Home Garden & Early Tomatoes

Although this weather really hasn't been cooperating, I finally have managed to get the home garden planting up to date!

Monday I planted the 10 early tomatoes. Four of them are in the greenhouse bed and the remaining six are in Kozy Koats (water cloches). I planted one each of the following varieties, Matt's Wild Cherry (a/k/a "Garden Helper's Tomato"), Howard's German Red, Pineapple (seed from Diana), Black Cherry & Paul Robeson (seeds from EG). I also planted 4 Cherokee Purple. Each one is from a different seed source. CP's are our favorite eating tomato and I have not been happy with the seeds that I purchased for a couple of years now. Thanks to Diana, Thomas, EG & Daphne we now have  a lot of CP's! It will be very interesting to see if there is much difference in this tomato from these four sources.

Early Tomato in Kozy Koat. It's hard to get a good photo with the red color reflection. The plants are doing well in the cloches.

Tuesday, between rain drops I fixed my old strawberry bed for the new owner next door and did some much cleaning up out back. We were starting to look like "Those" nieghbors! I put the shelves up in the greenhouse and moved 4 flats of plants out there to live. All of the eggplant, peppers, some herbs and misc seedlings are now living happily outside!

Peppers in the greenhouse with 3 extra early tomatoes that presently have no home.

A bud on one of the peppers

More seedlings in the greenhouse. The rosemary is doing well!



Wednesday I finally got to sow 4 large planters of carrots! Between the weather and running to the plots I have not been able to get them in. First I had to turn the compost pile to get some much needed compost to add to the planters! I am hoping that the carrots will love these nice deep pots. The carrots were covered with burlap and a tile to keep them moist. If Granny were here, I would have had her cut some nice round pieces of wood with the jigsaw to cover them...you know how handy she is!!

Carrots sown in planter. I even started to set-up the patio furniture.



I cleaned up the flower pots on the deck and porch and planted some new mint I had grown in a few small pots. Six celery plants were put in at the end of the garlic bed and most of the early potatoes were finally planted! I planted 2.5 lbs of Yukon Gold and 1.25 lbs of Sangre. The balance of the Sangre potatoes and the Kennebecs will be planted at the plots today. It seems so late planting the potatoes, but it really isn't. I always plant my potatoes when the first dandelions bloom and yesterday I saw the first one.

Potato bed next door with early potatoes.

The Sugar Magnolia Purple Snap Peas are doing the best out of all of the peas I have planted at home. The Little Marvel English Peas germination rate is a little sporadic. I may sow some additional ones this weekend.

I'll be heading over to the plots shortly and will post what has been going on over there tomorrow. Have a great gardening day everyone!



Planning the Gardens for 2011...phase 1

I have been spending a great deal of time this past week or so working on garden plans for this year. Most of the time has been spent on seed ordering, seed organization and researching some varieties of veggies and fruits. I am pleased to say, that I think that I have this part pretty much worked out. All of my seeds and most plants have been ordered. I still have to order the raspberries, strawberries and asparagus plants though. I even found a local source for artichoke plants! This was a big relief since I really don't think I will have the time to try to grow them from seed this year.

"The Italian" and I have been working on the excel worksheet where I try to keep track of everything for the garden. A lot of changes have been made to it....so, hopefully I will keep it updated as the season progresses! I do think that I am going to create a separate sheet and print it out to keep track of the daily harvests. This sheet will be kept in the kitchen and "The Italian" can then update the worksheet in the computer once a week......unless HE comes up with a better idea!!

We have estimated the amounts of produce that we think we need for the year and added that to the sheet. Hopefully, Mother Nature and the critters will cooperate and we will have most of the staples we need this coming year!! Believe it or not, with the 221 lbs of tomatoes harvested last year.....we did not have nearly enough to keep us for a year!!

I have already received two of my seed orders. This is the first time that I have ordered from Pinetree and Baker Creek. I only ordered two packs of seeds from Baker Creek and they sent me two free packs! How Nice!

Phase 2 of the garden planning is the garden layouts. I have worked on them a bit on paper....but, most of the information is still in my head!

So...how are your gardening plans for 2011 coming along??

Seed & Source Recommendations Please!!

Now that the hustle and bustle of the Holidays is over, I finally went through all of my seeds. There are a few veggies and fruits that I would greatly appreciate some variety and source recommendations on.

Veggies:

Artichoke, Globe, plants - to buy on-line, I have completely failed growing them from seed and I did not like the variety I purchased last year (I had Imperial Star)

Asparagus Plants - to buy on-line, I have never grown asparagus

Brussels Sprouts - (I planted Long Island) mine grew nice and big, but they did not form heads early enough...I'm still waiting for them to get bigger

Cabbage, Red - I always grow Savoy and it does well. I would like to plant a red variety though

Cauliflower  - (I planted Early Snowball) mine grew well despite the hot weather. I would like to try another variety as well

Corn, Sweet - I have never grown corn in my home garden

Corn, Popcorn - My mother used to grow a great popcorn when I was growing up. I don't know what variety it was.

Lima Bean - I'm looking for small limas, pole if there is such a variety

Pumpkin - I'm looking for a good pumpkin for pies



Fruits:
 
Raspberry, canes - I have never grown raspberries
 
Strawberry, plants - I will be making another bed for strawberries. I have several varieties planted in the bed I have now....but, they are all mixed up and I lost the tags!! I want to plant both Alpine and June