If we ever get summer this year ...

Wow, it has been a cold and wet Spring so far. One week of lovely weather, where my seedlings could finally go outside, and now here they are again indoors as it gets down to 0 overnight. It would be nice if Summer would finally arrive. That looks to be this week (fingers crossed)!

But the seedlings are doing well and that week in the warmer weather outdoors helped. The tomatoes are large and the stems are strong even if they are bending over a little. That is quite common, sometimes people put a stick in the pot to tie them straight but I don’t bother. When you plant tomatoes out into the garden, you want to plant them quite deeply anyways, much deeper than they are in the pot. It encourages them to grow stronger root systems as they can grow roots all along the buried stem. I plant them deep enough that only one or two sets of leaves are still showing above ground, so if they bend over a bit in the pot, it doesn’t matter in the end because that part of the stem will be underground eventually anyways.The seedlings are back outside, as of today, to prepare for planting.

One more of the pepper varieties has grown properly, so I will have one chili pepper and one sweet pepper this summer. I’m glad I have another, but am still disappointed. The peppers whose seeds didn’t germinate well were commercially bought, and I will be looking for a different seed source next year. To have such poor germination, and across several varieties, doesn’t speak well.

The onions are still small but growing. Only about half of them went outside that week, but they actually perked up a lot, and the stems got stronger. Once the weather warms again, they will all go outside and hopefully I can rescue the onion seedlings even if they will be getting a late start!

Squash and Cabbage seedlings are already planted out into the garden, as were the pea seeds and they seem to be surviving the dip in temperatures. Potatoes were planted as well. Peas are already coming up! Half the tomatoes are planted as well - they sulked in the unexpected cold but are starting to perk up a bit. I really need to get to the square of the garden where the carrots and onions go, weed it, and get them in the ground ... those are behind. Then the cucumbers,  which are huge and clearly need to get out of their pot and into the ground, and the rest of the tomatoes and peppers.

Then I’ll have to move back to weeding the flower gardens. It always amazes me that weeds can flower and go to seed before you can barely even get out into the garden in the Spring. It makes it very difficult to keep up with. I always start with the vegetable gardens because they need to be planted early, but then the flower gardens need to be tended and I’ll be playing catch-up. With the hard, freezing cold winter we had, there is a lot of die-back and a lot of plants that didn’t make it, so there will be quite a bit of clean-up and moving things around this year ... unfortunately.

Seedlings

The seedlings for the year are coming up nicely. I am most impressed with the cabbage and squashes so far, they look really healthy and strong. The tomatoes look good, although they could really benefit from some sunlight (real sunlight) and a light wind blowing them around (to make the stems stronger). Today was the first day that it was warm enough to set them outside in some light shade for a couple hours - it was above seasonal temperatures here, people were wearing tshirts and some were even wearing shorts. It will cool off over the rest of the week but I think I'll try to get them outside for a couple hours each day to start acclimating them. They are getting too tall for the grow lights anyways!

Disappointing so far have been the onions, and the peppers. One pepper came up well, all seedlings sprouted, and is strong and healthy. The others are weak and poor germination, and I'm not sure why. They got the same soil and same treatment as the other pepper, and all the tomatoes, which are all doing fine. Perhaps it was bad seed, some old seed? Some seeds I got in a trade, others I purchased fresh this year, so I'm not sure. I'm going to plant some more and see how they do. Its getting late in the year to be planting peppers from seed but I have so few that I really need to try something.

The onions are disappointing from a different perspective. I like growing onions from seed, you can choose the variety, and sets are very vague (white onion, spanish onion, is about the extent of the varietal information). Onions from seed aren't supposed to be too hard either, just need to be started quite early. But mine never quite work out the way I plan. They sprout, but they are so skinny (even under strong grow lights) that they end up lying down instead of growing sturdier stalks, and then eventually wilt and die away. I have no idea what I'm doing wrong but I'm going to be looking at some "internet research", as my sister kids me, to figure it out. They are alive, but not very strong or healthy looking. Certainly nowhere near ready to be planted, and they should be getting close to garden planting now. This is the second year in a row and I need to figure this out!

But so far so good on everything else. Potatoes are cut and waiting to sprout a little, and then they will get planted into the garden too. Snow cover over the garden is gone (finally, after such a long and tough winter) so it is almost time for potatoes, onions (if they make it), cabbage, peas, carrots perhaps (direct sown).

Next up, starting some flower seeds. Once some of the herbs and early veggies are moved outside, I'll have space under the grow lights for some flowers. Sunflowers, marigolds (for the tomato patch), I'm going to try a couple asters, hollyhocks and columbines this year as well to add to the flower gardens. I'd really like to try and get a good hollyhock patch growing. They are bi-annuals so they only bloom every second year. Most varieties are, at least, some of the newer ones can bloom annually. But with the bi-annuals, you have to have some in their first year (growing year) and some in their second year (blooming year) to have flowers each year. They will re-seed themselves, although I always scatter seeds to help them along because they struggle in the mulch of the garden. I have a couple hollyhocks, but I'd like to try to develop that into a couple nice patches that can pretty much take care of themselves. They are so beautiful and tall, and bloom for such a long time in the summer.

Seed Starting

It seems to early in the year to be thinking of starting seeds, and the winter is still raging outside with snow banks taller than I am and no sign of stopping just yet. I can barely see the garden gate (it is buried that deep in snow) let alone the garden, but it is the very beginning of seed starting time up here in my Zone 5 garden.

This is the weekend when we start the earliest seeds, to give them enough time to germinate and grow strong enough to go outside at the last frost date. Mostly, this is the weekend to start onions. I also usually start Parsley at the same time as well.

Unfortunately my onion seeds haven't arrived yet, but will be here shortly, so I am preparing to plant them as soon as they get here. You have to grow "new" onion seeds every year because, unlike some other vegetables, onion seeds don't last very long. You can either grow  from the ones you collected the year before or you can buy new every year. I haven't had the patience yet to let some onions stay in the garden a second year until they go to seed, therefore I buy new seeds each year. This year I ordered "Ailsa Craig" from Heritage Harvest Seed and "Australian Brown" from Baker Creek Seeds. "Ailsa Craig" is supposed to be quite large and mild, a yellow skinned Spanish type onion, better suited to eating fresh rather than storing. "Australian Brown", on the other hand, is a great storage onion with a stronger flavour and gets good reviews for consistent performance in heavy clay soil. I'm excited about both!

I have also narrowed down my list and planned the vegetable garden. I'll be trying corn for the first time, which is exciting. I hope the racoons don't discover it!

Parsley "Giant of Italy"
Cilantro "Slo Bolt"
Basil "Corsican"
Dill "Dukat"
Summer Savory
Mint: Orange Mint, Spearmint, Apple Mint,  Chocolate Mint
Oregano
Rosemary
Chives
Thyme
Lemon Thyme
Celery "Tendercrisp"
Summer Squash "Ronde de Nice"
Summer Squash "Costata Romanesco"
Winter Squash "Boston Marrow"
Cabbage "Red Express"
Cabbage "Early Jersey Wakefield"
Cucumber "Japanese Long"
Carrot "Amarillo"
Carrot "Nantes Coreless"
Onion "Australian Brown"
Onion "Ailsa Craig"
Garlic
Bean (bush) "Piros Feher" (shelly)
Bean (bush) "Ireland Creek Annie" (dry)
Bean (pole) "Amish Gnuttle" (dry)
Bean (pole) "Good Mother Stallard" (dry)
Corn (sweet) "Simonet"
Pepper (chili) "Alma"
Pepper (chili) "Black Hungarian"
Pepper (chili) "Pasilla Bajio"
Pepper (sweet) "Marconi red"
Pepper (sweet) "Jimmy Nardello"
Pepper (sweet) "Sweet Chocolate Bell"

Tomatoes - this year's colours of choice, to narrow down options, are white and black:
Amazon Chocolate
Black Ethiopian
Black Krim
Black from Tula
Paul Robeson
Brad's Black Heart
Bedouin
Nyagous
Noire de Cosseboef
Japanese Black Trifele
Carbon
Sara Black
White Wonder
White Queen
Great White
(also one of White Beauty, Snowball, or Cherokee Chocolate)
and the paste variety Cuore di Bue

So, the onion seeds will get planted when they arrive and next up will be the Peppers (both Sweet and Chili) somewhere around the second week of March. Hopefully it will look and feel more like Spring then!