‘Dig’ The Earth

It’s Saturday morning and though I got a late start on seeding my flats this year I am pretty happy with my progress.  I have one mini greenhouse, one milk jug and 2 of the 10″ x 20″ black plastic flats with clear plastic domed covers planted.  After just 4 days I even have some sprouts from one of the flats.

Green Mini Greenhouse: The Basil Flat

I had forgotten how many varieties of basil I had until I went through my seeds the other day.  This will be my second attempt to get some decent plants out of these seeds.  Instead of using store bought peat pots or plastic trays in this mini greenhouse I used my hand rolled newspaper pots that I made a few years ago.  There was enough room for 11 rows of 7 little pots.  I labeled the lid with the seed name and L for left and R for right and the base with L and R so I could keep tabs on which row was which.  They were planted, watered and set in a south facing window with the cover on and vents closed on 4/14/09.

These are the seeds planted in the mini greenhouse from left to right:

• Cinnamon Basil
• Purple Basil
• Italian Sweet Basil
• Dwarf Bush Fineleaf Basil
• Spicy Globe Basil
• Greek Basil
• Fino Verde Basil
• Summerlong Basil
• Siam Queen Thai Basil
• Lime Basil
• Easter Egg Plant (no this isn’t basil, but I had an extra row )

Flat 1: Tomatoes and Peppers

I have a myriad of tomato and pepper seeds.  Since they have similar requirements for temperature and light I decided to plant them in one flat together.  The flat has 16 rows of 8 cells each.  The seeds were planted, watered and covered and placed over the top of my 30 gallon aquarium on 4/14/09.  The temperature above the aquarium and aquarium light is about 80 degrees providing a warm enough temperature to encourage germination.  After 3 days some of my tomatillo seeds (that are 6 years old) already started to sprout.  Yesterday morning, the 17th, I moved the flat to the south facing window.  This morning I noticed that one of Robbie’s Tomatoes had started to sprout.

These are the seeds in Flat 1 from left to right, and bottom to top (or front to back):

• King’s Choice Hybrid Tomatoes/Beefsteak Tomatoes
• Robbie’s Tomatoes/Spike’s Tomatoes (unsure of varieties, harvested from relatives gardens 2 years ago)
• Mom’s Tomatoes/Mystery Hot Pepper
• Olena Ukranian/Italian Market Wonder/Bonny Best/Golden Queen – only had a few seeds so I planted 2 of each
• Costoluto Genovese/Cosmonaut Volkov/Marglobe VF/TigerLike Tomatoes – 2 of each
• Assorted Tomatoes/Speckled Roman Heirloom
• Tomatillos
• Delicious Tomato/ Mystery Tomato
• Jelly Bean Hybrid (commercial ’07 pelleted)/commercial ’08 pelleted/harvested ’07 fermented
• Chile Arbol
• Chile Bola
• Chile Guajillo (4)/Cajun Tabasco (2)/Cuban Hot (2)
• Chile Ancho (aka Poblano)
• Green Bell Pepper/Red Bell Pepper
• Jalapeño Early Pepper/Serrano Pepper
• Marconi Red Pepper/Cayenne Pepper

Milk Jug Greenhouse 1: Mary Washington Asparagus

In this milk jug there are 19 hand rolled newspaper pots with Hoffman Seed Starter mix.  There are air holes cut in the top and sides and drain holes in the bottom.  The pots were seeded and watered and placed outside on 4/16/09.  The Mary Washington Asparagus seeds from 2004 season were put in warm water and allowed to soak for 10 days (hope it wasn’t too long; I kind of forgot about them ).

Flat 2: Herbs and Veggies

This 10×20 flat was filled with 8 9-cell trays.  Each tray holds one variety of seed.

These are the herbs and veggies planted in flat 2 listed as laid out in each tray (since I didn’t plant them in rows per se):

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Fennel	Oregano	Lemon Balm	Summer Savory
Marjoram	Curled Parsley	Early Golden Acre Cabbage RadicchioMilano (1) Early Golden Acre Cabbage	Broccoli Waltham

Well then here is the start of my planting for the 2009 season. I truly hope I didn’t get started too late. I think this afternoon Yeyda and I will go outside once the baby falls asleep so we can start cleaning up the yard. It feels phenomenal to have the windows open finally after being trapped in the house for so many months.

With below zero temperatures, several inches of snow on the ground and a newborn to take care of that keeps me inside all the time – I am seriously missing playing in the dirt.  Now that my pregnancy is over and my body is feeling more normal than it has in 9 months I want to get back to gardening.  There is a lot of catching up for me to do as far as cleaning and rearranging in the house before I can set up any place to do my winter sowing.  I better do it quick though or before I know it it will be March and time for me to start my seedlings indoors!

I guess you could call this recycling. My husband’s cousin’s widow gave me a 10 gallon fish tank that she said she was just going to throw away. It was practically brand new and in perfect condition. So, I couldn’t turn it down. The filter that came with it was very poor quality and insufficient for the needs of a fully stocked freshwater tropical fish tank. No wonder they couldn’t keep any fish alive in it. Anyway, after about a year of trying to keep it going with fish they all died and I turned it into a greenhouse for starting my seeds instead of throwing it out. I figured it has the special aquarium/grow light type lamp and it would hold heat and moisture well; it should work.

I used some of the newspaper pots that I made for my winter sowing project for this greenhouse. I fit in 15 rows of 8 mini pots each with orange juice carton pieces as dividers and markers. This is what I planted between April 23-25, 2008:

Date Planted	Row	# Planted	Bought/Rec’vd	Type	Common Name
4/25/2008	1	4	11/8/2007	Fruit	Tomato, Tiger-Like, IND, 70+ DTM
4/23/2008	1	5	11/8/2007	Fruit	Tomato, Costoluto Genovese, IND, 90 DTM
4/23/2008	2	4	11/8/2007	Fruit	Tomato, Italian Market Wonder, IND, 75 DTM
4/24/2008	2	4	11/8/2007	Fruit	Tomato, Olena Ukrainian; IND, 85 DTM
4/23/2008	3	3	11/8/2007	Fruit	Tomato, Bonny Best; IND, 72 DTM
4/24/2008	3	3	11/8/2007	Fruit	Tomato, Livingston’s Golden Queen, IND, 78 DTM
4/23/2008	3	3	11/8/2007	Fruit	Tomato, Cosmonaut Volkov; DET, 75 DTM
4/23/2008	4	9	10/23/2007	Fruit	Tomato, Assorted
4/25/2008	5	9	11/8/2007	Fruit	Tomato, Marglobe VF, DET, 75 DTM
4/24/2008	6	9	10/23/2007	Fruit	Tomato, Speckled Roman Heirloom
4/25/2008	7	9	2003	Fruit	Tomatillo, Mexican Husk
4/23/2008	8	9	4/15/2007	Fruit	Tomato, Jelly Bean Hybrid, Indeterminate
4/25/2008	9	9	9/30/2007	Fruit	Tomato, Delicious
4/25/2008	10	9	2003	Fruit	Pepper, Chile Bola
4/25/2008	11	9	2004	Fruit	Pepper – Ancho/Poblano
4/25/2008	12	9	2003	Fruit	Pepper, Cayenne
4/25/2008	13	9	2004	Fruit	Pepper – Jalapeno Early
4/25/2008	14	8	2004	Fruit	Pepper – Marconi Red
4/25/2008	15	9	2004	Fruit	Pepper – Serrano

 

I watered the whole thing with a pint of water with 2 baby aspirin dissolved in it. Supposedly the aspirin is going to aide in germination and ward off dampening off.

On Monday of this week I was searching through the “barn” and found an old waterproof lamp that’s made for a 15 watt bulb to give heat. I wasn’t going to use it for it’s original enclosure so I brought it in, cleaned it up and hung it inside the fish tank greenhouse as close to the top as I could get it. It keeps the temperature in there a steady 72 F. Both the aquarium light and the heat light are kept on 24-7.

It’s paid off already. I was misting the little pots and noticed that I have three sprouts – 1 of the Marglobe Tomato and 2 of the Speckled Roman Heirloom Tomatoes. In the picture you can barely see them so I’ve circled them in green. Hopefully once their baby leaves unfurl I’ll get a better picture. Not bad for only 5 full days in the tank and 3 under the heatlamp.