How does your garden grow? In need of warmth!

Wet and cool weather this spring has taken its toll on seasonal planting and crop growth. Warm days have been hard to come by and another week of below normal temperatures looks to be on tap.

March through April was indeed wet and cool. Paul and I wish we could deliver some news favorable for boating and beach temperatures.

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Check out some of the May temperature and precipitation statistics for Minnesota cities by clicking here.

I'm ready to move on to summer. Day camps and family trips are around the corner. The summer solstice is a little more than two weeks away.

Rain was falling over parts of Minnesota at daybreak and the heaviest rain in the next forty-eight hours will be over the already soaked landscape of southeast Minnesota, as well as the far northwest corner of the state.

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Today's forecast highs from the National Weather Service.

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The National weather map for today depicts more wetness in already soaked Oklahoma and Missouri, as well as showers and thundershowers moving into Florida.

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Growing Degree Days (GDD) are lagging behind and we need a surge of warmth to kick start the growth of late seasoning planting.

GDD are a measure of heat accumulation used by horticulturists, gardeners, and farmers to predict plant and pest development rates such as the date that a flower will bloom or a crop reach maturity.

You can read more about calculation of growing degree days here.

The outlook for June shows that Minnesota is in a region were conditions do not favor either above or below normal temperatures or precipitation. The first part of the month shows little change from the cool and wet spring.

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Craig Edwards