Seed Starts

We are growing more plants from seed for 2010, and I've been experimenting with some techniques to hasten and maximize germination.

For anyone starting plants from seed, I recommend that you do your research! In the past I've wasted seed and lost plants because of simple lack of knowledge. There are some great resources linked from this blog.

I purchased germination mats ($24.99 each at The Barn Nursery) to warm the soil in my germination flats. In the first of these these (planted on March 29), I sowed Holy Mole pepper, Early Girl and Rutgers tomato, and four varieties of basil. After four days, the cotyledons are up for all basil varieties and the Rutgers tomato. I can see that the Early Girl tomato is also about to poke through.

There are no seedlings yet in the other flat (planted on March 30). That is to be expected, because these plants and varieties usually take about a week to germinate:

Spear's Green tomato
Yellow Pear tomato
Louisiana Long Green Eggplant
Snowy Eggplant
Chocolate Pepper
Chinese 5 Color Pepper
Emerald Giant Pepper
Yellow Monster Pepper

In addition, I've been experimenting with okra seeds. Some people recommend soaking okra seeds in water for 24 hours, then planting only the ones that swell. So, I set up a plastic egg package to test whether or not soaking the seeds makes a difference. I planted seeds from 3 different varieties (Burgundy, Clemson Spineless, Dwarf Green) in the rear row of cups, and put the little "greenhouse" in the sun.

I put the same number of seeds in water for 24 hours...

By the next day, the majority of the soaked seeds had swelled. For the photo below, I placed a dry seed below the center group to show the size difference. A few of the seed covers had split.

I planted these seeds in the front row of cups and gave the greenhouse another day in the sun. After just three days, the seedlings are coming up in both rows - but more seedlings have grown from the soaked seeds and they seem to be a little more developed. We'll see how they do in the next few days.

Starting Up

With spring break coming to an end, I can no longer spend most of the day playing in the garden. Here's what I've been up to... Last week in the garden cool weather weeds were thriving and spring bulbs were in bloom.

When the daffodils, grape hyacinths, and iris are done flowering, I'll dig them out and move them so we can expand the vegetable beds without destroying the plants.

I almost missed the pleasant surprises growing among the vetch and henbit. Can you spot the red-leaf lettuce poking up through the weeds? These plants grew from seed sown in fall '09. I salvaged a number of plants for transplant - and some wild green onions for cooking.

I also spent some time gathering dandelion leaves, because I remember how my mother used to make delicious cooked greens from this spring weed. However, the result was a bit of a disaster. No amount of bacon grease, salt, garlic or pepper could mask the acrid taste! Mom, how did you do it?