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Thread: Seeds

  1. #1

    Default Seeds

    I like this time of year when all of the seed orders are in. Even though there is still about a foot of snow out in the yard.
    Already have the onions and artichokes in under lights (they went in 3 weeks ago and are already up.)
    Artichokes are a new one this year. Up here you have to start them early then put them out in the cold frame in March (about 40°) for 3 weeks so they think they've been through a winter.

    Have to start thinking about setting up the rest of the grow lights in the garage. The fam is joking that this year the neighbors are going to think we're growing pot out there. LOL.

    Actually I was thinking about growing one just to see what the flower looked like. Never seen one in flower and it is a native wild flower after all. Was bummed that you have to grow them under lock and key and not just out in the garden though. Hmmm....could be a new career for me as I get into retirement age. A little steel building...some grow lights...some heat and AC...soil base and organic. If I could find a way to grow it out under real sunlight, even better. Hate the smell of the stuff though and the smoke gives me a really bad histamine reaction. Be happy to sell it though.
    Last edited by LowKey; 02-05-2017 at 06:08 AM.
    If we are to have another contest in…our national existence I predict that the dividing line will not be Mason and Dixon's, but between patriotism & intelligence on the one side, and superstition, ambition & ignorance on the other…
    ~ President Ulysses S. Grant


  2. #2
    Senior Member ClayPick's Avatar
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    Low visibility this morning. The prevailing winds are out of the west. I'm not sure if it's fog or smoke rolling in from Maine and Massachusetts ....... best go stand outside.LOL!

  3. #3
    Senior Member hunter63's Avatar
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    I hear ya.....do while you are young enough to do it and support it.

    For years.. started flats of veggies, flowers and over winter and took cutting of geraniums to spread them out.

    At one point had 32 flats started....under lights, on shelves in the basement.....4 stands or four shelves each plus top some tops.
    Set up in a "U" shaped w/card table in the center for tall stuff.

    Come spring moved everything out to the garage...used old doors on kids wagons to place flats on to roll in and out......
    Had a small green house....but ended up cooking the plants while I was at work....didn't work out (still have the frame)

    Ended up giving a lot of veggies away to friends and neighbors.
    I did it for fun and the diversity of growing what I want, and under my control...

    Was NOT cost effective...and ran the numbers to prove it......when flats were and still are like $12 buck for 48 plants.

    Have stopped doing this and cut down working in the garden....to a few tomatoes, peppers and climbing purple beans....
    Was wonderful to see those little seeds start and grow....and they were mine....

    Just the 2 of us now...so Saturdays is a day of Farmers market, lunch there....the a few yard sales and a nap.....LOL

    Still like getting the catalogs and pouring over them..... in the dead of winter.....
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  4. #4
    Administrator Rick's Avatar
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    I installed six raised beds at the church last fall so I'll be starting plants under grow lights in a couple of weeks. I'll be installing six more beds this fall. All have underground irrigation.

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  5. #5

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    Rick that setup looks real nice!
    Is it a community thing at the church?

    It's been a wee bit too cold here to do anything outdoors. First day in a week we've broken 30°
    Got 18" of snow last Tuesday too.
    Artichokes are still out in the garage. Broccoli and cabbage are up. The tomatoes are just thinking about it. I see the soil was lifted this morning on them. No heat mats so they all have to tough it out at about 50° out there.

    H63, I hear you on the cost of flats but these days those plants, you don't know where they're coming from. I had a 6-pack of peppers, all died of some fungus disease and took out the cherry tomatoes in the next bed as well. Not cool. Had a bunch of onion sets once too, a couple years back, from big box store, that came in all infested with botrytis of some kind.

    If you think about it too hard, you get 75 onion sets for $7, of those 50 or so develop into real sized onions. How many 5 pound bags of onions can you buy at the store for $7? I just put a crapload of Spanish Yellow seeds that cost me $1.49 in an open flat in January, keep em trimmed to 3" until they go outdoors in (hopefully) April. They take a lot of abuse. For that $1.49 and some electricity I can get over a couple hundred good sized seedlings

    Sweet potatoes are worse if you buy slips each year. Can cost $14 a dozen plus shipping. I'm on my third year growing my own slips. I do a dozen plants and get a pantry drawer full of potatoes that'll last until April or May. They'll start sprouting in the drawer around the beginning of February. I just cut those sprouting tops off as I use em, give em a little hydration in a dish of water for a few days, then pop em into a flat out in the garage. They'll grow roots in a couple days. None of this toothpick and water glass nonsense. Once the leader gets to be 4" tall, I'll break it off and put it in its own pot. It'll grow roots pretty quick if you break off and bury one leaf at the axil at the bottom. That allows the others on the potato stub to decide who is next leader. Same thing for that one. Usually only one or two per stub though. The biggest and best.
    If we are to have another contest in…our national existence I predict that the dividing line will not be Mason and Dixon's, but between patriotism & intelligence on the one side, and superstition, ambition & ignorance on the other…
    ~ President Ulysses S. Grant

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    Administrator Rick's Avatar
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    Yes. Our county Soil and Water Conservation District is pairing community gardens with food pantries. This is the first year for it so we are on the ground floor. Our church will be donating all the produce to food pantries. The maters are up and the peppers are juuuuust starting to peek through.

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  7. #7

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    I've heard of lasagne gardening but that is a different take on it.

    Seedlings looking good there.

    I have to save seeding out the peppers until the weather warms more and I can actually start them outside in the cold frame. They don't like the cold garage this time of year. Trying eggplant this year and they are doing the same thing peppers do - deformed leaves and generally unhappy.
    If we are to have another contest in…our national existence I predict that the dividing line will not be Mason and Dixon's, but between patriotism & intelligence on the one side, and superstition, ambition & ignorance on the other…
    ~ President Ulysses S. Grant

  8. #8
    Senior Member hunter63's Avatar
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    Heater from old water bed....?
    It has a T-stat.
    Geezer Squad....Charter Member #1
    Evoking the 50 year old rule...
    First 50 years...worried about the small stuff...second 50 years....Not so much
    Member Wahoo Killer knives club....#27

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