From summer to spring again

The weather has changed again.  Our 80's are gone and we are cool and rainy today.  This is a relief to me as I was going to have to water the raised veggie beds tonight if it didn't rain.  The cool weather crops of lettuce, radicchio, cabbage, chard, spinach, and peas are sprouted from the heat but enjoying a long cool drink that has been falling most of the day.  I took a quick walk after work to find most of these crops pushing the row cover up a bit.  I like to leave the row cover on so the bug problems are minimized and weather damage is greatly reduced.  The leafy crops are so much nicer growing under a sheet of row cloth.  It is a small investment that is easily recouped with better crops and less use of bug control products.

I moved the tomatoes, peppers, impatiens, and the younger seedlings in for the night.  It is best to not chill these plants and have their growth set back.  They really like it warmer, so I won't put them in the ground for another couple weeks.  I wait until at least the first full week of June to set their roots in the soil.

The lilacs are in full bloom this week and smell wonderful.  The crab apples are on the down hill slide and had a shower of petals falling on the ground this morning.  That is always a pretty sight to watch.  

The forsythia put on a good show this year.  The park has a large hedge row of them that had grown over with weeds and brush.  A former homeowner concerned about security in his yard had the park cut everything to the ground over three years ago.  The forsythia responded to the renewal cut with a very profuse bloom this year.

My husband is getting ready to set the posts for the kiwi trellis.  We are going to use a T-bar and wire support system.  I also want to espalier and apple tree, so he will set a third post and tie into one of the kiwi post for both applications.  I am looking forward to the new challenge.

The asparagus which I just covered is now 8" over the new soil that I just added to the trench.  I should be able to completely level the bed this weekend.  The purple passion stalks are different from the usual green.

The last of the seedlings are up.  I should be able to move more of the basement plants out to the outdoors this weekend.  Lights will be going out on multiple levels.  I will probably dismantle the light and shelf system over the kitchen sink and just go outdoors with most everything at this time.  I may still start one more crop of summer lettuce to put seedlings in between pepper plants and under beans.  It is nice to have them all space out when they go into the garden.

Big planting weekend coming up with Memorial Day giving us a long weekend.  Get out to the garden center these last couple days before the mob hits the garden centers.

The best laid plans

I was so excited about getting all my seeds.  I had great plans for what I would have in my garden.  I was really looking forward to three different kinds of flowering kale.  Well,  what did I do with them???  As it happens in my house, things go missing.  How three packages of seeds got separated from the rest is beyond me.  I looked everywhere logical and even some not.  No seeds.

One set of my asters did not germinate, at all, the other variety is fine.  I have seeded both collected and purchased black-eyed Susan vines to see how collected seed performs.  I lost some plants to neglect.  I thought the seedlings were fine only to come home from work to find some plants permanently wilted.  The Celebrity tomatoes barely made six plants because of that mistake.  Luckily I went over-board on varieties so I have other plants to fill the spaces...so far.

Other things I am happy with.  I had good luck rooting cuttings of several plants and was able to successful divide others.  I am rethinking how many plants I want to carry over from one year to the next.  I had all three tiers of lights going this last winter and that is more than I usually burn.  I would like to look at the difference in the electric bills from one year to the next.  It may not be an accurate assessment as we also had a more mild winter last year and we used less heat than the most recent one.  I also don't know if I like taking care of so much in the off season.  If I had a well lit, sunny greenhouse to retreat to rather than a basement, it might be more appealing.  Ahh, to dream...

The spring is coming in slow but sure.  I have been able to quickly move plants in and out at night with my wheeled shelf.  I need to expand operations with a set of stationary shelves for the plants already hardened off.  So far the rotation is working this year.  I have room on the shelves for the seedlings almost ready for transplant.  It is a dance of timing and space.

The vegetable garden is at the fun stage to watch.  Seedlings are popping up in my square foot garden making a patch work pattern of greens in rows and dots.  The onions are starting to show their strength in the way they stand straight.  They are still tiny, but they are strong.  The peas are sparse due to the cold weather following my eager planting.  I will get enough to keep me happy, so I can't complain.  The spinach, radicchio, lettuce and cabbages are all putting on new growth and expanding.  I just have to remember to keep them all watered.

My bare-root shrubs that I tucked into pots are sprouting new growth and I even saw some flower buds forming on the kiwi.  I stopped at the garden center for peat pots after work yesterday and left with a Goldencrisp apple and an Alberta peach.  I may have jumped the gun on these but they were 20% off.  I want to make the apple into an espalier so I have a new subject to read up on.  I want to put this in the same spot as our new patio (which is still a pile of bricks next to the garage).  The peach tree will find a spot to stand out in the yard anticipating the ultimate demise of the male mulberry that is growing on the park side of our property line.  With all the hollow spots and cracks, it is only a made of when, not if.  We had it trimmed away from the yard to try and keep it from landing on our garage and shed.  Fingers crossed...

I came up with a pretty cool trellis for my sweet autumn clematis this spring.  I used some of the old wire clothes line and dog tie down to form a frame work.  I used the plastic netting that I ran behind it last year to train it away from the rails and stairs.  The beauty comes in with the grapevine I cut and laced over the rear fence for Christmas lights.  I cut a bunch to length and fastened them to the edges of the frame.  It is functional and attractive.  I think it should hold through the summer especially after the clematis reaches the second floor and grows onto the second set of wires which have carried it to the roof line year after year.

I also got busy with setting out the praying mantis egg sacks yesterday.  The weather has been consistently warm and the timing feels right.  I put them inside upside-down 4" pots with netting over the bottom to keep out predators.  There is one hanging right next to the clematis in the picture next to the drain pipe.  A co-worker orders and sells them every year.  It is an inexpensive and fun project.  Look back to my pictures of the little guys when they hatched last year. 
http://gardeninggwen.blogspot.com/2012/06/praying-mantis-emerge.html

Praying mantis egg case

It has been a busy week in the garden, but the pace has been an enjoyable one.  I was able to mix up the heavy work with some light duty tasks.  I even had the pleasure of going up to the Milwaukee High School of the Arts for their day with the Burpee Grow Anywhere Garden Tour. http://www.burpeehomegardens.com/(S(gf2402r0mzl3vwjqb4vdltms))/Blog/2013/05/07/grow-anywhere-tour--making-milwaukee-smile.html
I came home with a Fourth of July tomato.  They are an early season plant.  I took out my wall-o-water towers and filled them up.  I planted the tomato tonight inside the warm, insulated tower.  It will be fun to see how well the tower works to push the season on the tomato plant.  More on that later.

I certainly spent enough time logging garden time in today, but I love to look back at the digital record to see what worked last year and what didn't.  Once the flowers get transplanted, I may not get back to writing for awhile.  I also have to make at least one visit to the garden centers so I can find some flowering kale plants!

So, what's up?

I kept myself pretty busy with gardening this week.  So much is happening inside and outside the house now.  I will do a quick run-down on the seeds I have gotten in and what has sprouted so far.


Seeding


On 4/9 I seeded agastache, hollyhocks, petunias, impatiens, thunbergia, radicchio, and lettuce.  The hollyhock were up on 4/12, petunias on 4/14, radicchio 4/12, and thunbergia on 4/18.  The impatiens have also started sprouting but very spotty.  That does not make me happy.
On 4/7 I seeded some of the garden seeds. Flowering sweet peas and garden peas were both soaked 24 hours and then into the ground.  The garden peas are up as of 4/18, nothing with the flowering sweet peas yet.  I seeded more outdoors on 4/12, green onions, beets, Swiss chard, radishes.  The radishes were up by 4/18.
On 4/15 I seeded tomatoes, peppers, marigolds, asters, zinnia and nasturtiums. Tomatoes, marigolds, asters and zinnias were all up on 4/18.  
I have one more round of seeding this next week for indoor plants.  I will get the soybeans in the ground this next week along with some of the direct seeding of flowers.  I put the first round of cilantro seeds in the ground over the weekend.  Let's see if I remember to get a few seeds in every couple weeks this year.


Transplanting


This weekend I was able to transplant the earliest seeding from mid-March.  I started them before going on vacation and they had less than ideal germination without someone checking on them twice a day.  I do not hold this against my eldest as she did bring some of them through for me.  The viola germinated the best, and I was able to transplant 36 good seedlings.  Heliotrope came through with 6 plants.  We won't talk about the mammoth stock which are not living up to their name.  I also moved my coleus into larger pots so they can put on a little more growth before May garden time.

Transplanting viola seedlings

Misting in the seedlings

Transplanting coleus to larger containers

If you find a good misting head for your hose, it is a good investment for watering your new transplants.  They stand up to the watering better and are less likely to be washed out until they can put on enough growth to stand up to the regular watering heads.


Some things I have learned this spring...

• Wash all your pots and flats before winter.  It is so much easier to do this job outside than it is in the basement and it keeps the extra dirt outdoors and out of your drains.  I am finding out the hard way that I should have done this.  I have been using bleach and also some leftover pool sanitizers for this job.  Follow label recommendations for use.
• Make a seeding chart, even if it is simple.  I have done a much better job of keeping on task with seeding and transplanting because I had a schedule in my kitchen as a reminder.
• Think about numbers.  You may get 100 seeds in a pack, but if you only want 12 plants, seed only about twice that.  You will go through a lot less guilt over throwing out the ones you really don't need or cannot pass on to someone else.
• Save money on containers in several ways.  Buy containers at the end of the season when they are discounted.  I have saved many pots through the years.  I can't imagine how much I would have spent if I had to go out and purchase everything new.  Even cell packs can stand up to a few seasons of use if you treat them gently enough and clean them up for reuse.  Check with local greenhouses and nurseries if they have containers they are going to dispose of that you may be able to get for free.  Check the curbs in June.  Many people set this stuff out next to their trash in hopes that someone will come along and take it for reuse. 
• Salvage items from the curb for trellising your garden plants.  You never know what you will find for free.  Check out my pieces of orange snow fence that are going to trellis my garden peas.  I also have some curly willow stuck in the rows of sweet peas to add some interest and support.