I have cilantro sprouting inside…:dubious:
Alright, here it is - the ultimate deterrent to cats getting into your garden.
Behold, the porcupine tomato, Solanum pyracanthum. It also has purple flowers.
I have about a dozen young seedlings growing on indoors under lights. No spines yet, but any day now…
That’s a tomato plant? Are there fruit you can eat? Also-- thanks for the pics.
I did, in fact, order the corn up there when I said I would. It’s been might cold here and, as far as I know, corn needs warm ground to be sowed in. Which makes it a good thing I haven’t gotten my corn yet.
There are Solanums with edible fruit, but I don’t think S. pyracanthum is one of them.
It’s for ornamental (!) use.
I should probably know better - I grew another variety of spiny Solanum a few years ago and it was uncomfortable even with heavy gloves to pull the plants out at season’s end.
Maybe I should try growing Loasa roja from seed (an annual flowering plant known for the stinging hairs on its leaves, something like nettles).
Yay! Stuff is coming up!
Everything I’ve planted so far is starting to spout. It’s so fun watching the little plants pop up through the soil. Every day something new. Oh, and the most exciting thing: pumpkins! Volunteers from last year.
I have a question about growing basil. I bought a small pot of basil seedlings. There are three separate sprouts. I replanted them in a slightly bigger pot (they came in one of those cheap plastic things) but I’m wondering now if I should plant each sprout in its own pot. Will they start hating on each other if I keep them together? They’re still pretty small - maybe a couple inches tall.
I’m going to start sobbing any minute here - I’m in between assignments, and I desperately want to get out in my yard and clean it up after winter and start working on my summer projects even if I can’t plant until the end of May, but it’s all still under snow. Bleah.
Yes, you should replant the basil as they will grow and crowd each other.
Managed to get the main garden plot cleared and cultivated. A friend beat my bent shovel back into shape and sharpened it. I’m thinking of slightly expanding the main garden, adding enough for another row of plants.
Bought a hoe. Still need to get oinon sets and spinach seeds. The spouse wants blue flowers on the side of the house this year, so I got some bachelor button’s and purple alyssum. Still have to clean up the side beds, and I note that the squirrels have once again rearranged the bulbs - I have daffodils and tulips coming up in places they aren’t supposed to be.
Have several Beaver Dam pepper plants in sprouting pots indoors. Don’t trust the weather enough quite yet to plant anything outside. Maybe next week for cold tolerant stuff.
I wish I had that problem. The last three years, I’ve planted four strawberry plants in my garden. Every single time, some @#$@#* thing apparently ate them before I even saw a single one. I’ve literally only gotten to taste like four strawberries. None of my other plants. Just the damned strawberries. I’ve just about given up on them. I’ll have to try again this year, in a pot, with netting or something and see if I have better luck, because I haven’t had a good strawberry in years.
Anyhow, as for me, I’ve just got a bunch of peppers from seed that I started on March 1. Everything is looking good so far: chile arbol de yahualica, aji limon, aji amarillo, rooster spur, piri-piri, and corne de chevre. I’ll probably pick up some habanero-type seedlings as well, but this year I’m concentrating on different varieties, as I’m capsicum chinense-ed out.
I’m having a squash dilemma today- I have far more kinds, especially of pumpkins than I have space for in the heated propogator, but I want to plant them all!
I’m trying oca this year, anyone grown it before? I like growing things you can’t find in the shops…
Because I so wanted to grow something and I did not start anything indoors, this weekend I planted marigolds and zinnias in pots that are now residing ont the front steps. I’ve never grown them in pots before. I have had nothing but success with the marigolds (love 'em. So pretty, so many varieties, so hard to kill) both starting indoors and directly sowing in the ground. The zinnias, have not flourisned under my hand as of yet. We’ll see.
I hope I am not tempting the Frost Gods by putting out pots this early.
The only thing that keeps marigolds from being the perfect flower plant is that they don’t smell good. In fact, they smell a little off. Also, the perfect perennial plant has got to be hostas. Again with the plentiful varieties and the indistructibleness. That’s a word, right?
Sshhhh! Shh! Can you hear that? That’s my seeds screaming as they are washed into the gutter. I’ve never seen my raised beds flooded before, and I’ve been here 12 years. So much for everything I started two weeks ago.
Sigh.
Zone 5, Chicago suburbs.
All my plants that are starting to sprout were frozen solid this morning, but by afternoon, they had thawed out and it didn’t seem to have fazed them a bit. I guess if you’re an early grower, you’ve got to be hardy (not like there’s anything that isn’t hardy in my yard).
I love the smell of marigolds - it is weird, but I like it.
I think daylilies are the perfect perennial - nice, interesting foliage, beautiful flowers (and lots of them), extremely hardy and drought tolerant, and a billion varieties.
Aw, I’m sorry to hear that. 
I’m just getting around to clearing the raised beds of last year’s clutter. Things got busy last fall and I let it all go.
Imagine my happiness to find that last year’s collard greens are back! They love the cool weather and are about 10" high now. Next week I’ll have a mess of greens with eggs!
I must ask how you prepare them.
My Ex Northern Wife was elated when I bought some grape leaves and wrapped them around ground beef, and never noticed when I switched to mustard and turnip greens. 
Has anyone ever tried growing gerbera daisies indoors? They’re pretty and I’ve read they produce a lot of oxygen at night, but I’ve also read they’re difficult to care for.
I have never had a problem with gerbera daisies (unlike zinnias) but I’ve never tried to grow them indoors.
In my garden news, something has disturbed my pots. Birds or squirrels, I don’t know which. I’m hoping it was birds having a dirt bath and not birds and squirrels looking for seeds.
My dirt came! A big ole bag of dirt (one ton, I think) that I ordered a couple of months ago has showed up in our back yard yesterday - out to go shovel it onto the garden now. My dirt in this new yard is terrible, I think - nothing is growing right here.
My Night Flyer lily bulbs arrived today! This is a stock photo. But this is a photo of my already established yellow lillies. I plant to plant the Nights among the yellows for contrast.
Now, I planted the yellow Asiatic lilies in the fall but I was told these tiger lilies should go in in the spring. Don’t know if I’ll get flowers this summer from them.