March 20, 2011

First off, thanks for all the great comments folks and to all my followers.  I appreciate each and every one of you.

Deb, thanks for the offer. I may end up taking you up on that if this final batch doesn't germinate or grow well.

Before I get into my continuing tomato saga, I'd like to talk about the week that led up to Spring, 2011.  If it wasn't raining, it was windy as could be.  It seemed every day I had to go out and re-cover my salad bed.  The laundry clips I got from the Dollar Store weren't quite holding up to the power of the wind.

I especially had to take care of the two green onions that were transplanted out.  the back end of the hoop house kept blowing in, flattening them.  Happened twice before I wised up and clipped the plastic in place back there.  Sure hope they survive.  Speaking of survival, gotta get out and water them tomorrow.  Mother Nature isn't expected to help for a few days and I bet they're thirsty under there.

Now back to your regularly scheduled programing.  This week on How the Tomato Turns, I ran out of vertical space in my light system.  I knew this day was coming as the three initial plants were growing about 2 inches every three days.

It's a jungle out there doesn't even begin to cover it.  I had to do something drastic.  So, for the first time in 3 years, my light system was moved.  No, not to the other end of the house, but about 2 feet to the right, off the board.  Some careful plant movement and creative Jerry-rigging and I gave my tomatoes a few more inches.

Yep, it isn't pretty, but I've got a tray sitting on a TV tray. I don't like how far the lights are from the rest of the plants, but for now that can't be helped.  I've got a month before my tomatoes can be planted out.  I'm actually quite proud of my achievement there. Necessity is the mother of all invention.

Speaking of tomatoes, I'm kind of bummed.  I worked so hard to get my earliest producer, Bloody Butcher, to germinate.  After three attempts with two seeds each, I finally got something to grow.  Unfortunately it wasn't getting tall, but rather just sitting on the surface of the dirt. At first I thought it was just that the seed was too far down.  Then when I was moving things around, I snapped this picture and all became clear.

I'll be darned if that isn't a weed from a seed that must have overwintered in my cold compost bin.  What else could it be, it definitely isn't a tomato!?  Guess I'll be not only down a plant, but missing out of a very early producer.

Oh, and in case I wasn't aware, bigger plants need more water than little lettuce seedlings. Look what I found when I went up after three days to water and move plants around.

I wonder if this withered branch will still make a decent root when I pot it up into my SWC?

So, for now, this is my compromise of a set-up upstairs.

Gonna have to be creative about what to replace the TV tray with that's shorter and can hold up all that dirt and plant weight.

Hope you enjoyed the first day of spring in your garden.  I sure knew it was the first day as I took my first allergy pill of the season!

March 15, 2011

Beware the Ides of March... My wife was born tomorrow way back when, so I like to say she's perfect, born right between the luckiest and unluckiest days of the year.

Speaking of unlucky, this didn't happen today, but today's the perfect day to share it.  I was making a smoothie for the family and needed to get out the frozen fruit from the freezer.  I had checked the tomatoes on top of the fridge the night before but thought nothing of it, until this happened...

Crash! Dirt everywhere, water everywhere, and no seedlings from this THIRD attempt.  Pissed at myself, I cleaned it up, and figured I'd give up on them. So I went upstairs and counted my viable seedlings... 7, just seven. I needed 8 and wanted 10.  So back out to the garage and maybe the four time is a charm.  January 24th I planted my first tomato seeds of the season, and the last are being planted March 15th.  How crazy is that?  I definitely will over plant next year, this is ridiculous. 

If these don't go, I'll simply direct sow them and see what happens. Yeah right, in this climate? 

Today was one big thunder storm, not quite Spring, yet I hope you got to...

Enjoy your garden!

March 13, 2011

I kind of feel like EG when he said, sorry for yet another seedling post, but what do people expect... in late winter what else is there... unless you want me to talk about my chicken research. hehe.

This post is all about tomatoes.  Let me start buy saying I've learned my lesson and next year I'll way over plant seedlings like my brother and only keep the best.  I just don't have room to keep tons of tomatoes.  More on that soon.

Last post I mentioned that I really needed to pot up my tomatoes, especially the one that was breaking off mid-stem and the two-seedling cup.  Here is the state of affairs right before I re-potted them.

As you can see, they were very ready for bigger homes.  I know some folks like to pot up tomatoes several times, but I just don't have the supply of containers to do it more than once. So those big quart sized pots is what I use.  I salvaged them from a nursery recycling bin a few years ago.  For the cut stem, it was still connected so I buried it.  Not sure if that's sufficient, but if it grows I guess it is fine, right?

For the dual seed cup, I did what EG suggested.  I soaked the soil completely and gently pulled the seedling apart from the dirt clump.  It was like stringy thread.  I tried my best to spread it out in the soil of the new pot and buried it.  Really it should have been a two person job, but I didn't bother the kids for this.  In the end, here are the three new comers to the party.  And no I didn't plan on succession planting tomatoes.

Now, in case you're wondering how my initial crop of tomatoes were doing, here is a pic of the tinkering I did to make my flat of lettuce work with my really tall tomatoes.  I'm not happy using one light fixture for the entire flat of lettuce, but it can't be helped.  Hopefully they lettuce will mature fast and I can plant it out under my hoop cover.  Maybe I'll hit it with some fish emulsion tonight when I water.

As you can see, the tomatoes are getting really big, and it's only mid-March.  I've got a month to go.  No fish emulsion for them!  If you look closely, you'll see I don't have much room for them to grow more.  Heck, here's a pic to save your eyes.

Unfortunately a few more days and I'll out stretch my current light system. However, as necessity is the mother of all invention, I think I have a solution. I can move the light system over a foot or so and set up some sort of stand for the tomatoes to rest on, then move a tray down there. If I can't go up, I can definitely go down!  That of course is a post for another day.

Enjoy your garden!

March 11, 2011

Short post today on my soil blocks and succession planting. Mostly I wanted to make it through the last of my pictures and topics from the last week so I could get to the newer stuff.  I'd like to say I saved the best for last, but I didn't.  Soil blocks aren't the sexiest thing out there, but when they work, they work amazingly.  Most of this post is about when they DON'T work. 

Having dutifully grown indoor lettuce in 4 blocks per variety over the last month due to the inability to plant out in this inclement weather, I decided to go with 8 seedlings per variety this time.  Of course by now the aged compost and vermiculite potting mix I had stored in a kitty litter bin in the garage was gone, so I made more.  My overwintered compost was great.  Worms were plentiful and everything but the egg shells were broken down nicely.  My new potting soil was made up of rain-moistened compost and a conservative dose of vermiculite, as I'm running out and don't want to buy more in our economic situation.

The soil blocks turned out great!  They compacted nicely and came free of the soil block maker easily without breaking. I was really quite pleased with myself as I hear so many people talk of complex potting soil recipes.  I just don't have access to all that material and I'm certainly not buying anything I don't have to.

As always, two seeds went into each divot and the whole tray went into the kitchen.  My wife wasn't thrilled about putting back the stand I use to keep the tray off the counter, but she didn't complain about the clumps of dirt in the kitchen... maybe... just maybe, I'm growing on her.

All was well for the first day, but as these blocks dried out, they started to fall apart.  At first I thought it may actually be a worm or two that got into the blocks that were doing the damage, but then it started happening to all of the blocks, especially when I watered them the first time.  I was so unhappy.  All that seed and work to make those blocks. Not to mention I actually had rapid germination from this year's Red Sails.

Unfortunately it was even worse by the time enough had germinated and I sent the tray upstairs to the light system.  Boy did I have to tinker with the lights and tray placement to keep optimum light distance.  Kind of a fun little puzzle.

So, how are your indoor seed starting adventures turning out this year? I'm sure many of you have flatS of them going at all times right now, but some of you may be just like me, with a small garden or just starting out, and you're wondering if starting seeds indoors is worth it.  Well, for less than $100 I built my light system will be making my own soil block seedlings forever.  And if you would just feel silly just starting a few plants, don't.  I do it all the time. All the better to park on top of the fridge to germinate.  So let's hear it. What works and what doesn't? And as always...

Enjoy your garden!

March 8, 2011

Let's call this the tomato post.  In case you haven't been reading, you know I have a whopping 3 tomatoes out of 10 that are going gang busters.  Another handful are languishing and three are refusing to germinate despite multiple attempts with 2 seeds each.

So, just how amazing is the growth of those big three?  Here is what they looked like the day before I decided to pot them up.

Oh, and in case you're wondering, the CD case is just there for perspective, and to raise seedling trays to allow for gravity to feed water to the plants better.  And I used to like Depeche Mode. Hehe.

Yes, I know the seedlings were past time to be potted up.  I don't know what I was thinking?  When I went to re-pot them, I realized I really don't have a good place to do that, other than my chest freezer in the garage.  Since I gave them a brief walk in the yard, I decided to do the surgery on top of my yard waste container.  Don't they look like they want to start flowering already?!

Well, my waiting so long to pot these up was immediately apparent when I tried to free them from their 9 ounce cups.  They just DIDN'T want to come out.  One plant actually started to fall apart from the potting soil, such that I was very worried that it wouldn't survive the transplant. Anyway, here's what they looked like before I threw them on a tray and brought them back upstairs for their tanning session.

My brother says he pots up his young seedlings up to the first leaves.  I bury them up to the first true branch.  Not sure which is right, but I want the dew leaves or whatever to become roots.

Aren't they magnificent looking? I sure hope the compost I planted them in isn't too fertilizer rich that they shoot up again. I can't handle more than 18 inches including the pot in my light system, and it's a long time before April 15 (our traditional last frost date).
Speaking of roots, my Legend seedling (shown on the right below) that's about ready to be potted up looks like it's been almost cut at soil level in it's cup. I would HATE to lose it since my other Legend planting is one of the never germinated 3.  I have got to pot that up tomorrow.

Another one I need to pot up is my 3 seedling cup (on the left above).  I've since noticed one of the seedlings has simply disappeared, so now it's just two healthy seedlings battling for dirt in that 9 ounce cup.  The question was still, which seedling is which.  THANKFULLY one seedling has potato leaves and the other traditional tomato leaves.  A quick search online found that Stupice tomato plants have potato leaves, so I know which one I need to survive.  The other is gravy.  Well a bit more meat and potatoes than gravy, since I don't even have enough tomatoes to fill my SWCs yet.  Here's hoping EG is right and splitting tomato seedlings is easy.  I get the process but I hate playing with fire.

Now before you post that I should really plant more seedlings next time, you''re absolutely right.  My brother has the right idea to plant 6 of each to keep the best one and give away the rest.  I have always had good luck with planting multiple seeds in each cup, but only one cup.  My results were horrible this year, so I'll make room for more next time.  Maybe I'll just start them in soil blocks and pot them up sooner. I could fit many more in soil blocks than I can with those unwieldy cups.

Well, that'll just about do it for tonight.  Thanks for all the birthday wishes. I got some money that I'll use to pay bills and maybe even fund the construction of my chicken coop!

Enjoy your garden.

March 5, 2011

What a wonderful day for a birthday! I didn't wish for anything, but if I had, a little bit of spring would have been at the top of my list.  Mother Nature came through for us.  Partly overcast with highs in the mid 40s isn't amazing, but compared to what we've had for the last few months, I'll take it. 

I finally got out into the yard today.  I must say I've been a bit disheartened by the foul weather we've been having, staying cooped up inside most days, even when I had time to get out.  I think I'll spread out my eventful day into multiple posts though. I've seen other bloggers I read do that, though mostly they work long hours so can't do anything during the week, but as one can never count on good weather here, I'll just talk about my compost today.

You see, I haven't touched my compost in months.  Sure I've added my kitchen scraps to it whenever the kitty-litter container was full, but the last time I tried to turn it my pitch fork hit rock!  Today was very different.

Aside from countless egg shells that didn't break down because last year I wasn't crushing them when I put them into my kitchen scrap bin, my compost was nearly finished.  Turning it was just like I imagine a worm farm to look like when you're feeding it.  Every turn generated a dozen or more worms wiggling in the dirt.  The funny thing is the first thing I thought of when I saw them was my chickens would love this place!  My second thought was how good they are for the compost and garden.  How sad is that.  I'll have to turn in my green thumb for that one.

When I was turning the compost, I was smashing the egg shells into smaller pieces, so they'll eventually compost in place.  Then my youngest and I decided it was time to weed the garden beds.  I hadn't touched them, other than to harvest carrots, since last fall, and I had many weeds growing. 

Don't those weeds almost look like lettuce? I have let them grow thinking they may have been volunteers.  Today I made the executive decision to yank them though.  Of course it took all of 5 minutes to pull them and the moss out.  It all went into the yard waste bin rather than my compost. Let Cedar Grove worry about it. They're better equipped to ensure 150 degrees to kill everything.

When I was cleaning, I did notice my beds had settled even more this year.  If you look closely, you can see one whole 2x6 is visible now.  It may be time for a few yards of Cedar Grove compost as I don't generate enough to do more than augment my beds.

Although I couldn't add much in the way of depth with my scant compost reserves, I could do some major augmenting with the compost, so I added a wheelbarrow full of compost to the front part of this bed, then finally planted out the seedlings that were in dire need of more soil.  They weren't looking so healthy when I put them in the ground, but I'm hopeful some water and tons of great compost will perk them right back up.

Lastly, you can see that I throw my hoops up. I actually got the plastic over the hoops at around 10 pm after getting back from my birthday dinner at the folks place.  Here's hoping they survive the night in the low forties...

Hope you got to enjoy your garden today!

March 1, 2011

First off, sorry for my absence this last week. I had a bit of a computer panic to deal with.  You see, I was a computer geek in the 1980s, when the PET and C64 were all the rage.  Of course, like most non computer people, I never kept up with the Morse Law, and thank my lucky stars I didn't try.  Who wants to learn a whole new language every 18 months!  Anyway, I'm a bit of a computer dummy right now.  I'm not even good at learning to use new programs like I used to be.  I blame that on MS Office 7.  It is SO user unfriendly it's unreal, but that's a topic for another blog.  Anyway, my Internet Explorer crashed on me the other day. I couldn't go anywhere or do anything on the net.  So I couldn't update my blog or even catch up on my reading. After days of trying to figure out what was wrong, my computer guru friend that does technical writing for Windows at Microsoft figured out that I had a stuck key on a keyboard I only use for writing long blog posts or job applications.  Who knew it could cause such turmoil!  In the end, nothing's wrong with the computer, but I did read an entire book trying to keep busy.

So what has been going on in the garden do you ask?  Well, we've had sub-freezing temperatures with off and on snowfall for over a week.  As a result, it hasn't felt quite springy around here.  On the plus side, my seedlings upstairs are going gang busters.  The downside is that even with my hoop covers in place, I wouldn't trust them in the garden right now.  It's just too cold.  The shock alone would kill them and I'm afraid to take the flat for a daily walk to acclimate them to the weather.  I guess I should just start harvesting salad greens indoors.

I wish I'd checked on my seedlings while the lights were on, because you should really see my earliest tomatoes that germinated.  The plants are downright ready for potting up, or selling as ready-to-plant at a garden store.  I've got 3 really healthy plants that are probably a few weeks away from setting flowers!  A few more are getting their first true leaves, including the one that I have three seedlings in a 9 oz cup.  EG, I sure hope I can duplicate your success with separating them from their confines.  Wish me luck when I do pot them up...

I finally got to read Laura's blog, only to find that she planted her brassica's (cole crops or broccoli/cauliflower if you will), a few weeks ago.  GRRRR. I hate being so far behind her. I totally missed it.  So before I wrote this I ran out to the garage and threw together a handful of soil blocks and filled them with broccoli and cauliflower seeds.  This tray is now resting on top of the bin I'm using for the three remaining ungerminated tomato cups on top of the refrigerator.



Oh, the one off block was planted with the last of my 2008 cauliflower seed. Let's see if it germinates as well as my 2011.  Just an FYI, each block has 2 seeds, so I'm expecting to thin. 

It's funny how I am such a garden optimist, when my brother is the opposite.  He likes to say he's an "accidental gardener."  He says he plants 10 seeds to hope to get 2 seedlings, when he really ends up with 8 or so.  I plant 2 to get 1 and hope to thin.  Odd how our philosophies are so different for gardening, but in the rest of our lives, we're reversed.  Today my wife said I was too negative, which is true and probably related to the economy and my inability to find a job.  Thank goodness I've got my garden and possibly chickens to cheer me up. Come on spring!

Enjoy your garden!