I just finished planting seeds for Goliath and DeCicci broccoli, Copenhagen Market and Krautman cabbage, Bright Lights chard and Broccoli Rabe. They are all in the greenhouse. Some of the tomatoes in there are almost ready to start turning red. Next year I will start them earlier.
Next year I would also suggest planting redishes. lettuce, or onions early. Then when they are harvested, it should be the end of June or First of July. Plant the same cabbage, broccoli, etc so it would be big enough to plant at that time. They make an outstanding fall crop.
Dwayne
Ack...I hate you for having a greenhouse when I don't!
*pout* *heavy sigh*Well, anyway, I've got a variety of lettuces started, and my early tomatoes, as well as a few flowers. I had to retire my faithful old seed starting rack, the one my father built me this year. Two new kitties joined the household last fall, and the gleeful leaping from shelf to shelf in hot pursuit of each other was a little more than it was built to withstand.
I bought a large metro shelving unit from Lowe's, one of the ones that looks like stainless steel but isn't, and has wire shelves. It's 74 inches high, 48 long, and 18 inches deep. I put it on wheels, too. Shop lights hang neatly from the shelf above.
I'm still wrangling with ideas for what to put under the seed trays. For now I cut up the box the shelving unit came in, but I want something more durable and less flammable. I've been thinking about some of the foil or radiant insulation. It comes in rolls so I can easily cut it to the right size, and I can get some that has a fire safety rating.
I wonder if there's some that has a frisky kitty rating? They're "helping" me scrape the ceiling in the living room right now. I lay a drop cloth over the carpet where I'm working, and one gets under it and one gets on top, and they wrestle through the cloth. Heh, so much for easy clean up!
Penelope
Until we moved here I did not have room for one. There was a house that we passed frequently that had a nice one. I turned green every time we went by.
I should start some lettuces too. They will be ready to go into the boxes soon. Maybe I can stick some between the onions and shallots in the boxes. I do have some row cover in case of a late frost.
Get some trays or make something tray-like to keep the water from running onto the floor.
About the only thing I can think of to contain frisky kitties is concrete. And I wouldn't bet the farm on that.
I have a portable cold frame to cover the rows, but we're having quite a cold spell for this part of the country. The temperatures have been below freezing almost every night for the last two weeks, and the forecast is for that to continue at least through the coming week. My plan was to be moving the lettuce out to the cold frame for hardening off around now, but I think it's a little cold even for lettuce.
I am planning on transplanting some into pots this afternoon. I make a "salad bowl" every spring for my mother and sister. I get one of those large, dish shaped plastic pots, and fill it with a variety of lettuces. I use Romaines, buttercrunch, and leaf lettuces as well as using different color varieties like Sunset or Freckles or Yugoslavian Red. The pots are really very pretty and allow for a couple of months of daily salads.
I had planned to get another wave of tomatoes going today, but I'm going to hold off until I can move the lettuce outside. My Stupice tomatoes are doing very well, and have their second leaves already.
I do have some large metal trays that I use, as well as some plastic containers from Walmart. However, since I set the trays and containers on top of the seedling heat mats, I wanted something to go under the heat mats to insulate and reflect the heat upwards, plus something to provide an extra bit of protection to the lights underneath.
The foil insulation appealed to me because it has a fire safety rating, is water proof, and would also reflect the light back down to the seedlings. I guess I'm just going to have to buy a roll and experiment.
Heh, and how would I get them to keep their little feet in the concrete while it hardened!
I had a cat who wandered into my life as an adult. I really didn't know her age, but she was with me almost 15 years, so she simply became The Elderly Cat. Every year when I started setting up to start seeds, I had to take one of my seed starting mats and put it under a big soft towel on one end of the seed starting rack. If I didn't, I'd find her sleeping on the seed trays with nary a care about what she was doing to my tomatoes!
Penelope
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