Seeds!

[tesla]

We started planting for the vegetable/herb garden today.  It was bitwise's first excursion into starting seeds, which was probably more exciting for me than for him.  (When I first tried this I had a lot of anxiety about doing everything right; now I feel calmly confident that if I use care and sense, the seedlings will do what they need to do.  Not every one will thrive, but most probably will, and I'll certainly learn something either way.)

I used Mum's supplies from previous years, including an absolutely wonderful seed starter mix made from worm poop and horsehair, and three heated incubation trays with a total of 200 slots.  Of the 48 (not a typo) varieties we've decided to plant from seed, 27 are appropriate for starting indoors - leaving me with an irrational (practically if not mathematically) number of slots per variety.  So I rounded up to 8 and planted fewer of each pepper variety, since I have 5 of them.

Of course I then complicated matters by double-planting thyme.  That pushed the catnip out to a separate tray that will just have to live in a south window rather than under the light in the basement.  Not a big deal, and for the first time in recent memory I'll be able to say I have plenty of thyme.

I'm using a fixture with a high-pressure sodium lamp, which must have burned out fairly recently (I sometimes keep houseplants under it in the winter.)  I was delighted to find that a replacement cost $19 instead of the $75 or more that similar lamps sometimes run.  Unfortunately my friendly neighborhood indoor gardening store has moved to somebody's else's neighborhood; fortunately they're open 'til 7 and are still friendly.

Now the waiting.  I'm so eager to see tiny little sprouts peeking out of the soil!



Started:

• Vegetables/Fruits:
  • Alma Paprika Pepper
  • Beaver Dam Pepper (Heirloom - Hungary)
  • King  of the North (bell) Pepper
  • Red Cap Mushroom Pepper
  • Serrano Chile Pepper
  • Aunt Molly's Ground Cherry (Physalis pruinosa - looks a little like a tomatillo)
  • Eros Endive
  • Tres Fin Maraichere Frissee Endive
  • Boothby's Blonde Cucumber (Heirloom - Maine)
  • True Lemon Cucumber (Heirloom - Pennsylvania)
  • Lacinato Kale (Heirloom - Italy)
  • Sunberry (Solanum Burbankii - historic hybrid)
  • Romanesco Broccoli
  • Cherry Roma Tomato
  • Federle Tomato
  • German Pink Tomato (Heirloom - Germany)
  • Mexico Midget Tomato

• Herbs:
  • Sage
  • Rosemary
  • Triple Curled Parsley
  • Greek Oregano
  • Borage (for the bees)
  • Thyme
  • More Thyme
  • Sweet Genovese Basil
  • Thai Basil
  • Common Chives
  • Catnip

Not Yet Planted (to be direct-sown):

• Arugula
• Green & Purple Beans (2)
• Carrots (2)
• Lettuce & Mesclun (2)
• Spinach (2)
• Strawberry Spinach (Chenopodium capitatum)
• Melon
• Scallions/Green Onions
• Radicchio
• Snap & Sugar Peas (2)
• Radishes
• Sweet Corn
• Cilantro
• Mustard Greens
• Nasturtium
• Sunflowers

Not Yet Planted (to be received as live plants):

• Garlic (for 2011)
• Strawberries
• Rhubarb

Comments

[vgqn.livejournal.com]

Wow, that is awesome! Not to mention ambitious!

Boothby's Blonde is a great cuke and Lemon are fun too, but I think you've started them too early. Cukes only take about 4 weeks to be ready to go out. Even here in CA, I'm not going to start my cukes until April.

Federle is a great tomato. I've grown Strawberry Spinach, and the leaves are tasty in salads. The berries, well, it's fun to have grown them, but they're more entertaining than tasty.

Oh, now I'm feeling all guilty that I haven't started anything yet!

[minnehaha.livejournal.com]

I bet there's more seeds, so if they're too early (which I thought also) they can have the fun of a second round.

[tesla-aldrich.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the tip on the cukes - as you can guess, I haven't started cucumbers from seed before. We'll see how creative I have to get about holding them indoors. Moreover, this might be the push that I need to finally build myself some cold frames.

I like Federle a lot too - I grew some last year, and I'm thinking they'll make good catsup and paste as well as salsa.

Eric is a huge fan of spinach, so I got the Strawberry Spinach in the interest of experimenting on him. :)

I'm really looking forward to seeing what the Sunberries are like - have you any experience with them?

I know your climate and growing season are worlds better, but a part of me wishes you were back here so that we could exchange seedlings and experiences!

[vgqn.livejournal.com]

For hot weather spinach, have you tried Magentaspreen? (http://www.seedsofchange.com/garden_center/product_details.aspx?item_no=S10742) It's another Chenopodium, very pretty, with tender leaves, and is much taller and more branching (hence more productive) than the Strawberry Spinach, whose leaves are also a bit stiffer. (But no way does it get 6' tall like that catalog says. 2' is more like it.) Or red amaranth? (http://www.johnnyseeds.com/p-6111-red-leaf-vegetable-amaranth.aspx) Gorgeous, looks like coleus but wants full sun. Both of these reseed readily in my garden. I don't know if they'd survive the winter, but you could easily save seed yourself.

If the Sunberries are the same as or similar to the Garden Huckleberries I grew years ago (some confusion exists, apparently), I sorry to say I thought they were vile. I cooked up a batch with sugar as directed, tasted it, brought some over to a neighbor who had grown them in the past, asked her if this was really what they were supposed to taste like. She said yes, and apparently liked it, but I thought it was nasty, nasty, nasty. Um, maybe you'll like it better? (Btw, I doubt that it's a hybrid still. Burbank undoubtedly made crosses to breed it, but then he probably stabilized the cross.)

At least we can talk plants here in LJ!

[skylarker.livejournal.com]

Hee. It must be nice to have plenty of thyme. :)

[opheliac-9.livejournal.com]

Yum!!! I'd *love* to have a garden, but no lawn at all will just leave me with some windowsill herbs this summer (better than nothing I guess)!

But, I did sign up for a CSA share this summer, and am eagerly awaiting a massive amount of veggies. Waiting for it to start up in May is already driving me crazy!

[tesla-aldrich.livejournal.com]

Yum, indeed - we were considering a CSA, but decided to go this route this year. Which one are you using?

[opheliac-9.livejournal.com]

Harmony Valley Farm. Looked like they had a good track record and lots of happy consumers, plus nice newsletters with yummy recipes and a great variety of veggies. And, a monthly withdrawal option was definitely a plus for me.

Yeah, I'd totally love growing my own food (especially being able to watch 'em grow from seed to fruition!) but that's just not an option right now, unfortunately. So take lots of pictures and let me live vicariously through your garden! ;-)

[cloudscudding.livejournal.com]

Plenty of thyme. ::groan::

[ktig.livejournal.com]

Wow, that's ambitious indeed!

[pameladean]

Borage is very decorative, as well as being nice for bees. You're making me think I'll have to put some in myself.

P.

[tesla-aldrich.livejournal.com]

If mine do well I'll be begging you to take a couple of plants off my hands. I'll let you know how things are looking in a few weeks. :)

[pameladean]

Wow, that would be lovely! We have started seedlings here, but they don't generally do well in this house, even with supplemental lighting. It makes them sulky and hard to light. Or something.

P.

[apostle-of-eris.livejournal.com]

How big is the garden all this will be going into?

[tesla-aldrich.livejournal.com]

Currently about 6' x 40', plus about 100 large containers. I have space for another plot about the same size now that the neighbors' tree is gone, but haven't improved it yet.

Of course, I'm not planning on growing 8 of everything to maturity; I'm hoping the little guys will do well enough that I'll have some to give away to friends.

[mplsfish.livejournal.com]

If borage is at all happy it re-seeds aggressively. You cab weed it out of other stuff continually or plant it behind the garage or some other isolation. I have heard similar about catnip but my cats never let it get big enough to seed.
I plan to buy a big truckload of dirt this year and build raised beds for everything. Not sure I;ll actually have time to have a garden with all the building though. Chicken coop has to appear in there pretty soon.