Can't wait to start veggie seedlings!

Start some cold plants!

You have time to get a crop of lettuce, kale, bok choy, spinach, carrots, etc going before it's time to start your summer crops.

I currently have growing in my winter garden - lettuce (about 5 kinds), endive, spinach ( 4 kinds), kale (3 kinds), garlic, onions, dwarf bok choy, green onions… I have raised beds that I've covered with a heavier Remay type fabric with plastic on standby to go over the fabric if temps drop and stay dropped.

In the growing room, aka dining room, I have peas started in very small homemade paper pots. They will go in the ground either tomorrow or Sunday. If they don't get planted tomorrow, they'll at least go out in my holding cloche so they won't get too used to the house temps.

I'm going to start some Lavender and Rosemary next week. They take so long to get up to any size, so I want to start them early.

My first batch of new seeds came in today. I'm pretty much just doing Heirlooms, so I ordered from Sample Seeds, Baker Heirloom Seeds, and The Rusted Vegetable Garden (tomatoes). The Baker seed order came in today - I only ordered it on Weds!!!

I have been watching Youtube to get my gardening fix on days I can't get outside. I really like Gary Pilarchik who does a channel under his name and also does a channel under My First Garden. He is very thorough, especially on tomatoes. I love his tomato reviews; I had to order from him because I've watched the reviews so many times. LOL

Marcy

Doh! I forgot to answer the question!

I plan to have an abundance of tomatoes this year. Last year was a good year for tomatoes and my DH and DD discovered just how much they loved garden fresh tomatoes and we used up all the sauce I froze by November. LOL So, lots and lots of tomatoes. My favorite cherry last year was Matt's Wild Cherry - sweet, tiny and very prolific.

Peppers and cucumbers were also high on DD's request list. I have lots of different varieties of peppers to try, but none are really hot. I have several cucumber varieties as well as some cucumber melons.

I love eggplants, so i am planning on waging the war against the flea beetles again this year. Squash are also something I'm going to try growing, but on trellises this year.

Marcy

We are region 5 so not much to do here but dream at this stage! I wrote grants and got funded to start a raised bed garden at our school. I have lots of interested students and I am hoping this will be a continuing type of program. I'm off to look at you tube videos recommended here. Thanks for starting this thread!

I started two six packs with cauliflower this weekend.  First time ever doing cauliflower.   I start tomatoes, peppers, etc... around the end of February.

We once lived in an apartment and were so missing our garden. So, we purchased some huge pots and had tomatoes and cucumbers. We put strings from the top of the porch roof to the pot of cucumbers and the vines went up and made the cucumbers easy to harvest. Our downstairs neighbor laughed at us. We had the last laugh when we harvested our vegetables. The porch looked like a jungle with the plants, but we loved it.

Can someone help me out? We are in N Louisiana. When is the best time to start these? I have no idea what I'm doing but would love to grow some tomatoes this year for DD and DH. Matt's Wild Cherry sounds perfect for them.

A few years ago DD and I planted several tomato plants in a Topsy Turvy. Everything was going SO well! We had a TON of green tomatoes that DD was dying to pick but I told her they needed a few more days to ripen. That night, a herd of deer came through our back yard and ate the entire thing!

Here is the link but I have no idea what the germination chart means.
www.johnnyseeds.com/p-7932-matts-wild-cherry.aspx#

Here is a great site for determining planting dates for your area. Just type in your zip code and it will give you your first and last frost dates. You want to start your tomatoes about 6 weeks before your last frost date or from the date you think you want to set them out. I plan on planting my warmer veggies about 2 weeks AFTER the last frost date because I just don't want to worry about them being too cool.

tomatoes germinate best in warm medium, so you want to make sure that the location where you are starting your seeds has a heat source. I have a heat mat made for this that I put my flats on, but you can use a heating pad made for moist areas set to low or older style, not LED, outdoor safe rope lights under your containers. Tomatoes usually come up in less than a week, but peppers may take more than 3 weeks to germinate.

I buy most of my tomato seeds from sampleseeds.com or the rusted vegetable garden. Both are less than Johnny's by a lot, and they are small businesses, which I like to support. Gary Pilarchik of TRVG has some excellent videos on YouTube regarding how to start plants. He also has a separate channel with a series called My First Garden that is really a great resource for any gardener. 


What have you done to stop the deer from getting into your garden this year? I gave up vegetable gardening until we fenced the area in because I just couldn't handle the heartbreak anymore. Somehow, the critters always hit the night before I planned to harvest - it was so disheartening to wake up and find every. damn. plant. sheared off at surface level. The wind blew one of my gates open this last summer and in just a few minutes the deer and bunnies had a feast. Luckily, I got home in time to put and end to their rampage before they cleaned me out but you can bet I have much better gate closers now.

marcy

I didn't find lavender hard to start, but I was using a heat mat and that makes a big difference. If you have some way to raise the temp of your growing medium, I think germination is pretty quick. Getting the plants from seeds to planting out size, though, takes some time. If you think your area is too cool to grow lavender outside year round, consider pulling the plants out of your beds just after the first couple of frosts. Put them in pots and keep them in a cool dark area, preferably without constantly running heat. In early spring, bring them into the light and start watering. It may or may not work, but at least it's a shot.

so far, it's worked for my geraniums.

marcy