With our bulb onions already starting to show sprouts (so quickly!) I’ve got a bee in my bonnet about getting the shallot seed started, too. With how dry the loose peat in the K-cups are in the middles, this time I wanted to make sure the peat was thoroughly saturated before putting them into the planting trays.
After looking at what we had available that is cat proof, I settled on reusing a container from cheese balls that we would sometimes get at Costco. I’ve been keeping the containers like these, in various sizes, to cut open and use as cloche in the garden in the spring, but they are coming in very handy in other ways! We don’t actually buy these treats very often, which means that at this rate, I’m using them up pretty fast!
At least for this, I don’t have to cut it apart, so it will still be usable when it’s done. Because the peat is so very dry and fluffy, I made sure to scoop quite a bit into the container, filling it to just under half full.
Then it was time to add water. The arrow in the above image is the water line! The peat just floated on top.
It took a while to mix the water into the peat. Even when I thought I was done I’d uncover another dry clump of peat!
Then it was time to cover it, to keep the cats out.
They were very interested in the process. It the few seconds it took me to put the mixing spoon down and pop the lid on the containers, Saffron was pulling at the spoon, trying to drag it away!
Once it was set aside to sit for a while, before we can see if it needs more water or not, I checked the space I had in the big aquarium. How many egg flats would I be able to fit inside? One, for sure, but would I be able to fit two?
Yes!!! Each tray holds 30 eggs, so I’ll have close to the same number of potential seedlings as the seed tray the bulb onion seeds are in.
The next question was, what to put under them to support them when they need to be moved?
Handily, I had a piece of leftover rigid insulation that was large enough to fit both trays. So I cut it in half, and we’ll be able to move them around independently, even after the cardboard has started to get soft.
I don’t have anything I can use as a drain tray that will fit, unfortunately. If I did, I would be keeping them watered from below. Ah, well. We’ll manage!
Since I was checking sizes, anyhow, I checked to see if these would fit in the 20 gallon, for when we start the bunching onions. One tray does fit, but it’s a bit too snug. We would not be able to lift it out again later, without problems.
But that’s okay. When my brother and his wife picked up groceries for us, there were no flats of eggs available, so they got us 2 packs of 18 eggs. Those will fit, plus I have long, narrow scraps of the rigid insulation I can put under them, to support the bottoms when it’s time to lift them out of the aquarium.
This is going to work out rather well!
Also, that magnificent tail in the above photo is Fenrir, sitting on the light fixture. She did not approve of my activities! :-D
For now, it looks like I’ll need to add more water to the peat, so I will probably leave it to continue soaking overnight, and plant the shallots tomorrow.
What a fun and cheerful thing to do, to keep us thinking of summer on a cold, cold day! :-)
After having to get creative to prepare our first tray of seed starts, we left the tray overnight to give the peat in the K-cups more time to absorb the water.
I didn’t check it until late morning, and the peat was still dry in the middle! The water was basically staying on top. It was better than before, though, so I went ahead and planted our first seeds of the year!
I used a skewer to make holes for the seeds and sprayed more water into the holes in the K-cups (the peat pellets were fully saturated). Then I poured some of the seeds into a small dish and used the dampened, flat end of the skewer to pick up seeds and transfer them into the pots and lightly cover them. Using the skewer works really well! I ended up using only about half the seeds in the package to fill the tray, and that’s with 2 or 3 seeds each! Then I sprayed the tops with more water – especially the K-cups – before getting a daughter to help me transfer it into the big aquarium.
I am not going to use the tray’s dome to cover them, as the high humidity can promote mold growth. Instead, we will be checking them every day, and probably spraying them daily. The tray is designed to water from below, to encourage the roots to grow downward, so we won’t keep up the spraying for too long. It’s mostly the dry peat in the K-cups that concerns me. I will also be leaving the light on all the time until the sprouts are emerged for a few days, then reduce it to about 16 hours a day. Hopefully, we will soon have a tray of shallots in here, too! Before filling any pots (if I can’t get more pellets), I’ll have to make sure to use a container to saturate the peat in, first, then fill the pots.
Meanwhile…
I’m a suck.
I’ve mentioned that a few times, usually in the context of cats, but it turns out I’m a gardening suck, too.
Last night, the girls and I were pouring over a satellite image of the property. We marked out the current garden beds, and we have been using it to figure out where we are going to plant various things.
One thing is for sure. If we aren’t able to get a load of soil this spring, we’re lining ourselves up for some back breaking labour, and probably a lot of failed growth. Last year, we basically dug small holes for everything we planted, filled the holes with a soil mix, then planted or transplanted into these in-ground “pots” we created. That’s fine for the small garden we had last year, but not so much for this year! The soil is so hard and filled with rocks, it’s difficult to use a spade or hoe. Even sticking wire flags into the ground left me with several bent flags from hitting rocks. We have so few tools here, we don’t want to break what’s left of what we’ve found! My mother still goes on about how we could get one of the tillers fixed and using it, but I’m pretty sure we’d just break a tiller, trying to use it! I couldn’t even use the soil auger drill attachment when we planted all those bulbs in the maple grove last fall. The original plan had been to slowly build up areas and increase our garden size over several years, but… well, then the world went crazy.
We have so many more things we’re planning to grow compared to last year, it’s going to be a huge job. Especially the area where we want to plant the tallest things – 3 of our corn varieties, and the giant sunflowers. We’re wanting to start going into an area that has never been part of the garden before, and has only had grass on it. Two of the reason we grew giant sunflowers last year was for a privacy screen and wind break. We’re still keeping that in mind for this year. Between tall plants, using trellises, and whatever we come up with to keep the deer out, we should be able to make a pretty decent privacy screen. We may be in the boonies, but the main road goes right by the garden. Aside from vehicles slowing down to watch the deer at the feeding station, through the lilac hedge, we’ve got our vandal and his creeping about to contend with. :-/
As we talked about what seeds we have now, and what will be shipped in time for spring planting, we ended up talking about other things we’d like to plant, and I showed the girls some things I’d found on the Baker Creek website. We have a lot of things that are purple (corn, potatoes, sunflowers, beans, carrots…). We had a blast looking up other purple things, and talked about having a purple themed garden. So, of course, I was adding all sorts of things to my wish list.
I really ought to know better. :-D
Yeah, you guessed it.
I made another order this morning!
Thankfully, seeds are still cheap.
When I placed the order, there was a highlighted note telling people that, because there are so many more orders this year, things are taking longer to process. For us in Canada, that means it could take up to 3 months for our seeds to arrive. That would be too late for anything that would require starting indoors, but that’s okay. I’d rather order them now, while they are still available.
So, this is what we’ve ordered (all links will open in a new tab, so you don’t lose your place. :-) ).
Spoon Tomato: this is the one that I really wanted to show the girls – and then we got sucked into the vortex! We are not big tomato eaters; my older daughter enjoys eating them, and we have ordered a mix of cherry and grape tomatoes for her, but when I saw these “micro mini” tomatoes, I just had to show them to her. While they are incredibly small (possibly the world’s tiniest tomato), they’re supposed to be big on flavour. They’re adorable!
Chinese Pink Celery: this is a new variety for Baker Creek, and one that was already on my wish list. I was thinking for next year, but I went for it. These are supposed to be easier to grow than other types of celery, and seem to be well suited for our climate. Hopefully, we’ll get them early enough to plant them this year.
King Tut Purple Pea: This was another one already on my wish list, and since we’re going with a purple/pink theme, I included them. We only have 1 variety of peas right now, anyhow, and I felt it wasn’t enough. I’d resisted ordering more, since we already have so many other things, but… it’s peas. Can you have too many peas? I don’t think so. I highly recommend checking out the link and reading the story included about them. :-D
Merlot Lettuce: lettuce is one thing I had not included in previous orders for various reasons. We’ve tried growing lettuce before, in our balcony gardens, and never had much luck with them. Plus, they just seem to go bad quickly. But as we were looking at the purples and dark reds, these stood out. Not only do they have an amazing colour (they are well named!), but they are bolt resistance and cold tolerant.
Lunix Lettuce: Every time I see the name, I want to say “Linux” instead of “Lunix”. LOL These have such deep, dark red leaves! Bolt resistant, and apparently great for hydroponics and off season low tunnel growing. We’ve been looking at ways to use poly-tunnels to extend our growing season, so it would be good to test these out.
Lollo Rossa Lettuce: This is a very dramatic looking head lettuce! Also noted for its great flavour. I’ve had no luck growing head lettuce before, but maybe now that we have the spaces that we do, we can make it work.
Dishcloth or Luffa Gourd: this one’s for me! We have so many squash already, the last thing we needed was one more but, like I said, I’m a suck! Chances are, we won’t be able to start them this year, but they seem to be having a surge in popularity, so I figured I should get the seeds now, while I can. Young squash are edible and tasty. Left to fully mature, the gourds are dried, peeled, the seeds shaken out, and the remaining sponge is great for washing with. I don’t think I’d use something that size as a dishcloth, but in the shower, they are great for exfoliating the skin. You’ve probably seen them in stores, along with the back scrubbers and such.
Along with these, we will also be getting some free mystery seeds that Baker Creek always includes with their orders.
This really should be the last of the seeds we order, but I’m pretty sure I said that after our first two orders for this season! :-D
For our Zone 3 area, quite a lot of things will need to be started indoors. While most things won’t need to be started until April, onion seeds are supposed to be started up to 10 weeks before the last frost date. For us, that means late March.
However, all the experienced Zone 3 gardeners that grow onion from seed have been saying onion seeds MUST be started much earlier. They started theirs in January!
Do I go by the seed packet, or by these gardeners?
I have decided to listen to the gardeners, at least as much as I can.
The problem is we don’t really have supplies, and with the polar vortex we’re under right now, I do not consider it safe to drive. I just don’t trust that our van, or even my mother’s car, can handle it. In these temperatures, breaking down on the road is life threatening.
So, I can only start with what I have.
We have two seed starting trays that fit the Jiffy Pellets. We found a box of Jiffy Pellets while cleaning up the house. Unfortunately, there were enough pellets to fill only half of one tray.
K-cups to the rescue!
We used to have a Keurig, but when it finally died, we found ourselves left with boxes of product that expired. Rather than throw them all out, I emptied the contents into the compost and kept the cups, specifically to use them for starting seeds. :-)
Their bottoms fit in the trays, but the flared tops needed more space, so I put the pellets in alternating spaces, then punched drainage holes in all the K-cups with an awl.
We’ve still got peat from last year, so that was used to fill the cups.
They fit rather well, this way.
I have enough K-cups to fill another half tray, with a few left over, but no more peat pellets to fill the spaces in between.
We’ll figure it out.
The tray went into a shallow storage bin, where I filled the bottom of the tray with water. Then, to keep it safe from cats, I put both the dome and the other tray, upside down, over it, then put more stuff on and around it. The cats really wanted to get at that peat!
Remembering how difficult it was to fully dampen loose peat last year, I added more water to the top, the left it sit for a while. I used that time to cut label markers out of a 500g size plastic container.
We have three different types of seeds; bulb and bunching onions, and shallots. I can only start one variety right now, so I decided on the bulb onions. The shallots will be next, and I figure the bunching onions can wait until we can figure things out and maybe get more supplies.
The tray got checked several times, more water was sprayed onto the top, and I finally ended up leaving it overnight. The above photo was after soaking for several hours, and I’d just sprayed more water to the top.
This morning, I took a skewer and checked the status.
The centres of the K-Cups were still dry!
I ended up using the skewer to make holes in the peat of each cup, then used the stream setting on my spray bottle to direct water directly into each hole.
Before anyone suggests that I should be using a potting mix, or a seed starter mix, there are two reason why I’m using straight peat. One: one of my information sources is a soil scientist living in the same zone was we are, and she recently did a video on exactly this. Since every seed has all the nutrition it needs to support itself until the true leaf stage, sterile peat and water are all they need. I would have preferred coconut coir over peat, but we don’t have any. Two: we don’t have any seed starter mixes, nor the supplies to make our own. Some stores are starting to have them in stock, however many of these places do not accept medical exemptions to mask wearing, so I am essentially banned from them. Of those that don’t discriminate against people with medical mask exemptions, they’re a long drive away and I won’t be going to any of them until this polar vortex passes and it isn’t so dangerous to go out. Even curbside pickup is not an option; I’ve already heard from many people who can’t wear masks and have tried to do curbside pick up, only to be refused service because the staff refused to bring their orders to them, outside, unless they wore a mask. Not even shields are being accepted. As for ordering online, shipping costs rule out that option, as well as the current delays in shipping. They’d never get to us in time to use them, assuming they even find us. Which reminds me. We never did get my husband’s FedEx delivery (for something he ordered online in November). As far as we know, the package is still somewhere in the city. We can’t get it ourselves, and they won’t deliver it to us, even with detailed instructions on how to find us. So… yeah. Ordering online is not an option, either.
So we make do with what we have. It will work out.
At this point, I’m just hoping to be able to get the one variety of seeds in today!
Hmmm. Our internet is cutting in and out like crazy today, so I’m hoping I’ll be able to post this right away!
Today, our first batch of seeds from Veseys came in. Yay! There are more that will be shipped later, but even so, that little box was just jam packed! You can read about all that we ordered, and why we chose what we did, here (link will open in new tab).
This is what we got in today.
First, the wildflower mixes. These are both for planting in the fall, so we will have the summer to prepare the locations we intend to plant them in. The Western mix is intended for outside the yard, between the fence and the road, to attract pollinators. We have not yet decided exactly where the Alertnative Lawn mix will go, other than well away from the house. My husband is allergic to bee stings, so anything like these needs to be planted away from any doors, the path towards the garage, and the firepit.
Spinach is among the items we will have to ensure are protected from deer. In talking about it, the girls and I are leaning towards building simple box frames with wire mesh that will fit over the beds.
Here are 2 of the 3 varieties of beans we orders; a yellow variety will be shipped later, plus the peas. The collection I’d intended to order for peas suddenly went out of stock, so I ordered these as an alternative, and I’m still seriously considering ordering another variety or two. I like peas more than I like beans! :-D
The girls and I are looking into various trellis designs for these. Yes, I know, bush beans aren’t supposed to need them, but we are looking to grow as many things vertically as we can.
We already have 2 varieties of corn from Baker Creek Rare Seeds, so we might not actually plant these at all this year. It all depends on how well we are able to prepare growing spaces. The Rare Seeds varieties are priority, and we have to keep in mind that we don’t want them to cross pollinate.
The pelleted seeds will be much easier to plant!
We now have 4 varieties of carrots, and I will happily plant them all. Carrots are a favorite vegetable in our household. The challenge will be creating the soft, deep soil they need. We have space to create one more bed in the soft soil where the wood pile used to be, and that’s it. Our topsoil is shallow, and we have a lot of rocks. My mother always successfully grew carrots in the old garden bed area, but I don’t think the soil has been amended since my parents sold off the cows and retired from farming. Raised beds would be the solution. At this point, the girls and I are thinking we’re going to have to order in a dump truck load of garden soil. We have not yet decided where we will build permanent raised beds, so any beds we do build this year will likely be temporary.
At least we don’t have to worry about the deer going after the carrots.
Three of the 4 varieties of onions are in; the 4th variety are sets that will be shipped at planting time in the spring. I’m hoping to plant these in the old kitchen garden, near the house.
The beets are intended for the additional bed we’ll be preparing next to where the garlic is currently planted, where the old wood pile used to be. My daughters had wanted to get another variety as well, but they were sold out. These might be enough. Like the spinach, we are thinking of protecting these from the deer with a wire mesh box.
We got extra cucamelons, just in case the tubers I dug up and currently have stored in the old kitchen, where it’s not quite as cold as outside, don’t make it. We intend to plant these along the chain link fence bordering the south yard. The melons will be trellised, elsewhere. Possibly near…
…the squashes we will be trellising. :-) I am hoping to build squash arches for those.
The summer squash will, hopefully, be trained up stakes. We could get away with letting them spread on the ground, like we did last year, but it’s supposed to be healthier for the plants to train them up, while pruning off the lower leaves.
Speaking of summer squash…
Last summer we ordered a summer squash mix, with extra sunburst squash. We enjoyed them enough to order the same thing again for next year. I was a bit confused as I unpacked them from the box, however…
Somehow, I accidentally ordered three collections!
Totally my goof on that one.
I’ve offered the extras to my siblings. I don’t even know if they like squash. If they don’t want them, we’ll just keep them for next year! :-)
In the spring, along with the onion sets, cherry tomato mix, yellow beans and mulberry tree, we will be getting 4 varieties of potatoes. While using the Ruth Stout, no-till, heavy mulch method did work last summer, we are thinking of using grow bags or something similar, next year. Those would give us more flexibility and, hopefully, higher yields.
The more I think about the condition of our soil, and the spaces we will be working with, the more I think getting a truckload of garden soil is going to be the best thing we can do at this point. I would much rather build up the soil over time, but I simply did not expect the soil condition to have deteriorated as much as it did, over the years. Plus, given how much my planned timeline for cleaning up the yards has been pushed back, anything that we can to do make up for that will be good.
We just have to find a local source and see how much it costs. I think it’ll be worth it, in the long term.
The Re-Farmer 