Some New Findings!

The garden is officially planted.  Everything is in the ground that should be there.  However, the spinach is about done already, and the radishes are ready to be eaten as well.  So that means I’ll either replant the same things in that spot and see how they fare, or I’ll plant something different.

I also found some sprouts on my peas today-so far just the shelling peas, but I suspect the snap peas will follow along shortly.

Also growing on one of my early tomato plants- a few actual tomatoes!  Now, I know those little orbs are going to tease me for some time with their green-ness, but I’m really excited to see them.  This is the first time I’ve ever started tomatoes from seed, so to see the process continue to play out is very exciting.  Hopefully all the tomatoes I’ve shared with other people are doing just as well.

I was pleased to see today that everything I’ve planted this week in the garden seems to be thriving.  The peppers and eggplants in particular are practically growing before my eyes- it’s amazing how healthy they look.  With any luck there will be more updates shortly.

Finally, new sprouts and dirt in the new bed.

This was a good week for the Tummy Treasure Gardens.  My excitement began Monday morning when I peeked out between rain clouds and saw all the pole beans were coming up- and boy were they ever! They’re growing incredibly fast, they must like all the rain we’ve been having.  That would be the sprouts you see here at the base of the bamboo poles.

Moving around the corner to the back bed, I also found that one of my cucumber varieties was poking up as well.  The Poona Keera from Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds are all popping out and soaking up the son.  There are no signs yet that the Marketmore’s are coming, but I’ll give them a few days break.  I also was excited to see the long beans at least have sprouted.  Of all the things I’m trying new this year, this is the one I am most excited to see come to fruition. This is a picture of the cukes basking in the almost-sun.

And then!  Andy spent a great deal of time on Saturday filling in the third bed with some compost from some very generous friends.  We gave it a few days then to allow the rain to settle it and compact it up a little bit.  Then on Tuesday I added several bags of organic garden soil to top it off and stir into the mix and before I knew it, I was marking off my grid and putting in the plantings that have been so desperate to be in the ground.  The sweet red and yellow peppers are in here, as are some Kale, Radicchio, my Ping Tung Eggplant, Broccoli, and some more pole beans- this one a yellow variety.  I also have some lavender and thyme in this bed, and my patty pan squash.  I did sow some seeds as well for more spinach, carrots, and tatsoi, but left about 10 squares blank at the end of the day.  I really need to sit down with my seeds and see what I missed and what I want more of.  I think probably a few more lettuces will go in if nothing else.  This next weekend Andy will put the fencing up around this bed after I’ve totally finished planting it.

As long as I was emptying my starter pots of plants, I also went ahead and finished planting the hot peppers.  These ones I put in pots, as last year I discovered they did phenomenally well in pots compared to everything else.  The two varieties I planted this year were Chili de Comida and Anaheim Chiles- both started from seed from Baker Creek.  The Comida Chilis were a low germination variety, so I’m very pleased that I have three of them doing very well.

As far as the pots go, I think I have decided that planting such things like spinach and radish in pots doesn’t give me any advantage.  As it stands, the radishes in the pot still have some growing to do, where the radishes actually in the garden, planted several weeks later, are bursting to be picked- they’re gorgeous.  Same with the spinach.  While I felt I had a bit of an advantage planting spinach in the pot, the spinach in the garden grew quickly and is ready to eat now.  I’ll finish with the pot of spinach and the pot of radishes this week and then put something else in those pots.  I have plenty of eggplant and okra that could go in the pots, or maybe the last tomatillo sprout.  We’ll see.  I’ll get the rest of that third bed planted in the next day or so, and then it’s all just weeding and waiting!  The peas are looking fabulous, and any day I expect to see some blossoms poke their heads out.  Only one of my fennel plants germinated, and while I think I’ll let that one continue to grow and see how it does, I think the rest of that square foot will be planted with some carrots or something- we could never have enough carrots.

Overall, if the weather continues to cooperate, it looks like it will be a bountiful year for the garden.  The only thing that is still up for debate is whether or not I want to attempt a winter squash this year.  Last year’s turned out terrible, but I started them very late. If I started now, I might have a chance of success.  We’ll see.  This year’s growing season is a whole month shorter than last years.  Last year I planted the majority of my seeds on April 27th and the following week. This year most went in June 3rd or later. That’s a big difference!

Mary, Mary Quite Contrary

I have some progress to report as I’ve finally been able to plant the two established beds fully. About a month ago or so I planted the peas, lettuce and some herbs, as well as the chard and beets, but the rest needed to wait for warmer temperatures. Then yesterday I was giving my tomato plants a little loving when I noticed that two of them had blossoms. Uh-oh, they need to be in the ground. So I mustered up all the energy I could and went to work. Here to the left you see the finished results of the first bed. On the end closest to us you can see my bamboo pole bean trellis, followed by the snap pea trellis. Then the whole garden was boxed in and fenced with green garden fencing. Now there’s some great stuff! It’s much nicer to use than it’s metal counterpart-chicken wire. It doesn’t leave wires poking around and it’s really easy to maneuver with a scissors and a staple gun.

The bulk of my tomato plants went into the second bed pictured here to the right. That bed already had chard, beets, kohlrabi, and okra in it, but the back half by the wall was a blank canvas. The tomato plants are along the wall, although I still need to come up with something for them to grow on. In front of the trellis I planted my two varieties of slicing cucumbers as well as the Chinese Long Beans. I’m very curious to see if the long beans produce. I’ve never had them, but they look really cool- like giant green beans that are three feet long. This garden still needs its fencing around it, but I ran out of steam yesterday and didn’t feel like playing with the power tools.

So far the gardens are looking good. My fennel hasn’t come up yet, so I’m debating just using that square foot for more carrots or something, as it’s been a while. My eggplants aren’t looking so hot, but they like hot weather, so I imagine that as it warms up they’ll begin perking up and thriving. One that is surprising me is the Asian green Tatsoi. It’s like a baby bok choy and it’s growing beautifully! I think I’m going to have to plant some more in the third bed once I get that one going. The third bed will get rolling shortly, that one is going on the other side of the shed, so essentially, my gardens wrap around the shed. That bed will have more pole beans and also my patty pan squash plant in it as well as more greens, lettuces and carrots.

I also ran out of potting mix yesterday or I would have gotten the pot menagerie finished as well. This year my hot peppers and tomatillos are going in pots, as well as an early pot each of spinach and radishes. The radishes we’ve been enjoying, and we’ll nibble at the spinach later this week I think. We had a plant die out last year in our backyard landscaping, and since the patch around the plants is nicely covered in gravel, that’s where my pots are going this year. It works beautifully, and looks nice too. The tomatillos I plan to move around the yard as needed, because as I understand they are a big attractor for the pollinators, which could be good or bad, depending on how you look at it.

So far, so good. It’s so exciting to see everything growing in the gardens, I love it. As early as this weekend we could start nibbling on some of the baby lettuces, and of course, that spinach that is ready to go. It seems like we’ve had to wait so long for the gardening to really get going, but now that it is, life is grand again.

Seedling Check-Up

This first picture was this past Friday. Abigail got it in her mind to make this huge quilted heart on the driveway. About 1/6 of the way in, she realized just how big of a task she had before her and called in the reinforcements. Zander made one square and quit, so Mommy was called in to do the job right. A short while later a thunderstorm washed the project away.

And this is what I see this morning. Go away already!

I had been planning to take pictures of the pot of radishes growing in the backyard…except I suspect that may not be faring very well and I’ll have to start over. So you’ll have to settle for these pictures instead.

These are my tomato plants to the right! I cannot believe how well they are doing. They are doing very well it seems, and I swear they grow so much every day! I check them several times a day, and they are always just a bit bigger. I have two varieties that don’t seem to be doing as well, but since all the tomatoes are heirlooms, it’s hard to say if they actually are doing poorly, or if they are just slow to grow. Time will tell. I love brushing the tops of the plants with my hands and then smelling my hands- they smell like tomatoes and gardening. I think I may just have a few that will be ready to go in the ground come mid-May.

My peppers are very slow going. So far I haven’t had any germination at all of the hot peppers, and only one or two of the sweet ones. Sadly, I may end up buying some seedlings for them, but then again, they could just all the sudden start sprouting any day now. It’s a lesson in patience I guess. So these seedlings below seem a bit of shock then. These are okra sprouts. When I planted the okra, the information I had was that these particular seeds had fairly low germination, and that I should plant them densely to ensure sprouting. So far, they’re all sprouting. I really only wanted one or two okra plants to try out, but now I’m up to six, and I suspect a fewmay be coming along at any time now. It will be interesting to see how okra fare here in the north. I’m also anxious to sample fresh okra. I’ve heard it said that if there is one vegetable that tastes radically different freshly plucked off the plant, it’s okra.

Then these next sprouts also crack me up. These below are Asian Eggplants, specifically, the varieties Ping Tung and Applegreen in the back. Again, the seeds directed me to sow thickly, due to poor germination.

Um…I have an army of eggplant sprouts and garden space planned for two plants of each variety. I’m hopeful that I’ll find someone nearby who is interested in some unusual garden plants.

I’ve also got some radicchio and kale sprouting, and I’m waiting for any signs of life from my tomatillos as well. I planted some onion seeds over the weekend as well, but I suspect those may take a little while to start sprouting. I did two different kinds of scallions and some gorgeous looking red onions- all heirlooms and non GMO seeds, of course. I’m trying some leeks, but I don’t know that we have a long enough growing season up here for that one. So we’ll see.

I guess that’s the garden round-up for today. I am cooking something up in the kitchen for later today, so come on back for that. Other than that, it may be a slower week around here this week. We’ll see, I am looking for some inspiration- and definitely not finding it from the weather.

Planting Seeds

I know, it may be a little early to start, but I figure I should get into the habit of blogging about the garden.  I’m trying all kinds of crazy and new things this year- both the method and the vegetables I’m growing.  About a month ago I finally got in my seeds.  It was so exciting to open up those packages and see all these lovely seeds gazing back at me.  I had to laugh at myself as I looked at these seeds, because there are so many.  I ordered so many varieties to try…you would think I was planting a full acre instead of a few raised beds.  Maybe someday, but in the meantime, I’m using my small space to its fullest and learning.  I’m learning everything I can, because I love growing vegetables.

Two weeks ago I planted my first tomato seedlings.  And since they’ve been growing rather nicely, I decided it was time to “pot them up”.  They needed more room to grow, especially since some of the seedlings were sharing pots.  So this week I stopped by the garden center and picked up some pots and a massive bag of potting mix.  As long as I was there, I also picked up more seedling trays too for starting some more seeds.

I don’t have south facing windows that I can put seeds in, and I really don’t like the idea of using electric lights to start seeds, so I’ve created my own portable greenhouses.  They need to be portable because while I don’t have windows, I do have two large patio doors that face south, so I need to be able to move the seeds out of the way to go in and out.  I started with three plastic storage totes.  In this photo below you see some pots at the back of the tote, the pots each have three tomato seeds in them.  The smallest single pots each have one tomato seed in them.  My seedlings have been doing so well, I thought I’d start a few more to give away.  In the seed trays in the front are my sweet bell peppers and the hot Chile De Comida peppers.

In this next tray to the left you see some of the seedlings in their new pots.  Each seedling got it’s own pot to grow into.  In the seed trays in this one we have a bit of a variety.  We have four cells of Anaheim Chiles, four cells of tomatillos, and four cells of okra.  Then you see one pack of cells covered with plastic- that is two varieties of eggplant which specifically said they wanted to stay moist, so I covered them with plastic while I finished potting the rest of the seeds.  There’s also two more small pots of one tomato seed each.

And finally, this tote is my finished product.  These are all established seedlings in here, and you can see how my little greenhouses work.  I cover each tote with sheets of plastic wrap to hold the heat in.  The sunlight beats in during the day, and on the cloudy grey days, I make sure the seeds have been watered, and then I slide the totes up next to a heat register and pull open just one corner of plastic wrap.  Some of that warm air flows in, so they get the heat they need to germinate.  Every three days or so, on a bright sunny day I pull off the plastic, give fresh water, and let them air out so that we don’t get anything getting moldy.  This is working very well so far, I’m anxious to see how the new batch of seeds works out.

And finally, did you notice my labels for each plant?  With seven tomato varieties, four peppers, two eggplants, etc.,  I definitely needed to keep track of which plant was which.  When I was at the garden center, I was going to pick up some little plastic markers, but when I looked at them, they looked an awful lot like plastic dinnerware- specifically, knives.  Since I have two cases of plastic tableware in the basement, it was a no-brainer to go grab a handful of plastic knives and use a sharpie to label each plant.  My markers are plastic, so I don’t need to worry about them corroding- we’ll see how the sharpie lasts once outside.  The knives will move with the plants into the soil when they go.  Worst case scenario- as I told Andy, that’s what I draw a map for every year, so I know which plant is where.

If you’re looking for more garden news in the weeks and months to come, just click on the “Garden 2008? category, and all of my posts will pop up for you.  I’m very excited about the weeks ahead, as we look now to prepping the soil outside to receive some seeds and plants.  We have another bed to build this year, and maybe a surprise or two for the front yard.  It’s an exciting year ahead!

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