Yay for farmer's markets!

My local farmer's market opened for the season last week, and I finally got there today.  I know a lot of the vendors have seedlings, so I wait for the farmer's market to buy anything I haven't succeeded in propagating myself.  Here's today's haul of plants:

Three different types of basil, rosemary, chocolate mint (!), thyme to replace one of my plants that didn't survive the winter, and this year my favorite vendor, Chaplin Farms, has stevia plants!  The two stevia plants I started from seed last year were amongst the beetle casualties, and never made it past six leaves.

I also got beets, asparagus, rhubarb (crumble for dessert!), eggs, and milk and chevre from Sweet Pea.  Now I need to decide what else is for dinner tonight!  Maybe grilled chicken breast?

Soil blocks: Not an unqualified success :(

I got a soil block maker at the beginning of seed-starting season(which is February around here), hoping to get the convenience of peat pellets without the added expense.  So far I've had mixed results.

Most of my seeds germinated just fine in the soil blocks, but shortly after gaining their first or second set of true leaves they seem to have stopped growing.  These were planted sometime in March - I'd think the plants would be a lot bigger by now!

I've heard that if you pack your soil blocker too tightly the roots have trouble penetrating.  My first few blocks were loose enough that I had trouble moving them without crumbling, so I packed the next set more firmly.  There's no way for me to know what's too tight or too loose except trial and error.  It's also possible I might not have watered them enough - or I might have watered them too much!  I hate it when diametrically opposed actions result in the exact same symptoms!  I've tried potting some of them up and attempting to loosen the soil a little, but so far it doesn't seem to have made much difference. 

So far the broccoli I started at the end of February hasn't gone much past this stage here.  I planted them out in hopes that being in the ground would encourage them - I'll let you know if it works. 

My sage, on the other hand, was planted in a peat pellet, and is going gangbusters, along with several other varieties of herbs.


I'm not all that upset, because I knew that soil blockers had a bit of a learning curve.  At the most I'm annoyed at the prospect of not having some of my longer-growing veggies (namely broccoli and eggplant) this year.  I'm probably not going to have time to try and start the eggplants again if these fail to thrive, but I can start more broccoli seedlings for a fall planting.  I think next year I'll stick to the peat pellets for these, and experiment with the soil blocks for plants that grow faster, so that I have time to try again if I don't get it right the first time.

Back again!

I know, I have been terribly remiss!  It's been ages since I updated this blog.  Nothing very interesting has been going on, and the light hasn't been good for photos.  Now, however, it's gardening time again! Yet again I have way too many seedlings and can't fit them all under my lights.

 At least a good number of them are cool weather crops, and I'm finally starting to get them into the ground, thus making room for the new seedlings.  I finally got a heating mat for my germination flat, and that's made a huge difference in my success rate with some of my warmer weather plants!  Peppers and basil especially have had much better germination rates for me this year.  I hope the growing season continues to be this successful once I get them in the ground!

I'm trying several new plants this year!  In addition to lettuce I've got Swiss chard and spinach in the ground!  My broccoli seedlings aren't quite big enough yet, so it'll be another couple of weeks before I can plant them out.

I've also got a whole bunch of herbs going this year that I didn't have last year.  I get really tired of swapping places between not having fresh herbs on hand when I need them, and buying them so I have them but not using them up quickly enough.  I really hope that I'll have planted enough basil this year, and that it does better than it did last year! 

My mint is coming up nicely, and much to my surprise and delight I discovered that two of my parsley plants survived the winter!  Yay!  I had piled all our dead leaves into the garden last fall, instead of bagging them, and I suspect that's what did it. 

My peas seem to be doing nicely as well!  This is what the first shoots looked like a few weeks ago . . .

and here is what they look like now!

I'm very much looking forward to fresh peas in a few weeks, and I'm definitely looking forward to mid-late May, when I can start planting out everything else!