Seeds Arrived!

Finally this week my seed order arrived. Because I ordered them from Fedco through my local Coop, they were put in as a bulk order towards the end of January. I went to pick the seeds up on Monday. Unfortunately the later order date meant I didn't get any Fortex pole beans nor any Paprika pepper seeds. I guess those will have to wait for next year. The Coop order is nice because of the discount. However, next year I'll put in an early order for anything that is limited and for my onions and peppers which I want to have early.

As soon as I got home, I laid them out and sorted them into my seed box. Then I planted the 2 varieties of peppers that came, along with the onions. Last week I'd started the peppers I hand on hand, as well as my leeks. Some of the peppers are sprouting already!

Seed Sorting & Sharing

I decided today to spread out all my seeds and re-organize. It seemed like a good task for the coldest day of the year. I had been keeping some of them in a small set of hardware drawers in the refrigerator, but the seed packets didn't fit well and folded in half they would get stuck when I went to open the drawers. Bigger seeds were in jars, and other packets were in plastic bags. It was time for a new system.

I spread everything out on the kitchen table. Many of the older seed packets, I re-packaged into the coin envelopes I've been using for the seeds I saved. I grouped the seeds by type and used an index card to label them, before rubber banding them together.
They all went into a plastic shoe box in alphabetical order and back in the fridge. Now when my Fedco order comes in I can easily add them to the box.

In sorting through the seeds, I made a list of seeds I have plenty of and am willing to share with others. And I noted what seems to be missing. It would have been wiser to do this before I placed my seed order. Oh well.

Here's what I'm willing to share. Most of these are seeds I saved, unless otherwise noted.

Red Kale
Mache
Purple Haze Carrots- Jungs (I have more than I can plant in a lifetime)
Habanero Hot Pepper
Amish Paste Tomato
Purple Calabash Tomato (my favorite from last year)

The following three came from overseas. The seed packs were huge.
Chinese Green Onions
Chinese Bok Choy
Red Curly Lettuce

I'm happy to send seeds to anyone who wants some as long as I have some left to share. No trades are required. If you are willing to share some of your own seeds, I'm looking for a variety of cucumber seeds, radishes, and other lettuce & greens. If you're interested, please email me ( emb03 at alum dot dartmouth dot org )

2011 Seed Order

I placed my seed order before Christmas with our local Coop. They do a bulk order to Fedco and get free shipping and 20% discount. They send me a post card with the order is in and I pick it up at the store. It's a nice advantage, and they are based in Maine so the varieties they recommend are adaptable to my cooler climate. Here's what I ordered for this year's garden to add to the seeds from previous years.

Beans & Peas
Fortex Pole Beans
Roma II Romano type Beans
Cannellini Dried Beans
Windsor Fava Beans
Mammouth Melting Sugar Peas

Corn
Dakota Blue Popcorn (I hope it will be a good experiment)

Squash
Coastata Romanesca Zucchini
Benning's Green Tint Patty Pan Squash
Marina di Chioggia Winter Squash

Root Vegetables
Over the Rainbow Carrot Mix
Touchstone Gold Beet
Red Marble Onion Seed
Varsity Yellow Onion Seed

Greens
Giant Winter Spinach
Winter Lettuce Mix
Red Tinged Winter Lettuce
Minutina
Pink Lettucy Mustard Gene Pool

Brassica Family
Piracicaba Broccoli (had to try this after seeing it in so many harvest photos last year)
Gustus Brussels Sprouts
Rainbow Lacinato Kale

Peppers
Boldo Hungarian Spice Paprika
Jimmy Nardello's Pepper
Carmen Sweet Peppers (on Henbogle's recommendation)

Tomatoes
Cosmonaut Volkov Tomato
Black Prince Tomato
Sun Gold Cherry Tomato

Herbs
Genovese Basil
Lime Basil
Bodegold Chamomile
Ziar breadseed poppy

My potato order had to be sent separately as the coop doesn't do a bulk order for those. I ordered 1# of Rose Finn Apple Fingerlings, 2.5 # each of Irish Cobbler and Adirondack Blue, and 5# of Romanze, a red-skinned storage potato.

The rest of the seed catalogs were waiting for me when I returned home from Christmas travels. However, as I paged through, there wasn't much that I was interested in. Fedco's catalog is so extensive that others feel brief and lacking in variety. Two things did catch my eye and that was artichokes and edamame. Thomas had such beautiful artichokes last year. The artichokes caught my eye in another catalog but when I compared prices, Fedco was still the best. So I'll put in a one line order for artichokes. Edamame will wait for another year.

This list is not the entirety of what I'll plant next year, nor is it all my new seeds. I picked up some seed packets on sale at the end of the season last year. They included American Flag Leeks, Gardener's Delight Cherry Tomatoes, Asparagus Yard Long Beans, Dwarf Grey Sugar Peas, Laxton's Progress # Shelling Pea & Moon & Stars Watermelon. With the seeds left from last year, there is plenty of variety.

In less than a month it will be time to start some hardy seeds for the cold frame!

New Seeds from China

This year is the year of international seeds in my garden. First Miss M sent me some from Canada (OK, so it's not that far away). Today I got a package in the mail from my sister. I'd asked her if she could find me any Chinese vegetables seeds while she teaches in the northern part of China.

From all I can tell, she sent two types of possibly mustard greens (top), bok choy and a red leaf lettuce.These appear to be a bunching onion, a yellow tomatillo, and a purple cherry tomato ( the large word Melon seems to be the brand, tomato is there much smaller).A few of the packets have this interesting note in English. I guess I better consider myself a professional grower to open the package.

I'm excited to try these seeds out. I'm starting the cherry tomatoes tonight since they'll have to catch up with my other seedlings. The tomatillos may wait until next year since they look similar to some I got from Daphne and already started. The greens will come in due time once things warm up a bit.

New Seeds!

New seeds came in the mail this week and the week before last. Thanks to the generosity of Miss M at Dirt Happy, I now have more seeds to try in my new garden.
She sent:

Dragon Tongue Beans
Small Sugar Pie Pumpkin
Jarrahdale Pumpkin
Red Acre Cabbage
Broccoli Ramoso
Purple Calabash Tomato
Sweet Chocolate Pepper
Long Purple Eggplant
Iroquois Melon
Minnesota Midget Melon
Winter Savory (Perennial Herb)

I'm very excited that I'll have room in the garden for melons, pumpkins, and winter squash and I'm glad to try out these varieties.

Thanks Miss M!

Seed Starting

Update to the Seed Starting List

2/25/10
Chocolate Cherry Tomato (2) from Daphne
Red Zebra Tomato (2) saved 2008 from a store bought heirloom
Green Zebra Tomato (2) saved 2009
Sweet Chelsea Cherry Tomato (2) 2009 Fedco

My hope is that by starting my earliest tomatoes, I may get some fruit before mid-August.

2/28/10
Arugula (14) 2009 Peaceful Valley
Tatsoi (14) 2009 Peaceful Valley
Swiss Chard (10) 2009 saved (Bright Lights Chard, but the plant I saved them from was red so I'm curious to see whether they turn out more than one color or not)
Spinach (14) 2008
Cubanelle Sweet Peppers (4) from Mom

I got seeds in the mail from my mom so I needed to start the Cubanelle Peppers. We are just under a month from our closing date on a new house and when we drove by the house today they had less snow then we do. So I sowed some hardy greens in hope that we might be able to move the cold frame and transplant them into the ground in early April. We may have to dig the cold frame out of the snow here to make that happen.

First Seeds Started

Spring is on its way. Each day we can feel the sun getting warmer. Our temperatures have been unseasonably warm (above freezing!). Today I cleaned my seed starting trays with a mild bleach solution and started my first seeds.

I started my herbs because I found last year they were not big enough nearly soon enough. I started Rosemary, Oregano, Summer Savory & Sage. I have overwintered two thyme plants , one rosemary and two sages but the aphids are starting to attack those and so I'm hedging my bets by starting new seeds. These overwintered plants have been babied under the seed starting lamp but now they have been relegated to a sunny window so I can start other plants.

I also started three Winterbor and three Lacinato Kale, and six oak leaf lettuce. When we move I want to be able to move the cold frame in the new garden and place these inside.

Finally, I started my hot peppers. Last year I struggled with germination, and it took over a month for one. This year I'm finding a warmer spot and starting a month earlier. I planted 4 Habanero seeds from some peppers my mom gave me this summer. And I seeded 8 peppers from a Burpee Hot Pepper mix.

Here's the list so far:
2/21/10
Rosemary
Oregano
Summer Savory
Sage
Lacinato Kale (3)
Winterbor Kale (3)
Oak Leaf Lettuce (6)
Habanero Peppers (4)
Mixed Hot Peppers (8)

Garden Plan 2009

I am taking advantage of not having school today because it is Town Meeting Day to plan my garden. I liked the idea suggested on Henbogle of using an Excel Spreadsheet because you can easily move things around. I use the square foot method, so I made my 3' by 8' beds with square cells. I planned what the garden would look like in April (if I'm lucky enough to be able to get the ground thawed then) and May. Then I copied those plans and added in the June plantings of warmer weather crops. The crop name is followed by how many plants I'll be putting in the square.

My beds are actually actually oriented horizontally next to each other like bricks are in a wall, but for the spreadsheet and the image it was easier to place the north bed above the south bed. Below is the plan for April/May.
And here is the plan for June.
I didn't plan beyond that because everything is subject to change and July's arrangement will depend on how fast earlier crops mature.

Last year I experimented with a lot of variety but it felt as though we just had little tastes of each kind. This year, I'm trying to plant more squares of fewer kinds of vegetables. I left out winter squash because it takes up so much space and I only got one squash from each plant last year. I left out the brussels sprouts because they take so long to mature and take up a fair amount of space too. Last year I experimented with leeks and shallots and onions. The shallots were poor, as were the onions. The leeks did well, so if I see seedlings as deal I might try to squeeze some in.

I added cucumbers to the plot because I enjoyed making pickles last year and it would be easier if they come from my own garden. We enjoyed the Romano Beans last year but they didn't make good Dilly Beans. So I ordered Blue Lake Bush beans and we'll give those a try instead. We loved our Rainbow Chard last year so I'm planting more as well as a variety called Pot of Gold that is all yellow. We enjoyed an asian green called Tatsoi when we got it from our CSA so I'm giving that a try too. We enjoyed beets, but prefer golden beets so I added those varieties. I added another variety of carrots (Purple Haze) and made sure I gave them a sunnier spot so that they will mature faster. I'm expanding salad greens by adding Freckles Romaine Lettuce and Arugula. We're also planting more spinach. I'm giving peas another try, though I need to pick up some inoculant so that hopefully they do a better job of sprouting than before.

My tomato varieties are up in the air. I saved a few seeds from my yellow heirloom last year and a few zebra tomatoes from store bought heirlooms. I'm not sure if they'll sprout, or if I'll be able to raise healthy enough seedlings with only my sunny windowsills. I'll give it a try and if it doesn't work, revert to other sources.

So now that my garden is planned, it is time for the snow to start melting.Only 9 inches to go!

Seeds for 2009

The seed catalogs have been rolling in ever since Christmas. I finally broke down last night and ordered some because there were two things I really wanted for my garden in 2009: golden beets and red dragon carrots.

I looked through the catalogs and decided to order from Peaceful Valley because their packets were $1.99, and they the price if you order more than 5 packets, and if you only order seeds, shipping starts at $2. It seemed like everything was meant to be. They had golden beets and dragon carrots from Seeds of Change in the catalogue. I picked out a few other things and then went to order online. Would you believe, that both golden beets and dragon carrots were out of stock! I checked on Seeds of Change, but their note on the dragon carrots says that there is no seed as of 12/31/08. What a bummer. After seeing the dragon carrots on Dan's site this summer I really wanted to plant them next year. So I paged through the other catalogs at my fingertips and found some Purple Haze Hybrid Carrots, and Burpee's Golden beets. They were more expensive and shipping was more, but I really wanted these two things.

Here are my new seeds for 2009:

Burpee Golden Beet
Purple Haze Carrot
National Pickling Cucumber
Tatsoi
Blue Lake Bush Beans (oops, I meant to order pole!)
Freckles Lettuce
Yellow Chard: Pot of Gold
Arugula

I'll be using these seeds left over from 2008 (and years past)

Bright Lights Rainbow Chard
Dark Green Bush Zucchini
Chantenay Red Core Carrots (though they didn't have a red core)
Danver's Carrots
Oak Leave Lettuce
Longstanding Bloomsdale Spinach
Romano Bush Beans
Lacinato Kale
Santo Cilantro
Bouquet Dill
Ruby Queen Beets
Cherrybelle Radishes
Catskill Long Island Brussels Sprouts
Sugar Daddy Sugar Snap Peas
There maybe more seeds in the jar that never made it on my list and I'll find them tucked in there come spring.

Also this year I saved seeds from my marigolds and nasturtium. I also saved a few tomato seeds from some heirlooms from the store but I'm not sure I have the set up to start them properly. Maybe I'll give it a try anyways. I do plan to have tomatoes and a few hot peppers, but will need seedlings. I'd like broccoli too but probably won't start it from seed either since I only have room for a few plants. The garden plan is still very much up in the air.

P.S. In writing this post I looked back at Dan's site, and he said he found them on Seed Savers Exchange. I checked there and they are available on that site, but I'd already placed my other orders. I don't really need purple AND red carrots in addition to the orange varieties still in the refrigerator from last year. So I guess Dragon Carrots will have to wait for another year.