages, check with family members, peruse the selection at our favorite nurseries and then pull the trigger on seed orders for those we cannot find nearby. Then, while we await the seeds and warmer temperatures, we build a mouse-proof seed container, prepare the peat pots, and spread a truckload of compost on the garden beds. Similar springtime routines are practiced by gardeners across the world with varying modifications, depending on all sorts of factors like climate, space, and age.

One of the largest factors in deciding what/where/when to plant is the successes and failures of past gardening seasons. For us, 2025 was the “Year of Tomato-Geddon” where even I was tired of tomatoes. What started as seeds in peat pots set by the sliding-glass doors, and lovingly spritzed and babied by Prof Pep, turned into something from a sci-fi movie. While certainly not as terrifyingly creepy as “Invasion of the Body Snatchers” (though we have seen zucchini grow to that size if left unattended for a few days) and not quite the same as “Attack of the Killer Tomatoes,” Prof Pep’s tomato plants were something to behold – easily towering to over six feet. The tomato patch quickly engulfed the peppers, pole beans and eggplant, offering a marvelous home to all sorts of critters like toads and lizards, as well as a cool, safe place for birds to rest during the heat of the day (and take a few bites). The branches, heavily laden with fruit, bowed the wire-mesh fencing as they sought more space in the yard.

These plants were prolific! From mid-July through the end of October, we picked bowls and bowls of beautiful tomatoes. At first, we were miserly with our bounty but as the plants burst into their full glory in August, we were giving boxes of them to everyone we knew. We made tomato jam. We pickled green tomatoes. We canned ripe tomatoes with bulbs of garlic for quick soups and sauces all winter. We ate them raw on fresh bread, slathered with mayonnaise and topped with fleur de sel (the only time we use it). Salads of all kinds like panzanella made with stale bread, torn basil leaves and good, grassy olive oil. We cooked them into sauces, put them on pizzas, inside omelets, casseroles, vegetable pies. As the winter descended and we could no longer keep them warm enough under tarps with heat lamps, we finally picked them green and set them on two card tables to ripen. There were well over one hundred. Checking them daily, we continued to enjoy tomatoes throughout the fall and early winter. We ate the last of them at Christmas dinner. Yes, Christmas dinner!

These indeterminant super-toms demonstrated just what that type of tomato is capable of. This year, Santa put two of Pepper’s favorites in Prof Pep’s stocking: Brandywine and San Marzano (how did Santa know?). The tomato patch will be moved to the other side of the garden because that type of growth sucked the nutrients from the soil. Less hungry crops will reside where the tomatoes were last year. Our hopes this year? Eggplants, hot and sweet peppers, okra, basil, parsley, pole beans, cardoon, swiss chard. We’ve given up planting summer squash or cucumbers because the squash bugs are tenacious and impossible to control without harsh chemicals. Well, OK, I’ll plant some zucchini in the middle of August – after the squash bugs have moved on – mainly for the flowers which can be difficult to find at the markets.

So, who knows what the 2026 garden season will bring? We will sow our seeds and plant the seedlings, make sure they are watered, pull weeds and pests as needed and watch as our labor, hopes and dreams come to fruition … or not. Sometimes the best planning just does not pan out. A water timer is accidently turned off, a hailstorm, a virus … so many things can go wrong. When Tomato-geddon occurs, we count our blessings and our canning jars!

We wish you a wonderful gardening season!

Pepper, March 2026