Digging Up Some Dirt

Yesterday Justin and I stumbled upon some
interesting data regarding soil temperatures. The Illinois Climate Network (ICN) has an observation site setup in Freeport. After looking back over the month of March, it shows that the soil temperature was very steady near 31° for the first 3 weeks of the month. The ground did not show signs of warming up until the last 10 days of the month, in which in made it up to 40°. If we were to extrapolate this graphic out through the middle of April, it would show our soil temperatures rising to 50° by the middle of the month. This appears likely to happen as well with the warming trend that is expected to take place in the next 10 days.

I mention this for a couple of reasons. First, for the wild chance that we run into a few snowflakes in April, the snow won't stick around for more than a couple of hours with the ground heating up so significantly. Secondly, it goes out to the farmers and gardeners. The "Do It Yourself Network" states that you can safely plant most spring vegetable seeds when our soil reaches into the 50s. They also go on to mention that it is OK to plant summer crops when the soil temperatures rise into the 60s and 70s, which should occur by early May. In conclusion, green thumbs the time to play in the garden is not too far away! -ADAM