Category: Seed Starting

Posted on in Gardening, Seed Starting, Surviving Winter, Veggies

Seed Catalogs

catalogs LAHThere’s “only” 55 more days until Christmas. Catalogs are pouring into our mailbox. Most go straight into the recycling pile, but a few I set aside, saving them for a break in the holiday frenzy. I don’t keep the gift catalogs, or the home décor catalogs. I only save the important catalogs… the seed catalogs.

The gardening season is over for the year, but next season’s garden is already germinating in my mind. Regimented rows of bush beans spread their leaves toward the spring sun, lettuce forms tight rosettes and huge broccoli plants are crowned with enormous heads of perfect buds. No hail has punched holes in the leaves; hungry cutworms have yet to fell a single stalk.

(more…)

Posted on in Conservation, Gardening, Green Gardening Tips, Landscaping, Seed Starting, Veggies

Recycled “Greenscapes”

continer-whimsy-dbg-2008jun26-lah-461“Don’t throw that away!”

My family is used to my exhortations by now. Mom, the recycling nut. It’s true—I have a bin for metals and one for plastics, 1 through 7. Glass has its own container, next to the compost bucket. Worms eat my garbage. Paper and cardboard pile up in old laundry baskets (I’m recycling the baskets too). Still-usable discards go to the thrift stores, worn out clothes get used as rags. Not much ends up in the small trash can we lug to the curb every week.

As a gardener, I want to extend my recycling efforts to my yard. How can I avoid making new purchases for my garden?

(more…)

Posted on in Gardening, Seed Starting, Veggies

Peas & Carrots

Peas and carrots are a classic couple in the kitchen, but what about the garden?

Normally, peas are sown in early spring. The traditional date is St. Patrick’s Day. While that may work in gentler climes, at 7,000 ft. elevation I would need a drill to create holes in my frozen ground. I usually plant a month later, on Tax Day. At least it gives me something to enjoy on that date.

This year, weekly snowstorms have delayed all my gardening chores. I finally got my peas into the ground on May 6. I don’t have great expectations for the harvest. Maybe we’ll have a cool start to the summer, and my husband will get to enjoy his Sugar Snaps. Maybe not. That’s the gamble of gardening in Colorado.

carrots-csu-lah-058Carrots, on the other hand, are usually planted a week or two before the average last frost date. The cool temperatures and snow-damp soil help keep the seeds from drying out during the three weeks it takes them to germinate.

This year, I sowed carrots on the same day as the peas. At least they’re right on schedule. I took the time to arrange the seeds in blocks of 16 per square foot, so I won’t have much thinning to do later. In my 4 x 4 foot carrot bed, that gives me 256 carrots—plenty for our needs.

(more…)

Posted on in Seed Starting

Starting Seeds: Pre-germination

corn-germinating-on-towel-lah-1Vegetable seeds will germinate with or without soil. All they really need is an infusion of water to swell the seed coat, and sufficient warmth to signify spring. In fact, seeds for our most commonly grown food crops are among the easiest to start. They will begin their growth on a paper towel, a bed of agar, or even while still inside the fruit where they were formed! The home gardener can put this fertility to good use.

(more…)

Posted on in Seed Starting

Starting Seeds: Growing Transplants

Congratulations. You are the proud parent of a tray (or more) of baby plants. Remember, though, with parenting comes responsibility.

komatsuna-seedlings-needing-thinning-728-1
These are just the “seed leaves”

Once your seedlings are up and growing, they’ll require almost daily attention. If your potting mix did not contain fertilizer, you’ll need to start a feeding schedule. Wait until the first true leaves appear. (The initial “seed leaves” are the cotyledons, which contain plenty of food to get the baby off to a good start.) Use any liquid all-purpose fertilizer at half-strength, twice as often as the directions tell you.

And speaking of water, don’t let them dry out! At this stage, wilting is fatal, Even if your plants survive, they will suffer the effects of this trauma all their days. The ultimate crop yield will be smaller, and won’t taste as good, compared to plants that grew unchecked.  Continue to water from the bottom, using water that is room temperature or lukewarm. You don’t want to shock their little roots with ice water!

(more…)

Posted on in Seed Starting

Starting Seeds: Light

If you’ve ever tried growing seeds indoors, you may have ended up with tall and spindly plants, flopping over, adorned with pale leaves. When planted outside, these ungainly wisps quickly succumb to bright sunlight and the gentlest of breezes. What’s a gardener to do?

While overabundant food and water, coupled with too-warm temperatures, contribute to this problem, the primary culprit is insufficient light.

The crops most commonly grown in our veggie gardens all require full sun—at least eight hours per day. Likewise, bright light is essential for producing stocky seedlings with healthy green leaves.

(more…)

Posted on in Seed Starting

Starting Seeds: Soil and Water

Do not start your indoor seedlings in soil.

Does that surprise you? Yet, even good garden loam is not the best choice for growing transplants.

For one thing, soil is more than just dirt. It is full of micro-organisms such as nematodes, bacteria, and fungi. Out in the garden, they keep one another in check. Indoors, it’s another story. One of the most common causes of seedling failure, “damping off” is a disease causes by a fungus. Once infected, it is fatal to the baby plants. The only hope is prevention.

You do have the option of sterilizing your garden soil. You can bake it at about 250º F for several hours. That will kill all those nasty diseases. It will also create a stench in your home. If you want to stay on good terms with your housemates, this is not the best way to go.

(more…)

Posted on in Seed Starting

Starting Seeds: Containers

Raise your hand if you remember starting seeds in elementary school. Perhaps they sprouted in the cells of a cardboard egg carton. Sound familiar? Now, did your seedlings grow and thrive? Hmm, thought so. Granted, you probably forgot to water them, or you dropped the whole shebang on the way home from school. But it wasn’t all your fault. Egg cartons make awful seed starting containers.

What should you use to start those little seedlings? There are a number of excellent choices. Suitable containers share several attributes.

(more…)

Posted on in Seed Starting

Starting Seeds: Seeds

You’ve decided to grow your own transplants this year. You’ve checked your average last frost date, so you know when to start. Now it’s time to think about seeds.

catalogs-lahThe seed catalogs that arrived around the first of the year are now well-worn, with pages dog-eared and varieties circled. I spent blissful hours going through every one, comparing glowing descriptions and luscious photographs. Having a pre-determined planting list[1] and budget helped me exercise at least some self control. I finally made my order about a month ago, which is much later than usual. Now I’m haunting the mailbox, waiting for my seeds to arrive. Next year I’ll make a point of ordering in January, so I’m prepared when spring comes.

(more…)

Posted on in Seed Starting

Starting Seeds: Timing

Crumbly potting soil, warm water, tiny seeds—I love starting my veggie garden. Even though we had almost a foot of snow two days ago, I was happily planting lettuce and tomatoes, peppers, broccoli, kale and cabbage. When your growing season is as short as mine is, it’s essential to start many crops indoors.

pepper-cotyledons-vs-leaves-lahOf course, you can buy started seedlings at your local garden center. But where’s the fun in that? I prefer to take advantage of the wider selection of varieties found in the seed catalogs. I want seedlings that are stocky and healthy, not leggy and root-bound. Plus, there’s a certain satisfaction in knowing that you grew your plants yourself.

The first step to success is planning. What is the average last frost date for your area? You can ask a gardening friend, contact your local Master Gardener help desk, or check the Farmer’s Almanac website.

(more…)