Seeds and Squash

Yesterday I managed to be fairly productive in the garden, planting carrots, lettuce, squash, and doing a little garden maintenance.

In my vegetable garden I planted eight 36" rows of carrots , Carnival Blend from Botanical Interests, alternating with Renee's Garden Asian Baby Leaf mesclun. Row spacing was 3" with seed spacing of 3" as well.

Next door to that patch I planted seven 36" rows of carrots (six more rows of the Carnival Blend and three of Little Finger - also Botanical Interests) alternating with Renee's Garden Cut and Come Again baby mesclun. Again, 3" spacing all around.

Between these two patches there was maybe a 3" gap where I transplanted two Butternut Squash seedlings. One of the transplants has two vines while the other has four. I think I will thin that second one down to only two vines once it has settled and I can decide which two are the strongest. The spacing between these two transplants was 15" with five radish seeds planted evenly between them.

Tranplants

Butternut Squash in the Ground

At the end of the second patch I transplanted two zucchini seedlings. Again, with 15" spacing and 5 radish seeds between them. Both these transplants already have flower buds on them, which I left because I'm not particularly fond of zucchini, but I do enjoy squash blossoms. Perhaps within a week or two we'll have our first taste!

Zucchini Squash

Zucchini with buds

At the L corner, just next to the rhubarb plants, I planted my Wyatt's Wonder (giant pumpkin) plant. It has two somewhat sickly looking vines (somewhat yellowed and dry) but there are some new green leaves emerging so hopefully it can recover. I also planted an Acorn squash transplant at the southwestern corner of the strawberry/flower bed. This is a bush type squash, so I'm hoping it won't grow all over the place.

I planted borage seeds as well yesterday. One on each end of my tomato bed, one at the Western corner of my vegetable bed near the chainlink fence and one (or two...I think I lost one) at the corner of the L between my rhubarb and Wyatt's Wonder. Borage is a fantastic bee attractant and has pretty little blue flowers that look lovely floating in punch bowls or as a garnish for appetizers or salads.

Rhubarb
I also planted three Durango marigolds, one at each end of my tomato bed and one in the very center. Armstrong was having a 2-day sale (79 cents/4inch marigold) so bought those and eight more that will find their way into the vegetable bed. Marigold roots excrete a pesticide that supposedly lasts for a couple years in the soil even after the marigold is gone. They are the go-to plant for companion planting....and they're pretty too!



Tomato Bed
Lastly, I watered down all the beds and pots with fish tank water, since our fish tank was badly in need of a water change. The nitrate rich water is a great, low dose fertilizer and with a 160+ gallon tank, there is plenty of it. Finally, I set up more bird netting over the vegetable bed so that the dogs (and other lesser pests) will hopefully stay out of it.




Fava Beans looking tall!

Show Me the Green

My first strawberry leaves have started to pop up along with the first sweet pea, and many of the fava beans are breaking ground as well!

Strawberry Start (Sequoia?)

Fava Bean and Sweet Pea Shoots

I spent the afternoon double digging the vegetable bed. I got halfway done, so hopefully I'll finish that up tomorrow. It won't be a minute too soon either. I put peas in wet paper towels on Monday and they're already trying to sprout. The sooner I can get those off my kitchen counter and into the ground, the better!

Squash/Melon Flat

Pepper Seedlings

My seedlings are coming along. Many of the herbs died, but the squash, melons, and peppers are all putting up their first true leaves.

Dead Herbs (except one Cilantro)

I reseeded a few pots in my squash/melon seedling flat today. The first seeds sprouted promptly and then wilted. I was afraid I'd lose the whole flat that way, but they seem fine.
Hopefully these seeds catch up soon.

-Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Plants in the Ground!

I spent several hours this afternoon finally putting plants in the ground instead of just digging the place up! Along the eastern wall of my garden there is now a row of ~27 fava beans (I forgot to count before some of them got buried) with 3-4 sweet pea seeds in between them.

Strawberry starts were placed in an intensive pattern with 12 inch spacing. On the south end of the bed there are 12 Ozark Beauty starts, on the north end are 12 Sequoia starts, and in between there are 12 Quinalt starts. Because these form a pretty diamond pattern due to their spacing I planted seeds between them. Inside each diamond there are now three beet seeds around two globe amaranth seeds with mesclun seeds sprinkled randomly throughout. In each front triangle along the wood partition there are lobelia seeds with poppy seeds at the top of each triangle. Towards the back, just in front of the fava/sweet pea row, there is a row of swiss chard planted between the strawberries sprinkled with dual colored caesar romaine and patches of three bachelor's button seeds just in front to fill out the triangle.

I expect to see favas and sweet peas pop up in only a few days since most of them were already sticking their little roots out and a few were working on their stems. It's so exciting to finally have something in the ground!

First Plants!

I tore out the ugly mess of last year's potted tomatoes today (Elliott and my landlord are probably happy about that!) and replaced one of the dead tomato plants with my little Martino's roma tomato. I'm so happy to have plants planted! I planted him in Home Depot's budget potting soil (which appears to be mostly sawdust). He got a couple tablespoons of E.B. Stone's Sure Start fertilizer and a couple tables spoons of John and Bob's Soil Optimizer. The latter I picked up at Armstrong Garden center over the weekend while attending a (mostly useless) free seminar on tomatoes. The "expert" raved about this stuff so I thought I'd give it a try this year.

I also dumped all the dead potted plants on the side yard and front porch. I wish I'd done it months ago as it looks so much neater now. Oh well...now I can fill them up again when I get a chance :) Update 4/2: I planted 8 sweet pea seeds around the roma, leftover from my fava bean/sweet pea planting. My hope is that they will climb the trellis while my tomato grows inside, and by the time the tomato gets really going the sweet peas will be spent. It may be too warm a spot there for my sweet peas though. I suppose we shall see!

Seedlings Update

I moved some of the basil out of the covered seedling tray so that I can keep that tray covered. In their spot I put some Bon Jour Bicolor corn. The Marigold and Borage seeds I think are just not coming up, so I replanted their spots with Globe Amaranth seeds. I also added more Sweet Basil seeds and Scallions seeds because only one Sweet Basil seed sprouted and three Scallions. The new layout can be seen here:

Nasturtiums in Bloom

The nasturtiums have started blooming the last couple days. Maybe there will be enough next weekend to do some experimenting with them in the kitchen. All three varieties are starting to bloom, though the Vanilla Berry variety is not nearly as all over the place as the other two. They're still flowering though, so maybe next year I should stick with this smaller plant.

Vanilla Berry

Fava bean plants are growing strong and have loads of flowers on them. Some of the flowers towards the bottom are beginning to wilt and show signs that they'll produce a pod. Should have loads of fava beans in another few weeks to put in the freezer. Alas, some sort of bug has also taking a liking to the fava bean plants. It doesn't seem to be hurting the plants at all, but there's these little not quite sesame seed sized black bugs that are clinging to a couple of the stalks. They're so numerous that the whole stalk in that area looks black. Those areas also seem to have quite a few ants crawling around...not sure how the black sesame seeds are related to the ants but until the fava beans start to show some discomfort with the situation, I think I'll leave them be.

Strange little black bugs

All my leafy greens have been getting munched on by something over the last few weeks. I've got several holes in each leaf of my Asian mixed greens, Swiss chard, and the beet greens so I spritzed everything with some neem oil. If that doesn't work I'll dig up the bottle of Bt I have laying around somewhere.