First Spring Planting

This evening I am nearly too pooped to blog.  Neighbors met at 6:30 AM Saturday morning--now a recurring ritual--to get a head start on yard work.  We used the trailer to take downed branches from last month's ice storm to the dump where they will be turned into free mulch.  It was our third such trip this spring, and we probably make three more trips to get rid of it all.  Making another trip today was out of the question as scores of other area residents seem to have the same objective this time of year, judging by the traffic at the dump.

At the neighbor's house we put up more garden fencing after planting lettuce and some other vegetables.  I say "some other" because we failed to label them when they were seeded.  They are either cabbage, broccoli, or cauliflower; or some combination thereof.

In our yard we put in spinach and bok choi.  We also accomplished some weeding before putting a short run of chicken wire around the deer fence to keep rabbits out.

Having space freed up from all the planting, we transplanted cucumbers, peppers and okra from trays into pots in the hoop house.  The temperature outdoors was only 65 degrees today, but the hoop house was an amazing 120 degrees even with the door and window open.  The tomatoes were a bit droopy in the heat but they made it through the day.  The summer squash didn't seem to mind a bit.  And to think it was snowing just two weeks ago.

With the next frost predicted for Tuesday night, we're keeping our eye on the weather.  The plastic will have to go back over the row cover for that event.  Nevertheless, this weekend was awesome for gardening.  To top it all off, the lady at the beer store gave me a couple of beautiful Stella Artois beer glasses!

Frost Dates

My favorite site for ordering seeds is Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds.  All of their seeds are heirloom, meaning they have not been genetically modified, and making them safe to save seeds at the end of the season.  Moreover, they have a beautiful catalog, they often include "gift seeds" with your order, and the appear to really, really care about preserving heirloom seeds in their extensive seed bank.  Each year they send a complementary planting guide which allows gardeners determine when to plant seedlings indoors, plant outdoors, transplant, and harvest various vegetables.  To decide when it is safe to plant in your area to avoid a frost, refer to a state or local calendar which shows the last probably spring frost date.

For our area, the last frost date is May 8, with an earliest fall frost date sometime in October. For more information about frost dates, see this article at Mother Earth News.

 Use a garden planner to determine when to plant seeds

indoors, when to plant seeds in the ground, and

when to plant seedlings.

Outdoor Fireplace

When neighbors are not gardening they enjoy doing other house projects, and they have been waiting patiently all winter to begin this one.  Finally the weather is warm enough.  Pictured here is the footer for the planned outdoor fireplace.  The footprint is nearly four feet wide, and more than 12 ft. long. Fifty 60-lb. bags of concrete were used.  On sale for $1.99 a bag, this DIY job was far cheaper than having concrete delivered.  The goal is to have it finished by August for a backyard wedding reception.  The neighbors cut down two tall pine trees last fall, so there will be plenty of firewood.

Saving Tiny Seeds

We grew Virginia Tobacco last year for the first time, more as a novelty than anything else.  I smoked it once just to see.  Way I figure, if we have to survive through hard times, I can put food on the table selling tobacco and homemade hard cider.  (That was a joke.)

Interesting thing about tobacco, it is the very smallest seed I have ever planted.  Think, smaller than poppy seed on your morning bagel.  Maybe even grain-of-sand-small.

This poses a serious challenge in my mind if you're inclined to save seeds.  Last year was also the first year we made a concerted effort to save seeds from every variety of vegetable we grew.  That said, I hardly even tried looking for the tobacco seeds, because I knew they'd be too small.  As it turns out, I couldn't be more wrong.

This afternoon while weeding and wandering around our winter-empty garden, I discovered these pods at the top of last year's tobacco plant.  The stalk is over my head, about seven feet in the air.  There are about two dozen pods on each plant.  And when you break open a pod, it is just full of seeds!

Left: tobacco seeds; right: broccoli, lettuce, spinach, 

and bok choi surviving in the hoop house.

Strawberries Installed

Lots of perennials--such as strawberries, blueberries, asparagus, and many kinds of flowers--do very well in our area.  I recommend planting them in a bed apart from vegetables so that they do not compete for space and nutrients.  Tonight we planted 75 strawberry plants in a raised bed adjacent to a watermelon patch.  I am in favor of raising new beds for the first 1-3 years to allow the soil beneath to improve.  Strawberries, in particular, like well-drained soil, so having raised beds is doubly good for them.  The strawberries will come up year after year.  We specifically ordered three different varieties of strawberry plants that blossom at different times of year so we'll be in fruit from spring to late summer.  Neighbors also put deer fence around the area, and covered them with straw to retain moisture and cut down on weeds.  Neighbor, help me out here!  What kinds of strawberries are they?!?  Edit: the strawberries are Earliglow (Early Season), Allstar (Mid Season), and Sparkle (Late Mid Season).  Also, neighbor says that covering strawberry plants with straw is NOT recommended.

Left: 6 ft. x 12 ft. strawberry patch; right: vegetable seedlings

 doing well indoors under grow lights.

Cucumbers and Bulbs

What to cucumbers and bulbs have in common?  Well, today our bulbs are about in the same phase of their growth cycle as our cucumbers.  Cucumbers are annuals, meaning they have to be re-seeded each year.  By contrast, bulbs are perennial, meaning they die back but come up from the root again next year.  Both sprouted this week.  The cucumbers were planted in a tray indoors ten days ago and have been incubating beneath a plastic cover.  The bulbs--more than a hundred of them--were planted directly in the ground last fall after replacing the landscaping around the walk.  The bulbs will be back, year after year to bring early color to the area.  The cucumbers are just good eats.

Still Snowing

Our unusually harsh winter continues now into spring.  In spite of the forecast calling for rain yesterday, snow began falling late in the afternoon.  We got about an inch of the slushy, heavy, freezing-rain kind before nightfall.  It was the second snow since installing the row cover a week ago.  Luckily the temperature hovered just above freezing all night, so most of the snow melted.  This afternoon we peeked inside the fabric and discovered that the broccoli and bok choi have survived.  Their condition is similar to the plants in our hoop house: slightly frostbit here and there, but mostly living.  The only total loss were four squash plants that really had no business being in the hoop house this early in the season.

Tonight we transplanted more spinach and lettuce, then planted a tray with three varieties of Asian gourds: bitter mellon, long gourd, and luffa gourd.  A second tray contains watermelon.  Just for fun we also transplanted some young onions into larger pots to see how they do.  Honestly, planting onions from seeds seems like a huge waste of time when the farm store sells the marble-size pearl onions (yellow, red, and white) in bulk.