Will They Survive Without Me?

A number of my plants are in the ground! I hope they're still there when I get back from my mini-vacation to Florida. It looks like it will be cold and rainy everyday that I'm away. I'll try not to worry too much about them. They are only plants, after all.

The rest of my seedlings are inside the house, next to the East-facing sliding glass door and are being watered by my aunt.

The above photo was taken on 4/28

Transplanting

The time had come.
I thought the time had come.
I decided that the time had come for moving some of my seedlings into the ground.

I put the pumpkins in first, then the zucchini, then the cucumber, then some yellow squash, followed by the onions. And for good measure I planted a few onion seeds directly in the bed.

My biggest misstep in this whole process was definitely planting some of the seedlings too close to one another. If I had it to do again I would be sure to put just one seed in each little planting compartment, regardless of what the seed packages recommend.

The bottom portion of the egg crates were perfect for planting. The top portion- not so much. I realize now that the drainage holes I made in the cartons weren't very effective. Next time I'll make them much wider than the width of a pen tip.

I was surprised by how complex the root systems were of the pumpkins and cucumbers. If any of my transplants fail, I predict it will be the cucumbers. The seeds were sewn too close together to begin with and separating the roots for transplanting was very difficult.

I was out there early and it looks like it's going to be a hot sunny day. If I have time this evening I'd like to go out and put a couple tomato and cabbage seedlings in the ground. The tomatoes aren't that big yet, but they seem sturdy and I'm curious to see what will happen.

The photo above shows two of the zucchini seedlings that were growing in one planter compartment. I had to gently tease them apart. I'm glad I thinned them out last week. Originally there were four plants growing in each compartment. Below is the pumpkin going in. Those seeds were planted April 12th.

Prepping the Bed is Hard Work

This is the bed as it stands at the moment. I woke up this morning and worked in a bag of last year's top soil and two enormous bags of gardening soil. I took a break to head to the garden center and pick up a few more bags of hummus + manure and two more enormous bags of gardening soil. Those two bags are still sitting in my trunk because I haven't figured out how to get them from the trunk to the garden while my cousins are still asleep. But once those are in I'll be ready to do some planting.

I've been evaluating my seedlings trying to figure out which are ready and which still need some time. I definitely overplanted so that will work in my favor. If I transplant a couple prematurely I'll have some back ups standing by if it doesn't work out, my understudies. Though I'd like to avoid transplanting too early if at all possible. I wish I had planted my seeds earlier this spring, then they'd all be ready. Anyway, the zucchini looks ready and maybe the cucumber too. And the pumpkins won't be far behind.

Zucchini is on the left, yellow squash on the right

The Beginning of the Pumpkin Patch

Planted April 12th

Happy Earth Day

Nearly everything I have planted is growing taller and taller by the hour. The only varieties I haven't seen sprout yet are the pumpkins (which I expect to break the soil's surface today or tomorrow), the dill, and the mint.

Predictably, the zinnias I planted in the little plastic greenhouse germinated before the ones I planted in an open air tray, as has the basil.

The lettuce seedlings that I thinned out seem to be doing well. I was worried I'd disturbed the root system in the process, but they seem fine. I also trimmed some of the zucchini plants. In the photo, they're the second row from the top right corner. You can see the ones that I clipped on top of the tray. The leaves and stalks are much thicker than any of the other plants' and they really seemed to be inhibiting one another's growth sitting in such close proximity. So, clip, clip, clip!

The big underdog of the bunch has been the tray of tomatoes, pictured in the white tray on the bottom left. I left them out in the cold rain early on, but now there are 13 little plants growing. They're tiny and so frail looking, but I'm still rooting for them.

Thinning Out The Seedlings

What's wrong with the tray of lettuce seedlings in the picture on the left?

They're all growing on top of each other, next to each other, underneath each other. . .you get the picture. This morning I fetched my weapon of choice, a pair of sharp pointy scissors, and summoned up the courage to snip the stalks of the very plants I had nurtured from the seed. This was particularly difficult since I'm not a violent person, but it was necessary.

For the lettuce, I tried to give the strongest looking seedlings some room to breathe and grow by removing the surrounding sprouts. The strongest ones have already grown a third leaf and were the tallest and greenest seedlings. I only thinned out half of the tray, in case it was too early to do this. I was careful not to disturb the plants as I trimmed, but it was tough as they're still pretty delicate. If the thinned out half continues to thrive, I'll do the same thing to the others. (The second photo is the after shot, click on either of them for a closer look.)

I also thinned out two thirds of the tray I think is cabbage. The seedlings are a bit hardier and I'm pretty convinced they were ready. While I was at it I snipped some of the spinach plants which had wilted on the hot day and never recovered.

In little plastic greenhouse news, the mint and basil seeds are sprouting.

Sunday was cloudy and the plants stayed indoors, as they will today and tomorrow due to rain.

Below is a shot from just a few minutes ago of the whole lot. The cabbage is the row at the very bottom, the spinach is above that, and on top of the spinach is the zucchini which are my favorite by a long shot. They're huge! All of a sudden they just sprung from the soil, wearing their seeds like birthday hats before growing into these thick, beautiful little plants.

Wilting Spinach

It has been a very busy day in the garden.

I woke up and planted the parsley seeds I'd been soaking all night. Then set out for the Home Depot and purchased some 8 foot long wooden planks to frame my garden bed and some soil and peat. I also solicited some advice from the other shoppers- home gardeners sure are a friendly bunch.

My uncle brought the leveler and power tools and together we built a lovely frame. We planned out how we'll level the bed, since it is a bit sloped. More photos to come. We may need to build a second bed for some of the plants that need a lot of room. I'm envisioning a pumpkin patch. That shouldn't be such a hard sell.

This was the second sunny day in a row and the warmest day we've had all year. Temperatures reached the mid 70s and I knew my babies where feeling it when I noticed my spinach seedlings passed out in their tray. I moved them to the shade and am hoping for the best.

Everything I planted April 3rd is sprouting! And the first seed of the April 12th batch is just shy of peaking through the soil's surface. And the winner is- cucumber!

Send happy thoughts to my spinach!

Update: It has been a couple hours since I moved the plants into the shade and the spinach seems to have mostly recovered. All but a few of the sprouts are standing up straight again.

AND I forgot to mention that the zucchini has sprouted and they look amazingly solid. You can see them on the lefthand side of this pic. The photo was taken a few hours ago, now several of them are standing up and open.