Seeding

Last year I seeded about 3 weeks earlier than I am this year.  My peppers were big and had to have flowers picked off them every couple days and the tomatoes went a little crazy and outgrew the space I had for them.  That is why I am just starting to seed now.  On the top shelf I planted a half tray of peppers, chocolate, and king of the north, jimmy Nardello and sweet banana.  Space is going to be a little more limited this year so I don’t have as much room for everything. A half tray of medusa (because I have tons of seeds that I collected) and the other half of the tray is bok choy and kale. The middle shelf has a tray of tomatoes (Isis, black, yellow cherry tomatoes, alpine, black Ethiopian and polish linguisa tomatoes), and the other tray is half black prince tomatoes and half green onions.  Finally on the bottom shelf I have a full tray of leeks, and in the other tray I have a row of peas, kale and broccoli. My plan is to use that last tray mentioned as sprouts. They are all extra seeds I have leftover that do not have a place in my garden, so figured I might as well try it out.

Preparing the Growing Room

The shelf I used last year is now in the shed covered in all of the empty pots and trays I have, so I decided to make a new one.  It is identical to the old one same measurements, same wood so that it will work just like it did last year.  I will be using the exact same setup as well, 3 overhead shop lights hung on chains, and water with a small watering can and spray bottle.

New Gardening Year

The weather is finally warming up and time for me to start thinking about gardening again.  Last weekend I bought a few seeds for new things I am going to try, but for the most part I have enough left over from last year that I didn’t need to buy very much.

While walking around the garden I noticed that the garlic is starting to just poke through the straw in a couple places.  This is very exciting as garlic has become perhaps my special favorite to grow.  There was also the leftover evidence from the rabbits that ate all of my winter kale.  The good part is that there is some fresh manure for my plants, the bad is that there are rabbits wandering the neighborhood.  This is the first time I have had problems with rabbits and am hoping that the farm cat that wanders over frequently will keep them away, if not I will have to trap it and quite possible eat it.  I have always wondered what rabbit tastes like. If not just let it go elsewhere.