What Did You Do In The Garden?

[ducks4you]

It all depends on how you babysit them. Some seeds will sprout in warm/cold/wet/a little bit dry. Others are picky, picky, picky. Get it wrong and they bite the dust.

 

[Zeedman]

Temperature aside, most seedlings will do well if using soil less mix, sterile water (I use RO filtered), and adequate ventilation. With the exception of a good soaking immediately after planting, the soil should never be waterlogged. IMO you also want to let the soil dry out almost to the point of wilting before watering again; if the soil surface never dries out, it will promote the rapid spread of algae at best, fungi at worst... which leads to damping off.

When I first began starting my own plants, I fell for those "mini greenhouse" trays with the transparent covers. The results were, well, educational (in other words, a failure). Germination was initially good; but mold quickly overran the entire tray, and killed all of the tomato seedlings before they had their second leaf. I had a similar issue crop up when I first used the setup I have now, because the trays against the wall had poor air circulation... so when the plants were 4-5" tall, mold began to appear on the stems & I lost a few. When I put the remaining plants outside, they recovered. I use a fan at low speed now to prevent stagnant air, and have lost nothing since.

 

[Zeedman]

I had a chance to cultivate again before the rain came, and added some gypsum, soil sulfur, and as many chopped leaves as the mower could pick up from the back of the lot. It was a relief to finally get that done early, after so many wet years. All that remains to be done now is the final tilling before planting.

 

[flowerbug]

I had a chance to cultivate again before the rain came, and added some gypsum, soil sulfur, and as many chopped leaves as the mower could pick up from the back of the lot. It was a relief to finally get that done early, after so many wet years. All that remains to be done now is the final tilling before planting.

looks like you have protection from the wind there which is nice for taller beans.

 

[flowerbug]

i managed to waste a bit of yesterday trying to get some pictures and seeing if the killdeer would calm down enough for me to get a close up picture with the new camera, but it would not cooperate. the birdie knows us well enough that sometimes we can walk right by it and it will sit there and just look at us from a few feet away, but not yesterday. still it was nice to take a break and watch the bees on the flowers and listen to the birds around and just generally enjoy a warm enough day where you're just perfectly comfortable outside.

i saw the first large bumblebee of the season working on the wind flowers. sadly the wind flowers are rather faded this year and not very deeply blue/purple as they can get some years. perhaps the many frosts have been too much for them? the frosts certainly have made a lot of the daffodils look rather poorly already, but we have the later daffodils starting to come out now and the tulips are just starting up.

what i did manage to do was get some weeding done for an hour or two and that was it for the day other than taking pictures.

 

[ducks4you]

I transplanted the one geranium survivor from the winter from upstairs to the garage bed. It had already flowered.
Today, I cleaned up some tall, dead weeds from around the chicken coop, added my piles of stick pick up from around the yard and burned them in my fire pit. Clean up is important, too.

 

[Prairie Rose]

Today I finally got a chance to get some gardening done. Planted my tomato and pepper seedlings, piled some more sticks into the hugelkulture experiment, and also planted some flower sprouts. Mom worked in the flower bed we made last fall, digging out dandelions and bits of bindweed that we missed. I have two gallon-sized pots of delphiniums to plant before I quit for the day...and I bought a lavender rose from Lowe's that I want to get in the ground before the rain hits.

 

[Zeedman]

I have two gallon-sized pots of delphiniums to plant before I quit for the day...and I bought a lavender rose from Lowe's that I want to get in the ground before the rain hits.

DW has been searching for more delphiniums to complement the one light blue that she already has, but no one locally has any - yet. Apparently they are all shipped in here from elsewhere. One greenhouse said they are expecting some this week. There are some really beautiful ones out there, but I'll wait to see what shows up locally before resorting to ordering online.

 

[seedcorn]

I tore up a 20’ X 20’ space for a seed treatment/foliar treatment plot. The ground was sod over gumbo. I hate tilling up clay. Made tiller and me work. Tilled it 3X. Allowing it to rest, then I’ll till it a few more times before planting.

 

[henless]

Tied up my tomatoes and trimmed off the lowest leaves. Also checked on the muscadines to make sure the ends were tied. Got storms coming on so didn't want any to get knocked over/off. Did a little bit of weeding and gave them to the chickens.