Trial by Perlite

We went to Home Depot tonight to get a few things.  I had a coupon for $5 off a purchase of $50 that was burning a hole in my pocket.  My plan for today was to try perlite as a seed starting medium.  I saw this on an episode of Wisconsin Vegetable Gardener's weekly webcast.  I thought it was worth a shot.  The perlite is about the same cost as the seed starting soil, so I bought some of both types.  I tried something else.... I put a layer of the seed starting medium down first.  Then, I put the seeds on top of that.  I got some cucumber seeds from my secret santa, so I used these.  Then, I put a layer of perlite over the top of that.  I soaked it down and covered it with a greenhouse cover.  I only turned the light on for the picture.  

You can see my new houseplant on the left.  Since I was able to keep my precious orange hibiscus alive all winter long, I decided to add a palm to the mix.  This palm was on sale at Home Depot for only $12.88, and I was lucky enough to already have a pot for inside the house and some potting soil.  It only took me about 30 minutes to do the whole repotting deal.

Pinterest had some ideas on making your own seed tapes.  I have bought seed tape in the past, and I think that the seeds in it are pretty old and aren't viable anymore.  I have lots of carrot and lettuce seeds, but they are so darn hard to plant outside.  Those tiny little buggers fling all over.  I'm also HORRIBLE at thinning plants outside.  I have the best intentions, but I'm too lazy to remember to get out there and thin them.

So, an easier option for me was to sit down now and pre-thin them by making my own seed tapes.  I started out small.  One type of seed: Blend of Color Carrots.  I've read that you can make these with paper towel for the square foot method, but I didn't do that this time around because I'm going to use them in a smaller space than can take a square foot of carrots.

The steps were easy.  I can see, now, why some people use Elmer's Glue.  I think it would be way easier to get a little dot of glue out of the bottle.  I made my own paste by mixing flour with some water.  I had some really thin toilet paper (that I hate using as toilet paper.... it's TOO thin!) that I decided to use for this project.  Every inch or so, I put a dab of my paste.  I sprinkled two or three seeds on each dot of paste.  I made my strips of TP about two feet long, and put the dot of paste towards the bottom of the toilet paper.  Then, I was able to fold the TP in half, kind of like a sandwich.

You can sort of see the TP fold in the picture above.  I then spread them out over an aluminum pan to dry.  Those babies are still drying, about seven hours later.

When they are completely dry, I am going to roll them up to store them until spring!  The more work I do now, the less work I will need to do when the snow is gone and I can plant things outside.

More seeds!

I have some great things going on in my dining room!

Seed starting things, of course.... I don't cook.

This week I was able to get my tomatoes planted.  I started seven different types of tomatoes, six of which were heirloom varieties from Seed Savers Exchange.  I planted all different types of tomatoes; from red to yellow.  All of them are dusted with cinnamon in the above photo, to help ward off disease.

I've just started my seeds, but already I'm thinking about them outgrowing the little cells that they are in.  This weekend, I went to Farm and Fleet and bought pots to replant my seedlings into.  I'm trying to water all my plants from the bottom.  These pots are going to be perfect for that... and I've finally found a use for the aluminum trays that were salvaged from a Christmas party two years ago.  I just need to buy some medium to put in them and they'll be ready for my transplants.

I also planted Genovese Basil, cabbage, Romanesco Broccoli, and coriander.  Since everything was just planted this week, I need to be patient and wait for it to germinate.  I'm not very good at being patient. 

Testing 2 Products

This year, I purchased two different products from Gardener's Supply Company that I'm going to test against each other.

Product #1:  The APS Starter Seedstarter Kit
http://www.gardeners.com/APS-Starter-Kit/32-573,default,pd.html?start=1&cgid=SeedstartingKits_Cat

This kit included a bag of seedstarting medium (you can kind of see it off to the left), two self-watering trays, plant markers, water level indicators, and a seedling fertilizer.

Product #2: Fast Start Success Kit
http://www.gardeners.com/Fast-Start-%23174%3B-Success-Kit/40-274,default,pd.html?start=8&cgid=SeedstartingKits_Cat

This kit is on the right had side of the picture.  It came with a brick of coconut coir, two self watering trays, plant markers, and seedling fertilizer.

My goal is to start the same exact plants in each kit, to see which one I like better.  I'll keep the lighting the same, the temp the same, and the seeds the same.  It'll be like a little experiment!

Peppers!

Today I started some pepper plants!
I want them to get nice and big before taking them outside, so I started them a little earlier than I normally would.  I am doing a trial between two different seed starting kits that Gardener's Supply offers.  So, I decided to start three seeds in each cell.  I planted three cells of each kind of pepper in each of the two different types of kit.  So, that will give me six plants when all is said and done.
So, first I got both the kits out and made a plan.

Next, I carefully read the directions for each kit.  I'm sometimes not very good at reading directions.  I set out each kit.

The most time consuming part was filling the cells with the planting medium.  The top kit came with coconut coir, which I find pretty hard to work with.  It takes time to let it soak in a bucket of water.... and I'm not very patient.  The bottom kit comes with a germinating soil mix.  I thought it was way easier to work with.  But, I used more of it.
I finally got everything planted.  Both kits feature capillary mats that water from the bottom.  The bottom kit also has a water gauge, but I found it hard to get to sit upright.  If it's lying down, it's not going to be very useful.  I popped the tops on, and put them in the grow stand.  The package says that germination time is 14 days.  I got the seeds from Seed Savers Exchange.  Now it's the waiting game.

Project: Seed Organization

Here is the photo of the way that I stored my extra seeds from last year.
I had some empty packets, so I could remember what varieties I grew last year.  I had full packets.  I had ripped open packets.  I had flowers and veggies and herbs.
It was a mess.

Here is my new organizer, from seedkeepercompany.com.  I tried to make my own.  I bought a plastic container and some alphabet tabs.  Fail.  They weren't the right size or shape.  After I decided that trial and error was NOT going to be cheaper than just buying it, I ordered the seed keeper.
It's awesome!  I have the seeds organized alphabetically.  Now that I see what they use for the divider, I can make another one for my flower seeds and bulbs.  When I start using up the seeds, I can use the extra space to keep receipts and tags from my fruit trees.

My wonderful gift!

My husband is amazing. Yesterday, we had a free Saturday.  No hockey, no school commitments, no place that we had to be.  I used yesterday as my blow-off day.  The finished reading the book was was almost done with, and started another.  I played SIMS on the computer.  I didn't change out of my fuzzy polarfleece pants.

Tim, on the other hand, saved his blow-off day for today (Sunday).  He worked hard yesterday; measuring, cutting, shopping at Menards, and making me another grow stand to start my seeds.  I will now have room to start 25 flats, and the plants will have PLENTY of headroom when they get larger.  Last year, I had room to start 17 flats.
I ordered seeds yesterday, too.  I have a friend that loves to cook, and she loves hot peppers.  I sent her an e-mail to find out what kinds of peppers she would like for me to start.  She is pretty much the only person I know that likes hot peppers (besides my dad) so I basically grow hot peppers just for her.  Why not give her  the choice of which hotties I grow? I was hoping she would have an opinion, and not just tell me "whatever is fine...."
Thankfully, she had an opinion.  Ten years ago, she had gotten plants at the farmer's market.  She loved them, but had never found them again...

• Bulgarian Carrot Peppers
• Black Hungarian Peppers
• Fish Peppers

Wouldn't you know, I found seeds for ALL of them at SeedSavers.org.  I ordered them all, and the shipping was only $1.90!  I could have probably asked my friend, who lives in Decorah, to pick them up for me.  But, for $1.90 shipping, it's hardly worth her trouble.  Apparently, all of those types of peppers are heirloom varieties, which makes me super excited to grow them.  For more on heirloom seeds/plants, please check out the link to Seed Savers Exchange.

Working with the Worms

Although today was my blow-off day (see my post titled My wonderful gift!), I did spend about an hour getting new layers of bedding ready to start moving my worms up and out of the bottom level of my bins.
Here is how worms work: if you put the kitchen waste into a layer of bedding above the layer that they are in, they will move up in search of food when they've depleted the waste in the bottom level.  So, since they have pretty much outgrown the bottom level of my bins, I made new levels of bedding for them, and added just a little bit of waste to the middle level.  I prepared the bedding (made of shredded newspapers and coconut coir) on the top level, too, but I'll only add kitchen waste to that level when I know that my worms are smart enough to figure out how to migrate UP in search of food.  So far, no smell is coming from my worm bins, at all!

That little pod that is yellow? Worm cocoon!