2nd post of the day....

Today's earlier post on specialty strawberries is below, the day has been all about the garden I guess.

Peppers sown:

(2) Baby Belle (for containers)

(2) Spanish Padron

(2) Corno di Toro

Carmen

(2) Pizza (for containers)

Tam Jalapeño

Tomatoes thinned, potted up into Cow Pots, and given a fish feed:

We have a quite a cold snap coming tomorrow night, at least in relation to the recent day and night temperatures.  I will be plugging in the soil warmer and covering the smaller fruit trees and bushes  and garlic with burlap or row cover.  Lets hope the weather folks are wrong and we stay in the low 30's......the trees could sure use a gentler forecast!

(Edit: I decided to go out and cut some blooms before they are knocked off by the rain and cold.)

Seed Sowing List

The shelf lights have gone up, and seeds are being pulled for sowing....on today's list:

• KALE- Blue Curled Vates
• TOMATOES- Juliet, Sun Gold, Matt's Wild Cherry, Ella's Pink Plum, Mountain Magic, Black Krim, and Chianti Rose
• SCALLIONS- Delicious Duo
• ALPINE STRAWBERRIES- Mignonette
• BULBING FENNEL- Trieste
• LAVENDER- French Perfume

~YIPEE!!!~

Growing Greens

Grow light system arrived today, and it was perfect timing.....the seeds have sprouted and are reaching for the sky.

Rain, Rain, Go Away!

The animals are pairing up here in Massachusetts, the yard is flooded, people are losing power, and wet-vaccing their leaky basements- what a mess!  Torturous after the tease Mother Nature gave us earlier last week.  I am dying to get back out into the garden....my wonderful husband whipped out my new beds yesterday so they are waiting to be put in their proper spot and filled.  The shed is finished (and now needs to be stained), so we are well on our way to a productive 2010 season!  (The beds are one 2' x 18', aka 'Tomato Alley' , and three 4' x 4'. )

I tried my hand at making soil blocks yesterday with organic seed starting mix from Lowe's, and it went quite well.  This came as a surprise after reading many people's tales of trouble getting the right consistency for the blocks.  I don't know if I got lucky or am just not being as particular.....the true test will happen when I transplant into the garden I guess- hoping the blocks will hold up!  The VCC mix I ordered is still not here since NOFA totally screwed up my bulk order, but that should be resolved by week's end, so it is all good.  I was all jammed up with the labeling though, my giant wooden sticks would split the blocks, I do have smaller plastic labels coming...but will they break apart the blocks as well?   For those of you that do them, how are you all labeling your blocks when you are only sowing a few of something and can't put a sticky on the flat for the whole row?  (oh, and FYI- Lowe's has potatoes this year.  Yup, now I have more.)

Next:  a confession.  I actually tallied up my tomato seed varieties yesterday, and somehow I have accumulated the seeds of 40 different tomatoes.  It was the recent Wintersown order that put me over the edge, I think I ordered 20 of those little packets.   So what you ask?  Is too many tomato seeds a bad thing?  No, but I can only grow 20 plants (ha, "only"), so choosing which to try is proving difficult.  I know many of the varieties I have won't perform well here in my zone or in my soil so over the next couple of season's I will need to experiment and see what is happy here in my little kitchen garden.  I have read to grow something for at lest 2 years before deciding it doesn't work for you so that may push this process of elimination out to 2014.  Maybe a Tomato Variety list will be going into my sidebar to record any thoughts this season, I know I can't depend on my memory!

Today's Sowings:

• Pistou Basil
• Lemon Basil
• Lg Leaf Italian Basil
• Thai Basil (Thanks Thomas!!)
• Easter Egg Radish
• Chioggia Beets
• Burpee's Golden Beets
• Extra Dwarf Pak Choy
• Bunching Onions
• Florence Onion
• Bright Lights Chard
• Red Sails Lettuce (one of my favorites!)
• Hon Tsai Tai

I keep re-arranging my garden layout.  Ideally vegetable families should be planted together for rotation, BUT, I keep reading all these great gardening magazines, and they have so many SFG layouts with everything all mixed in together, and they have me wanting a "Salad Garden" and a "Salsa Garden" instead.  Thoughts?

Boy am I behind on posting.....we had quite a bit of germination on the 26th of last month, here is a shot of one of the cells sprouting:

And here they are today, chuggin' right along:

It's the standard seed growing station.  Fluorescent shop lights hung on adjustable shelves.  Everything is growing quite nicely aside from the Red Wing onion seeds.  Nadda, nothing, crickets.  Hmph.

So, I have been saying for a week now that I need to do a germination test on the buggers, but of coarse, I haven't yet.  They can take up to 13 days to germinate so there is a minute possibility they are taking their sweet time, but I don't remember things taking this long last year.

I have ben squirreled away reading my latest gardening periodicals as much as possible lately.  My 'Christmas Cash Stash' has just about run dry, but it was fun while it lasted!

Lastly, I have been trying to nail down the 2010 garden layout which has been proving difficult since the new beds aren't actually built yet, so it's more fantasy than reality at the moment. Below are my cut-outs, each meant to resemble one raised bed.  The trouble is I grow more nightshades than anything else, so proper rotation is an issue.

 (And some good news, we are expecting............a shed.  :)  Well, not yet, but very soon we will, and that means I will have a potting shed/bench for potting, storing, and curing.  YIPEE!!!)

Ready to Sow (Well Almost)

Dang is Johnny's fast!  I just ordered this stuff 2 days ago, and it is here!  I am equipped to sow, aside from not having the Vermont Compost Fort Vee mix for the soil blocker.  I do however have organic potting mix in the basement from last year's bulk order.  (Did I mention the puppy shredded anything plastic and gardening related this Fall and Winter?  Somehow she found and destroyed all of it.  She won't be able to shred the blocker now will she.)

There was a recipe included with the blocker (Eliot Coleman's), but I went with the recommend bagged mix since I can get it at a decent price through the NOFA bulk order.  The problem is that it might not be in before I want to start those maters.  No worries though, I also purchased some Cow Pots.  Ever see the "poo-pot" episode of Dirtiest Jobs?  (Just in case you missed it back in the day and are curious:  http://dsc.discovery.com/videos/dirty-jobs-poo-pot.html - check it out!)  I will probably transplant into the poo pots rather quickly this year, then bury the pot and all when they go into the quart size containers.  Hoping for happy roots!

As for seed flats I love the domes for germinating and keeping the delicate new seedlings moist.  I ordered a 'kit' that came with different sized cell Pro-Trays to keep the soil blocks company.  This year I will most likely be germinating my fall sowings in a flat wherever possible since my seeds/seedlings were snacks for creatures this past year.  Fall sowing was a complete bust!  And that giant green thing?  I am messy.  Very messy.  Not so cool when your baby veggies live in the bedroom.....this contraption should help keep the dirt where it belongs, not on the floor.   If only I bought an extra to keep in the kitchen.  :)

Ooh! I finally have my cherished Pistou Basil seeds in hand.   Last year I did a post on this favorite herb which can be found here after my plants arrived.  We LOVE this stuff sprinkled generously in salads all summer long.  It has a pleasant, mild flavor and there is no chopping involved.  Mmmm, I can almost taste it now.