Try hilling your row, and putting Remay row cover over it to warm the soil
and protect from spring frost. Standard Minnesota trick. Plant earlier.

Karl


"donald girod" wrote in message
...
We live in the "southern tier" of western New York state, and we have late
springs and early frosts. Still, some years we have been able to grow
lima
beans with reasonable success. Not this year, which was cool and very
wet,
and not last year, which was warm and very dry (but not too dry). What,
if
anything, can we do to improve our luck? Mostly we have germination
problems. Even this year, the few plants which germinated had respectable
numbers of beans. Since lima beans are just about our favorite vegetable,
this is sad.