They can make it… I hope. See what happened is I bought a shoplight and 2 plant bulbs way back before I planted my first seeds. I wanted to be prepared. Then I waited until the plants were sprouting and hooked up the light. Of course it didn’t work! Why would it? So plan B involved me going to the hardware store (not where I bought the first light) and finding another light that was supposed to be compatible with my plant bulbs. Luckily this one works. Now I know that my next batch of seedlings will have a good light, I’m just not sure how this first batch will do. As you can see they are awfully spindly and crooked right now from seeking out natural light. I rigged up the light in my closet and plan to plug it in with my Christmas light timer set for 14 hours of light per day. How are your seedlings doing? Anyone care to place bets on whether or not these seedlings will be worth a darn?
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I Started My Seeds!
I’m not exactly sure if this was the right time to do it, but I did it. The weather will never be exactly right in Michigan anyway. Here’s what I started on Sunday: Snapdragons – 9 cellsBaby Dolls – 9 cellsPing Tung eggplant – 9 cellsLong Purple eggplant – 9 cellsAmish Paste tomatoes – 36 cells I used equal parts of peat moss, vermiculite, and perlite as a starting mixture. The plastic cells and trays are being reused from last year. I’ll be starting another batch of tomatoes in a few weeks as well as some other flowers, my herbs, broccoli, and some others I’ve forgotten. Right now I have the tray down by our corn burner to stay warm. This next goal is to get Brian to hang up my new lights so the seedlings can go under there once they sprout. It feels like spring it finally here!
Continue readingBack 2 Basics and Other Challenges
I’ve decided to start the Back 2 Basics Harvest Keeper Challenge for 2009. Chicken eggs will be the only thing on the list for now but I am excited to see things rack up once spring arrives. This will be very good for me because I kept no records from all of the farming and canning I did last year. Check out my sidebar if you’re interested, and go visit Farm Mom for a better example. Other challenge updates: We haven’t been using our corn burner at all due to it malfunctioning and refusing to keep a fire going. Brian is trying to track down the problem but in the meantime we’re blowing our budget with all the fuel oil we’re burning. So much for keeping track of the corn we use! We do keep the thermostat set low (58-62 F) and I finally found the controls for our dual heated blanket so we use that every night to take the edge off. I covered most of our windows with the clear plastics kits in the fall and although I don’t how much that is helping I do like that I can’t feel a breeze when I walk by the
Continue readingHow Do You Start Your Seedlings?
I am happy to be back to blogging after the holiday. I meant to leave a more upbeat post up over Christmas but have been having a lot of trouble with my internet connection and therefore gave up. I have some nice Christmas pics to post and I’d like to share what gifts we gave this year, as well as some nice things we received. Today, though, I would like to discuss something that has been on my mind a lot, and apparently on others too. Let’s talk about garden plans! The latest edition of Hobby Farms is full of tips and tricks for garden planning. Sharon Astyk posted awhile back about signs of a possible seed shortage so I sorted through what was left of last year’s seeds and made my list for this year. I order my seeds almost exclusively through Baker Creek Seed Co. at rareseeds.com. They are a great company to deal with and produce a wonderful catalog chuck full of good information. The real reason I prefer them is because they care so much about seed integrity and I trust them. Frankly, I don’t have to time or the knowledge to sort through other catalogs
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