Grow-Along Week 2

Happy Spring!! It is finally here! We made it!

So, we're super excited this week to share our growing progress with you. This week confirms a lot of the earlier suspicions that we'd written about when we talked about past seed-starting failures. The combination of excellent soil and a much better growing light have definitely solved our problems!

Two weeks into our seed-starting adventure and we are proud to report that we have a total of 56 little plantlets in our grow-room. We have some that already have their second set of true leaves coming in and they all look so much stouter and heartier than any seedlings we've ever started before! We are simply jumping for joy!

This week, the Early Jalapenos are winning by a long shot with a total of 14 robust little seedlings. Second place goes to the Ace Tomatoes with 12 happy little plantlets. In third place, we have the Rainbow Cherry Tomatoes with 10 healthy little sprouts, and earning honorable mention for the sprouts with the most true leaves. Fourth Place is a tie between the Principe Borghese Tomatoes and the Pepproncinis with 6 seedlings each. Cherokee Purple brings up fifth place with a very appropriate 5 young plants. The Rainbow Bell Peppers bring up sixth place with 2 little plantlets. And last, but not least California Wonder Bell Pepper with one little sprout. I'm starting to question the viability of my bell pepper seeds at this point, though as they should at least be showing a better sprout rate than this. I'll give them one more week and reseed if they continue to show such little progress.

Our biggest cherry tomato

Cherokee Purple tomato

The cherry tomatoes and Ace tomatoes

The Early Jalapenos

Not to be left out, here are the little onion sprouts I started as well. They are Red Marble Cippolini onions, and my first attempt at starting onions from seed. We shall see how it goes. They are under a different grow light as the bigger light only covers one seedling tray, but they seem to be doing just fine with the bulb nice and close to the little onions.

Little baby onions! :)

 I really am convinced that the grow light and better starter soil are working to our advantage this year!

Stell Michelsen sent us in her update and her plans sound awesome as usual!

• Garden Update - Spring Equinox
  Well, as you can see, we're still not doing much gardening here. First you see the view of my existing back garden - straw bales ( http://www.resilientcommunities.com/extreme-urban-gardening-straw-bale-gardens/ ) along the drip line of the house and along the back wall, and there are actually stacks of tires there at the base of the wall for making potato towers. ( http://bonzaiaphrodite.com/2009/04/how-to-grow-potatoes-in-tire-towers/ ) I tried growing sweet potatoes along the drip line last year, but I overestimated how much sun that spot got and they didn't do well. This year, those bales will be planted entirely with sugar snap peas. I'm re-using rather than starting new ones this year, because they seem to be holding together ok and didn't do much last year. I may try vertically growing some summer squash and melons in the space on top of the wall. Not sure yet. It would mean building more trellises. The space beyond the van is our "compost" heap. I say that because it's really just an out of the way corner that we pile our weeds and leaves and kitchen scraps in. I never really touch it. Hopefully I'll do something with it this year. The space that the van is occupying is where the keyhole gardens ( http://www.texascooppower.com/texas-stories/nature-outdoors/keyhole-gardening ) are going. I'm having trouble thinking of a decent walling material, and may end up just using cardboard-lined hardware cloth enclosures. Since I'm in town, I'm not really supposed to be building any permanent structures anyway. This is where the dug-out compost heap will hopefully be relocated. Then there's the front garden. Until last year, it was a hideously neglected "flower bed" (read: weed patch.) But I got it all dug out, laid down planks for square-foot gardening beds, planted bulbs across the front, and put straw bales along the drip line. I'm going to reuse the existing bales this year here, too. Probably tomatoes and cucumbers. I need to get some lovage going in the herb corner, but I can never seem to remember to start it in time. Anyway, while I'm waiting for all this crap to melt, I need to get moving on my seed mats, ( http://hickeryhollerfarm.blogspot.com/2012/03/making-seed-mats_12.html?m=1 ) at least for the carrots, parsnips, and beets. I HATE planting carrots. I might try making some corresponding newspaper mulch mats to use in conjunction with the seed mats, because I hate weeding carrots even more than I hate planting them. Anyway, that could be an interesting challenge. Anything to let me be lazier when it's hot out! I still have to order seeds. Obviously, I'm not in a huge hurry. I haven't laid out my final plans, either, because I can't get into my spaces to measure what I have available. Normally I use the Garden Tracker app on my iPhone....but I haven't felt any pressing need to plan in advance this year. Maybe that will change once the snow level shrinks some

  Rebecca Michelsen

  
  

   

  

  
  

  
  

Elaine Budner let us know that she's got some excitement in her garden this week.

• My chives are 3" long already and, I found this flower spike growing on one of my orchids!
  

 Elaine is also the lucky winner of the Mystery Plant Contest!

The mystery plant is called a Voodoo Lily and is a close cousin of the notorious Corpse Flower. They both come from a family of flowers that produce a single, large, smelly flower every year (or more in the case of a Corpse Flower). The flowers usually only last for about 48 hours before beginning to fade as the plant uses a lot of energy in producing such a large and smelly flower. We had the luck to experience the bloom and HORRENDOUS smell of Romero, the Corpse Flower in Phipps Conservatory of Pittsburgh's collection this past fall. Our little stinker grew to a rather impressive 18" and smelled like sweaty gym shoes. It has a little sibling in the same pot who will be putting up a flower as well, so we'll keep you posted on when it blooms.

Until next week! Happy growing!
If you want to get in on the Grow-Along, feel free to jump in at any time by sending us your garden plans, projects, or pictures via email, Facebook, or in the comments!