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| Our daffodils are about to bloom! |
We've got some super-exciting news today that we just can't wait to share with you all! We're so excited that we can't even wait till after we show you the new pictures from our grow-room! Sarah (that's me) signed up to captain a screening of the new movie, Open Sesame: The Story of Seeds at the Crown Center Stadium 14 Cinema on Tuesday, April 29, 2014 at 7:30 PM. One of our primary goals at The Dusty Rose Micro-Farm is to achieve as close to a self-sustaining farm as possible. That means that we intend to save our own seed, start our own plants for food, and be able to repeat the cycle indefinitely as many of our ancestors did before us. There are many companies out there in the world of big agribusiness that would prefer to see that seeds be regulated and controlled, patented, modified, and restricted in use. Join us in screening this wonderful documentary that discusses the importance of seed freedom and helps to show us all how we can be involved in making the choice as to what kind of food we grow and consume. The showing is a special one-night-only screening and you do need to reserve your tickets ahead of time. The movie will not be shown if we do not get enough seats reserved for the showing. Book your tickets now (don't worry, your credit card will not be charged until or if we reach the number needed to guarantee the showing) and join us for this special event!!
Reserve your tickets today at: http://gathr.us/screening/7731
In other news, we are thrilled to share our growing progress with you this week. We were finally able to get the tomato and pepper seedlings potted up to 3" peat pots and we are excited to announce that we can officially call them tomato and pepper plants now! I feel like I can truly own the "farmer" title now that I've conquered my seed-starting nemesis. :) Just look at these gorgeous tomatoes!
Since we have so many different varieties of tomatoes and peppers, we needed a creative way to mark the pots and identify the plants inside. Originally, I thought we would use small wooden plant markers or perhaps popsicle sticks with the varieties marked on them. However, when we wound up with so many healthy little plants, we had to change our plan. I poked about in the closet and found a box of mixed color toothpicks and had an epiphany. Each tomato and pepper variety has been assigned a color code and has a corresponding toothpick in its pot. We coded the plants as follows:
- Tomatoes:
- Cherokee Purple - red/blue
- Principe Borghese - orange
- Ace - green
- Cherry tomatoes - as marked on pots as I ran out of toothpick colors
- Peppers
- Early Jalapeños - red
- Pepperoncini - blue
- Rainbow bell - yellow
- California Wonder - blue/yellow
Just look at these lovely peppers!
We did run into an interesting problem, however, once all the little plants were potted up. We hadn't at all considered how much more space this many little plants would need under lights until the weather is finally warm enough to harden them off and move them outdoors. We wound up rigging up a few old fluorescent strip-lights that we had from when we lived in the apartment as temporary lighting and much sooner than anticipated, ordered our second grow-light. Our new light is twice the size of the first one at a wonderful 4ft long and was ordered from the same company as the first to ensure we continue to have such wonderful results. The new light just arrived today, so we have yet to get it set up (and we aren't exactly sure how we're going to do that yet). As soon as it is set up, we will share our new set-up pics with you. We're planning on expanding our seed-starting for next year and hope to be able to offer heirloom, organic, non-GMO seedlings at a reasonable cost to gardeners next year.
We will be starting lettuce, onions, strawberries, and peas outdoors soon and will be sure to share some pictures of those when we get them going. The onion sets we ordered should be arriving any day now along with a couple of blueberry bushes as well. Also, we have 3 currant plants that we'll be potting up this week until we can safely get them in the ground outside as they have decided to break dormancy early while they were in cool storage in our laundry room.
We feel for our friend Stell up North where Jack Frost is still hanging on:
Ain't nothin' growin' here but ice puddles. But WAIT!! You can SEE THE FLOWER BORDER!! Maybe temps will stay favorable enough for bulbs to show their faces....if they survived the awful temperatures over the winter.
Elaine didn't have time to take pictures as she had her 3 year old granddaughter visiting this week and was busy with her. However, she let us know that she is working on planning some flower gardens this year and will be adding a top-bar beehive to her yard and garden in order to help save the bees. We will be installing and maintaining the hive for her, so look out for some new videos this spring when we unpackage the bees at both our farm and at her house. :)
Until next week, Happy Growing!!
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