When the temperature spiked into the 90s on Thursday, I was tempted to run out and start planting tomatoes. But it was only April 11, I reasoned, more than a week away from the average date of the last killing frost. Just as quickly as the thermometer had risen, it might plunge and punish the impatient gardener.

While we are accustomed to wild extremes of weather in Kansas, we often act as if the climate behaves logically. This is foolish.

About 10 years ago we had an early-April temperature surge and I was emboldened into thinking I could get an early start on my summer garden. If April 20 is the average date of the last killing frost in northeast Kansas, I would take the plunge and be ready to plant my tomatoes then.

I had started an enormous assortment of tomato plants from seed, and I wanted to begin hardening them off. I moved them out of the house and into a cold frame, which worked fine for a while. During the day the lid was up, allowing the plants to sunbathe, and at night, I closed the lid and protected them from the chill.

Then suddenly the forecast shifted, the TV weather people underestimated the seriousness of the front that was moving through, and I lost every single tomato plant. Tropical plants, even those bred for our climate, are extremely fragile when it comes to cold.

Since then, I have taken an overly conservative approach to the spring planting schedule. In some years, this has meant that my garden is a few weeks behind others.

Initially I felt like a wimp. But one thing I’ve noticed is that hot-weather crops nearly always catch up with those planted a week or two earlier. In mid-June it will be impossible, all things being equal, to tell the difference between a tomato planted April 20 and one planted May 5.

Obviously, gardens planted a month apart will mature differently, but a couple of weeks is no biggie. That’s because the hot-weather vegetables planted later will have the benefit of higher temperatures from the beginning. Moreover, an early tomato will be less vigorous if temperatures were cool and the soil was clammy during its first weeks in the ground.

If we need a clear demonstration of the contribution of sun and heat to the growth of vegetation, all we have to do is look to last week’s heat wave. Before the temperatures jumped, we had just begun to pick the season’s asparagus, the lilac bushes had buds, and every other tree and shrub in the yard had a few leaves.

Then the temperatures rose into the 90s, and it was as if nature had taken steroids. Much of our asparagus shot up so quickly that it ferned out before we could pick it. The lilacs bloomed instantly, and everything else was suddenly awash in green. This happened literally overnight.

Clearly, nothing I have said about the value of hot temperatures applies to crops that need to do their early growing during cool weather or those that bolt or wither in the heat. In this category are lettuce and other greens, cole crops, onions, potatoes and peas. But the window for planting such hot-weather vegetables as tomatoes, peppers, squash, cukes and beans extends through mid-May.

For this latter group, soil temperature is as important as air temperature. Okra in particular should be seeded into the ground toward the end of that period.