Zucchini 

Try information from Cooperative Extension.

Plant more plants to improve pollination, instead of four plants, plant six.

Remember, these will be planted among the garlic. Garlic should come up by early May, so it should be easy to plant around. Garlic should be harvested un July, before the zucchini gets too large and shades it out.

Direct seeding is preferred for starting squash, so do NOT start indoors this year. Squash seeds will not germinate in cold soil. Plants started indoors and set out into cold soil will also not grow very well. Squash plants started indoors also fail to grow in the garden because of damage during transplanting.

Try putting down black plastic a week before planting to raise temperature 5 degrees. Use a soil (compost?) thermometer and sow seeds after the last frost date, once soil temperatures are at least 70° F at the two-inch depth. In most of Minnesota, this will be sometime in late May, or early June in the north.

For a longer, more even harvest, seed only part of your squash garden at first, and then finish the planting three weeks later.

Create mounds (6-8' high; the soil is warmer off the ground) with only two to three feet between. Plant three or four seeds sown close on each mound, then thin out once they have set fruit and start getting big. Sow seeds about a half-inch deep. If necessary, use plastic milk jugs for the first few weeks of spring. Thoroughly water after planting. Cover mounds with black plastic to preserve moisture in soil and keep soil warmer. Drip emitters should be placed on each mound, under the black plastic.