Timeline

• February 10th: need to be germinating anything like peppers growing from seed
• March 1st: cut off window for growing basically anything from seed (didn't happen this year...)
• April 1st-10th: Last frost date, in theory (theory is fact, and the garden was ready to go April 7th)

The garden beds should have soil in them before mid-March (try early March), but not mulched until after the ground warms up.

Seed Propagation

In 2012, seed propagation was an experiment in failure. Major problems:

• Attempted to propagate too many things
• Attempted to propagate difficult things
• Used tiny cells to start, waited too long to transplant many, killed several during transplantation/pruning.
• Using an air duct as a reflector hood was only effective at helping to keep them warm. We really need a sheet of mylar or something instead, or nothing.

Things that did work:

• The seed starting mixture and fertilization regime seemed adequate.
• Water procedure (fill tray and allow starting mixture to suck it up) worked well.
• Plastic wrap was indeed adequate for germination. Use less water this time around however.

Possible solutions:

• Germinate fewer things (probably herbs, a few weird peppers)
• Have the garden ready early enough to plant things like the melons directly in the beds
• Use the medium peat/cardboard pots to start a single seed, and instead of thinning later accept that a few will not survive hardening off.

Process

1. Staring mixture: 1 part vermiculite, 1 part perlite, 1 part spaghum peat moss
   • 3 Tbsp lime (antifungal properties?) when 1 part = 1 gallon
2. Fill peat trays 1/2-3/4 full with mixture
3. Put one seed per pot to minimize effort at transplantation time
4. Cover to the recommended planting depth
5. Fill drainage tray with 3 quarts water (overfilled the first with a gallon, underfilled the second with two quarts, three seems to be enough to keep everything properly moist)
6. Insert and mark seedling trays with business cards (variety + planting date + # of seeds/cell + expected germination date)
7. Wrap the whole thing up in plastic wrap and wait

Equipment

• 7 drainage trays capable of holding 5x10 cell paper/peat starter cell pots (I'm going for easy transplantation here) (GT_n = Germination Tray N, ST_n = Seedling Tray N)

• Storage rack for seedlings and germination trays

Seeds to Acquire

For 2013, it's probably too late now.

Marigolds, yarrow, potatoes?

Available Seed

• German Chamomile
• Dill
• Yellow Summer Crookneck Squash
• White Lisbon Bunching Onions
• Longstanding Cilantro
• Early Scarlet Globe Radish

• Yellow of Parma Onion

• Borettana Yellow Onion

• Romanesco Broccoli

• Parade Cucumber

• Five Color Silverbeet Swiss Chard

• Christmas Lima Bean

• SSE Lettuce Mixture

• Waltham Butternut Squash

• Early Hanover Melon

• Amish Melon

• Aurora Pepper

• Anise

• Cumin

• Sunflower Mixture

• Spider Flower Mix

Plants to Germinate

Easy:

• Basil

Transplants

Given the effort required to germinate a lot of things, we'll probably have more success just acquiring transplants for most things.

Needed

• Rosemary
• Habanero (2)
• Cayenne Pepper (1)
• Thai Pepper, if possible

Garden

Pests

• Figure out how to deal with stinkbugs

  • http://www.epa.gov/pesticides/controlling/stinkbugs/

  • http://njaes.rutgers.edu/stinkbug/pesticides.asp (looks like applying "Spectracide" around the deck might work)

• Deer fence
• Birds

  • We have a stream so puncturing things like tomatoes for water isn't as likely, but maybe we should get them a water source near the garden anyway to be nice people.

Construction

Several small raised beds due to limited areas that receive enough sunlight, root infested soil (well, living in a forest does have its disadvantages), crappy soil, large drip lines, etc.

Soil

Soil: http://www.areamulchandsoils.com/mulch%20price%20page.htm ($20.50 per yard2) The minimum order is way more than we need.

Raleigh will sell us compost and mulch at reasonable prices. Then we just need a small amount of topsoil.

Strata:

• 3" (overflowing top of bed) mulch
• 10" compost/perlite/vermiculite/peat mixture
• 1" of mulch
• tilled earth

Main garden bed had a small amount of blood meal added with the bottom mulch dug in (blood meal to compensate for nitrogen loss as it composts). Also added recommended amount of blood meal to mixture about halfway down (since the plants will likely need it when their roots get about that deep).

Layout

Pending raised bed plans... at first glance, Square Foot Gardening looks like a reasonable framework to sketch things out.

• 5'x3' raised bed

• 4 5'x16" beds, around a 6' tall garden trellis cube made of electrical conduit (Five 10' boards)

  • Two are built, two are not (but ends cut). We might want to build only one or zero more, and instead put down weed barrier inside the trellis and setup the teepee thing for squash instead.

Main Plot

First step: allocate each square roughly so that we can visualize the garden. Unspecific order (easier to perform plant location optimization after we know how many squares of each will be grown).

Cell 3x5 is the one in the corner closest to the house / next door.

Cilantro and dill might be better off in a small bed (or buckets) of their own, allowed to self-seed throughout the summer.

Garden CUBE

Probably just live with only two beds, perhaps three.

Containers

• Rubbermaid bucket of 4 Sweet Banana Peppers
• New Mint
• ?? Red Beauty Bell Peppers

Ideas

Take inventory of available containers -- ClintonEbadi 2013-01-29 20:24:04

Onions? More herbs?

• Habaneros x 4
• Bannana Peppers x 4
• Overwintered peppers x 1
• New bell peppers x 2
• Aurora Peppers x ??
• Basil x 6
• Overwintered Rosemary x 2
• New rosemary x 3
• New mint x 2
• New catnip x 1

In the yard somewhere

Possibly just mix a bunch of herb seeds together with a bit of sand, toss in a spot near the edge of the yard, and cover with a thin layer of topsoil.

• Chamomile
• Chicory
• Anise
• Cumin
• Lavender
• Rosemary (good hedge for the front!)

History

• /GardenLog2012

CategoryEvergreen