Just ordered my seeds for this year. Yes, I realize this list is insane, but no squashes or broccoli or cauliflower this time, and I vow to thin early and often! Fingers crossed that my big, dumb, muscly cat Boris doesn’t pull a stunt like he did last year with the seeds that I started inside…
(I also have a few pea and pepper seeds saved from last year. Plus we can get a nice, early start this year because the raised beds are already filled with dirt and compost, so I won’t have to wait until late May to plant anything in the ground like last year. Plus the trellises are already up, and I have some tomato supports in the basement from last year, and am thinking of acquiring a few more for tomatoes and/or peppers.)
Ordered already (plus I will probably buy a couple of potted herbs, depending on what re-seeds itself from last year - thyme and sage, at least, and hopefully also mint, and I have given up on growing basil from seed, and my co-worker gave me a few garlic cloves which were already planted before frost hit):
DRUZBA TOMATO (80 days heirloom)
BLACK KRIM TOMATO (69 days heirloom)
Striped German Organic Tomato (80 days)
TIGERELLA TOMATO (55-65 days heirloom)
MATTS WILD CHERRY TOMATO (55 days)
MARA DES BOIS STRAWBERRY - 10 plants
WATERMELON RADISH (37 days)
RED MEAT RADISH (50 days)
FRENCH BREAKFAST RADISH (HEIRLOOM, 25 DAYS)
KALEIDOSCOPE MIX PEPPER
CORNO DI TORO PEPPER (HEIRLOOM, 72 DAYS)
RED MARBLE CIPPOLINI ONION (80 days) (HEIRLOOM)
EARLY FROSTY PEA (60 days)
SUPER SUGAR SNAP PEA (62 days)
GREEN NUTMEG MELON (HEIRLOOM, 80 days)
MEDITERRANEAN MELON MIX (70-100 DAYS)
DINOSAUR KALE (Nero di Toscana) (HEIRLOOM)
AUNT MOLLY’S GROUND CHERRY (70 Days) (HEIRLOOM)
SLIM JIM EGGPLANT (60 days)
BEIT ALPHA CUCUMBER (F1 hybrid 52 days)
ARMENIAN CUCUMBER (90 days heirloom)
DI RAPA NOVANTINA BROCCOLI (30 days)
SPICY ITALIAN MIX 1/2 OZ
RUCOLA SELVATICA ARUGULA (50 days)
Mustard - Green Wave
ESCAROLE ENDIVE MESCLUN MIX
BRAISING GREENS
ARUGULA (38 days)
Wow, someone beat me to starting the gardening thread! Congratulations.
Last year, between traveling for work and my dad’s final illness the garden became seriously neglected. I suspect I’ll find some overlooked root vegetables next spring (mm… stew vegetables…)
Now that I have a full time job and have too much money to qualify for food stamps any more I plan to do less - concentrate not so much on “how much food can I pull out of this pile of dirt” and more on cultivating my favorites. Mainly edible greens and beans. Here’s the likely list:
Lettuce (mix)
Radish (easter egg mix)
Onions
[INDENT]white
yellow
red
Chard
Spinach
Beans
green
yellow/wax
purple[/INDENT]
It looks like rain all day, but I don’t care - I’m going outside to plant the peas, arugula, broccoli rabe, mixed greens of various sorts, and radishes.
Last weekend I started most of the peppers and the eggplant inside. In a couple of weeks, I’ll do the rest of the peppers and the tomatoes, and the melons. And maybe the cucumbers. So far the big, dumb lunky cat hasn’t shown any interest in knocking anything over like he did last year.
Have any of you ever had any luck with cipollini onions? I tried two different times last year and didn’t get a single onion out of either batch.
Not bothering with broccoli or cauliflower this year, or squashes - the broccoli and cauliflower were all leaves and no heads, and the squashes were insane (and are easily acquired elsewhere). I think I’m going to stick to the early-season greens, peas, and radishes, and for later season, tomatoes and peppers (which we can eat in pretty much infinite quantities), herbs, garlic, eggplants, and hopefully we will have better luck this year with the baby melons and cucumbers.
My first tiny tomato seedlings have been happily growing on my windowsill a week or two already We have to start early here in rainy ol’ England to get a long enough season.
So far, I’ve sown Gardener’s Delight, Tigerella, Red Cherry and Yellow Ripple Cherry tomatoes, and Alberto’s Rocoto (unusual species chilli) and something from a Czech seed packet labelled Paprika. Plus a bunch of other stuff like sweet peas and garden peas, (including some fancy heritage purple poddded ones), and broad (fava) beans.
I’m planning on growing a lot more flowers for cutting this year, I really liked the few I did last year. Besides, I have honey bees now, so more flowers is a good plan for them as well.
I’ve yet to properly plan out what I can realistically grow this year; I think if I actually grow all the plants I’m hoping, I’d need at least one more plot and probably a clone. I have cleared a lot more growing space in the last 6 months though, so I should manage quite a lot!
Today’s mission accomplished! Just planted in the one raised bed that we have dibs on so far - rain? Who cares!
Arugula Roquette
Escarole/Endive Mix
Radish Watermelon
Container Braising Greens Mix
Rose Meat Daikon Radish
French Breakfast Radish
Broccoli Di Rapa Novantina
Mustard Green Wave
Onion Red Marble Cippolini
Spicy Italian Mix Container
Snap Pea Super Sugar
Early Frost Pea
The chives that someone planted in the bed before us are starting to come up, as is the garlic from the bulbs that a co-worker gave me last fall.
I started cleaning up the beds last week. Found three carrots! One had gone all woody but the other two were featured with dinner, along with the frozen green beans from last summer.
I reviewed my seeds. They’re not the freshest, but should still be viable so I’ll just go with the “leftovers” this year. I have the next two days off and if it isn’t too rainy/wet I’ll do a little more work, maybe start planting the greens after working come compost into the beds.
Definitely have to clean out the old stems and winter trash from the flower bed on the south side of the building - the bulbs are all coming up.
I miss the fields of California poppies sometimes, so I bought some California poppy seeds (orange flowers), white poppy seeds, and I think I got some that are white and purple. I also think one seller gave be some lagniappe in the form of some other kind of seeds.
The problem is that I live in the PNW. I think there’s enough sun, but I don’t have an area where I can plant the seeds. I was thinking of putting them in pots and putting them in the sunny spots. And in the Mojave Desert, the soil poppies grow in is sandy. I’m guessing I can buy sandy soil from a nursery.
Cleaned up the bed on the south side of the building, trimmed down the roses (really, I’m about ready to kill them - they’re hideous, actually, vicious things reluctant to flower). There’s a tree growing way too close to the building wall and since cutting it down to the ground several times has resulted only in a coppice this year I’m going to buy some Round-Up (or equivalent) and kill the bastard dead DEAD DEAD!!!
>ahem<
Will be moving back to the vegetable bed next opportunity.
New plantings:
Tomatoes (for both eating and sauce making)
Green beans
Butternut Squash
Strawberries
Watermelon
Pumpkin
Acorn squash
Cherry tree
Mint
Basil
Assorted flowers
Still going strong from fall:
Lettuce (Bibb, Romaine, Red leaf)
Green peas
Rosemary
I have three jars full of dried hot peppers from last year, so I didn’t plant peppers. I may still get a couple of bell pepper plants. Planted twice as many sauce tomatoes as last year. We went through our canned sauce and salsa way too fast.
I fear you’ll only get replies from us Californians, so I’ll represent too
My patch at the community garden currently has:
4 bell peppers, 1 cayenne, 1 poblano
8+ pickling cukes (some of the pots had multiple seedlings, one even had SEVEN, which I divided up before planting. The snails snailed a few, but I think there will be plenty of pickles anyway… hence…)
Dill seedlings, a million tiny ones reseeding from last year
Cilantro, ditto - one has bolted right away, but two are flourishing, and spreading out horizontally, which seems unusual
Red and white onions, overwintered and am picking them for scallions as needed, we’ll see how many are left to bulb up. Gosh, they take AGES!
Garlic, biiiig - the stems are almost the width of a broom-handle!
1 brandywine tomato
1 San Marzano tomato
1 other indeterminite hybrid tomato variety, Silver Something? Can’t recall, but the Master Gardeners recommended it for the area
1 random Asian eggplant - we’re not big fans, but a plot neighbour gave me the seedling, so thought I’d better put it in
A ground cherry, aka husk cherry, goldberry, pichuberry, etc. Experiment this year, I’ll try more if they do well and I can think of some nice things to do with the harvest. Welcome thedigin.com - Hostmonster.com
3 cabbages, resprouts from when I cut off the heads. They’ll probably bolt soon, but I thought I’d leave them in and try to harvest a few more handfuls of leaves
Strawberries! They are technically communal, but the stacked pots are right next to my bed, and I helped to plant them out, and am keeping up the watering. The first fruits are a few days from ripe. Some of them are the white-fruited variety, I wonder what they’ll taste like? And how to tell when to pick??
Peas, nearby - they’re the purple pod kind, half a dozen of which popped up from last year’s compost pile. They’re a bit tough as snowpeas, and there’s not really enough to harvest all at once for shelling. Meh.
Still to come, I might squeeze in a cherry tomato or two, and I have yet to find melon seedlings around here – when I do, I’ll try one watermelon and one cantaloupe, since both did so well for me last year.
Here at home, my Thai basil reseeded itself (yay!) and the lettuce leaf basil seeds are just poking up now. My dwarf Alstroemeria are just gorgeous, if you’re not growing them, definitely think about it, but I’d recommend keeping them in a pot, as they seem like they’d spread scary fast. Here’s my Alstro container. My other herbs are mostly trotting along, not much regrowth from the tarragon yet, and the thyme is a bit dried-out looking, hoping for a spring flush soon. My flat parsley is about to bolt, I suppose it is two years old - they’re biennial.
Well, the daffodils are in full bloom, and the iris and tulips are sprouting.
In retrospect, it’s a good thing I did not plant early this year, between the recent cold snap going low enough to kill even cold-tolerant plants like chard and the lake effect snow today (50 mph gusts and horizontal fat snowflakes) I doubt any tender vegetable shoots would have survived.
Think of waiting until at least mid-month to plant this year.
One of my clients’ cats - Buscemi - is constantly leaving his (ahem) calling cards in the veg. garden for me to clean up - I’ll have to come up with a diplomatic way to broach the topic lol.
Most folks are barricading their patches with various bracketed nettings, because of the deer, which are everywhere in Victoria, especially in Oak Bay municipality. Maybe one could be set-up for Buscemi.
How come?
Too bad you have resort to Eau de Monsanto, but yeah the growing base of a coppice isn’t the best thing for a building’s structural integrity if left unattended to, so yeah - doesn’t sound like you have much choice on the matter but to use it. I admit I have that vile shit, too, but use it maybe once every couple years if there’s a lot of strong-rooted weeds like broom coming up though brick patios, etc. (other less toxic products, like Weedbegone, have only temporary success)
I have never been a gardener, and in fact I usually kill houseplants dead within months. But I have a bamboo plant that I have kept alive for eight years now, and I think it’s gone to my head - I started tomato seeds on St. Patrick’s Day. I have six seedlings growing now (it was five, but one more popped us this morning, a week behind the others), three Garden Gems and three Garden Treasures. This is the first time I’ve tried something like this, so I need you experienced gardeners to hold my hand and tell me what I’m doing wrong.
My landlord was going to hammer copper spikes into the coppice stump, but I pointed out that Roundup degrades relatively rapidly and in a year’s time you could replant over the spot. With copper contamination the killing effect lasts a lot longer.
To be planted inside in trays tomorrow (in dissolvable peat pots, for the melons and cucumbers):
DRUZBA TOMATO (80 days heirloom)
BLACK KRIM TOMATO (69 days heirloom)
Striped German Organic Tomato (80 days)
TIGERELLA TOMATO (55-65 days heirloom)
MATTS WILD CHERRY TOMATO (55 days)
GREEN NUTMEG MELON (HEIRLOOM, 80 days)
MEDITERRANEAN MELON MIX (70-100 DAYS)
AUNT MOLLY’S GROUND CHERRY (70 Days) (HEIRLOOM)
BEIT ALPHA CUCUMBER (F1 hybrid 52 days)
ARMENIAN CUCUMBER (90 days heirloom)
Planted in trays in the living room window, on the plastic-covered shelf that so far Boris the Big Dumb Lunky Cat hasn’t knocked over:
SLIM JIM EGGPLANT (60 days)
KALEIDOSCOPE MIX PEPPER
CORNO DI TORO PEPPER (HEIRLOOM, 72 DAYS)
Awaiting arrival from the seed company:
MARA DES BOIS STRAWBERRY - 10 plants
The other greens and peas listed above are sprouting in the raised bed outside - hopefully they will survive tonight’s frost. The garlic I planted last fall is growing nicely, and the chives are about a foot tall already. The thyme and sage haven’t come back yet, but we’re still a good 6 - 7 weeks earlier than I planted anything outside last year. I’m really looking forward to home-grown strawberries!
P.S. Eddie The Horrible, I’ve never even gotten basil to sprout from seed. I’m just going to stick to nursery plants for that. (And I will probably need a new rosemary plant, and we’ll see if the mint comes back from last year - I did put a good 6" of compost and peat, etc. on the bed at the end of the season last year, so maybe it was buried too deeply to come back.)
You’ll be fine! Your local Master Gardeners are probably your best resource if you have questions – well, I mean, SECOND best, after us here
Looks like your Garden Treasures are indeterminate, and, although the page didn’t say, a little Googling teaches me that the Garden Gem is semi-determinate. These terms are important, and refer to the growing habit.
Thanks, araminty! I will definitely get cages for the Treasures at least, and probably for all of them. Do you think I can grow these in containers, or do I need to prepare soil somewhere? The “best” place to put them around the house if I grow them out of pots doesn’t get much direct sun, although it’s not totally shaded, and I know they would prefer full sun if I can give it to them. Do you think I’ll get better yield by growing in the dirt but not in the best sun, or in containers in a location with more sun?
How should I prepare soil if I grow them outside? I have a sunny area that used to have raised beds, but those have been taken out, and I have no idea what the state of the dirt underneath is. Or I have a somewhat shadier area (but it still gets a few hours of full sun most days) that used to have flowers that I can use.
Ovenight low here in the upper 20s with a light dusting of snow, then 24F expected Tuesday morning.
That should knock back the roses (all but the rugosas) which survived the winter nicely and were budding out. Bleah.
Now I have to overcome laziness and inertia and reorganize the basement light garden for seedlings and cuttings, plus throw out the stuff I was saving over the winter that really shouldn’t make the cut.
Given your location, I’d say sun is most important. You CAN grow tomatoes in containers, but here in sunny Silicon Valley, I have had better luck in the ground, as pots dry out quickly, even if watered daily, which stresses the plants.
The best way to check out your soil is to get a shovel in it! Grab a handful from a few inches down and squeeze it. If it’s moist and black and crumbly, great. If it’s not… well, it might need some amendment, but that would vary depending on the problem. Report back!
If you do choose containers, make sure to get them as big as possible, including depth - tomatoes should be planted DEEP, as in, snap off the leaves on the “trunk” and bury that sucker with just a little puff of leaves on top. This encourages a strong root system, which in turn encourages strong plants, which will fruit better. Bigger pots take longer to dry out, too.
We have to start early here in rainy ol’ England to get a long enough season.