The old nursery rhyme asks, "How does your garden grow?" My guess is that with all the gray weather we have had we are seeing problems and successes that surprise us.

With a string of sun appearances last week I saw significant changes and suspect that things will soon swing back to normal. I won't fall into the trap of trying to define normal. One of the joys and challenges of gardening is that each season is different.

Growing in containers has presented a significant challenge this year. How do you keep them dry enough to prevent root damage or stem rots? It was a real test of your selected soil medium.

For what it is worth I have some containerized plants that I put outside in March and have yet to water them. Add in that I use a well drained soil mix that is unbelievable. That has never happened before.

My conversations suggest that perennials are faring much better than annuals so far this growing season. I think that can be explained logically.

Most of our annuals are derived from plants that are perennial in the tropics, or at least in a warmer climate. They expect warm soil, plenty of sunshine and plenty of moisture. They got only the latter so far. Plants like vinca, melons, cucumbers and peppers are really unhappy.

Our perennials are selections of plants that grow somewhere in the world in climates similar to ours. In fact, one problem with many of the perennials is that our springs warm too quickly. That didn't happen this year.

Rabbits also seem to be an extra problem this spring. Right now there is little we can do to discourage them. As we wrote before, rabbits can be easily live trapped in the winter when they are hungry but seldom frequent our traps in picnic season.

Many of the rabbit complaints claim that the rabbits single out new plantings and ignore existing plants. It's kind of like going back for seconds at a picnic. We target the dishes of the late arriving picnicers since they weren't there the first time.

Since the only effective defense against rabbits now is a barrier or fence a thought might be to protect new plantings initially. I can't guarantee success, but that it is a thought. That's about all we can offer in the battle against rabbits at this time of year.

The biggest plus is that we are having an extended planting season. Annuals planted now may quickly catch those planted in May that have struggled with the unusual weather. Perennials can be planted anytime, depending on moisture.