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Such gorgeous bean photos-- welcome! :frow

That is a truly amazing photo of the young deer-- well done! :)

There's something comforting about cooking up a big pot of Bolognese sauce when the snow flies. This one has roasted summer tomatoes from the freezer, home grown dried bay leaves, fresh garlic, and Siracha peppers and carrots picked from the garden. Not bad for February! We also made a beany...

I would encourage you to grow a crop of baby kale in a container, and then harvest the leaves when they are still fairly small. The seeds could be planted more densely and it wouldn't take asong to be able to start eating it. Kale is great in soups and stews, or in hearty salads if massaged...

Winter in the Pacific Northwest.

I may experiment with fall planting in my friend's hoop house come autumn-- but it's far too cold here to plant them in the fall without that kind of protection. Having said that, this year several ranuncula plants have popped up from corms that I neglected to lift last June, and they look to...

Well, it's a small high tunnel that measures 10' x 3' x 7', so it tucks right under the edge of our sundeck and is tethered to the deck support posts (so it won't blow away in a wind storm). The side that faces the house can be rolled down, but I just keep it up for the most part; the air...

I started three kinds of lettuce on vermiculite November 19th: Tom Thumb, New Red Fire, and Lunix. Once the seeds had germinated I pricked them out to 1 1/2" soil blocks. Then at five weeks I moved them outdoors; it has been such a mild winter here, and lettuce is pretty tough. Now there is...

Another bin of ranunculus on the move. I had planned on planting them out in the garden-- but cold weather is finally going to arrive later this week. So for now these ones are tucked into a large seedlings bin so they can continue to develop unfettered in our carport for extra protection. I...

I was reading an Eliot Coleman book, and in it he mentioned that they space their tomato seedlings out a bit once their leaves begin to overhang adjacent plants. Otherwise it creates shade, forcing the seedlings stretch and get tall as they search for light. A bit of extra room to grow seemed...

It was time to move a batch of corms that were pre-sprouted about 12 days ago outdoors into deeper containers. They had developed such broad white roots that they required twice as much space as compared to the first stage, where they were snugged in shoulder to shoulder in a couple of inches...

And this morning breakfast is the cutest little Sweet Dumpling squash. Not much flesh on it, but delicious just the same. If all goes well I would like to grow a lot more of these come summer, for autumn meals.

Last night was perogies and pan fried Andouille sausage with some of last summer's bounty on the side. Fermented vegetables from the refrigerator hold a lot of appeal come January. These fermented cucumbers were the variety 'Homemade Pickles,' started on September 10th with 15g of sea salt for...

In a batch of 24 Rottkappchen dwarf tomato seedlings I found two tricots, with three cotyledon leaves instead of the typical two seed leaves. This seems like a lucky happenstance, and given that I have time on my hands I am going to grow them out alongside one of the 2-cotyledon ones to see if...

What a thoughtful gift! I hope that gives your seeds a boost, to get them off to a good start. My dome is beginning to crack a bit, and the bottom tray is feeling a bit sketchy too. I think I will put a strong nursery tray under it; the folks at Bare Mountain Farm suggest doing that, to...

10/10 is a great start to the tomato growing year-- way to go! I would love to see 'Seedling Saturdays' pop up, both for selling and also as a great way to share excess seedlings too (mostly because I have a real aversion to killing my extra seedlings). For those who garden on patios or...

All good points Zeedman-- I'm truly shocked by what a difference those few degrees can make with peppers. In the photo below there are 17/24 pepper seeds putting down a radicle after just 4 days on heat-- I could hardly believe it. And your suggestion to include a bit of nitrogen at the start...

Every now and then my soil blocks develop the white fuzzies. Usually I attribute it to cool, dark growing conditions. This furry tray had a couple of factors that likely contributed, including adding some bagged potting soil and dried kelp to the peat moss-- and a generous dose of liquid kelp...

Annual scabiosa, dianthus, and snapdragons in mid-January. So odd. The dianthus looks like it could use a shot of fertilizer, but it's far too cold for that.

I order basil seed in quantity, and keep it in the freezer for long term storage.