Seedling Update

Most of my veggie seedlings are doing well. A few are getting slightly leggy (not enough to affect the plant), so I probably need to rotate all of them. Below are a few pictures.

Some of the pepper seedlings, along with a close-up of one:







Some of the tomato seedlings & a close-up of my most mature Sungold:







My dwarf lime tree has started its Spring growth a bit. Here's a pic of it:

My First True Raised Bed

This will be a learning experience for me, for sure. In all my years of gardening, I have never grown in a true raised bed. I'm thinking maybe all garlic & onions? lol...Should be fun, one way or another. I'm researching soil pretreatment on it now, with the help of some friends on GardenWeb. Here's a before picture of it with all the dead wildflowers, weeds, etc. & an after picture. I dug out about the top foot of the whole thing, to try and get rid of all the old plants there. There was one root about a foot or so long by a few inches wide that took a while to get out of there! Anyway, i'm gonna fill it with compost and some good soil soon. Gotta find some compost first. :)

Before:


After about 30 minutes of digging out all the old weeds, wildflowers, etc. & tilling up the soil a bit. Looks good so far & not too hard to do:

First Veggie Plant Forming True Leaves!

The excitement continues! Today, while checking on my plants, I found a Sungold Select II cherry tomato plant starting to grow it's first true set of leaves. Very cool, as at this point they usually start growing fast/take off. I have several more that are barely a few days behind this one, if even that long. So, many more of the first tomato & pepper plants I started should also start growing their first true leaves soon. Below is a picture of the wee seedling.

First sign of Spring in the garden!!! =)

As always, my 5 year old Garlic Chives are the first to show signs of Spring in my garden. Very excited to get things going this year! Here's a little pic of them.

Seed starting update & more.

I have had some great sucess starting my seeds so far this year. My attempt to use the floating pellet tray did not work out well though. I didn't keep much of any water in the bottom of it, but some of the "pellets" got moldy inside. I had about a 50% germination sucess with it. I transplanted a small handfull of seedlings out of it, then tossed it. I will not use this method again. I know that it is this approach alone that failed because I used my new seed starting process (explained below) in the same exact conditions and had great sucess with it. Here is a picture of the floating pellet tray...

Tray after pellets moistened & seeds added, before it was put into my seed starting greenhouse:





In past years, my veggie plants have experienced symptoms of being potted up too many times, along with some legginess caused mainly by starting them in peat pellet trays. These things, especialy the legginess, have caused severe problems with many of my plants. So, I decided to try a different seed starting method with somewhat larger pots, better medium, etc.. I bought some trays/flats & 3 inch square pots that go together (these are durable & will last a few years at minimum). I also bought some Pro Mix Seed Starting medium. I would start a flat of seeds & place it on a heat mat inside a covered greenhouse. This atmosphere also tremendously helped the germination process as inside the greenhouse would stay very humid & also quite warm, from the heating mats. Below are some pictures of the flats & greenhouse.

The flats with 3 inch square pots in them:


One of the flats, fully prepared (this one contains 6 types of peppers & some Dill):


The greenhouse I kept the flats in while seeds were germinating:


The seed starting mix, flats, 3 inch pots & a few other items I ordered from ICG.





A few pics of some of the wee seedlings, which were recently potted up to 1 gallon pots that they will stay in until they go into their final homes (5-10 gallon pots) out on the deck or in the backyard.

Milk Thistle seedling (about 2 weeks old...one of my "test plants" this year):


Pepper seedling (about 10 days old, from seed in dirt):


Tomato seedling (about 10 days old, from seed in dirt):





I am very excited to grow garlic again this year. I hope it does as well as it did last year. One pot of it was planted in late Fall & 2 more will be planted soon, in Spring. This is the Fall planted garlic.






Last, but certainly not least, are some pictures of a few more of my plants, most of which are currently living in my garden room upstairs.

Adult Aloe:


2 of my 3 Angel Trumpet plants received at the Fall MTPS swap. These were simple sticks when I got them with no roots or anything and have grown insanely well over the past 5 months!


3 baby Aloe plants, received in a mail swap. They are about a year old.


The plants I left outdoors over the Winter in dormancy. My almost 4 year old Wineberry Raspberry & Triple Crown Blackberry (should get several berries of them both this year!), 2 grape plants (will be a year old this Spring. Probably won't produce any grapes this year) & a few other random plants.


Mother of 1000's (tons of babies hanging off these)


Red Dragon Flower.

Baker Creek Order Arrives!

Now i'm just waiting on my Greenhouse MegaStore order which contains my seed starting supplies for this year (and a few more things). Once I get that order, i'll immediately start some of my garden items for this year, mostly herbs. I'll probably start my tomato plant seeds in mid February then start the rest (peppers, cukes & such) in late February.

Below is a picture of my Baker Creek order which contains the following: Thai Green Cucumber, Jamaician Hot Chocolate Pepper, Caribbean Red Habanero Pepper, Chocolate Habanero Pepper, California Wonder Pepper, Golden Marconi Pepper, Thai Long Sweet Pepper, Orange Banana Tomato, Sungold Select II, Amish Paste, Chadwick Cherry, Placero, San Marzano Lungo No. 2 Tomato, Rutgers Tomato, Thai Dill, Milk Thistle, Sage, Soapwort & Stevia. This is only about a third of what I plan on growing this year! =)

Steve's Garden 2011

I just wanted to drop a quick update on here to let everyone know that my 2011 garden will be completely insane! lol...I plan to make up for having a horrible garden in 2010.

Just a few of the items you'll see in Steve's Garden this year are: Dwarf Banana tree attempt #2, 4 beautiful Angel Trumpet's I got from Joe at the Fall MTPS, Maybe a lime or two on my 3 year old lime tree, a few handfulls of berries off my Wineberry Raspberry & TC Blackberry plants (almost 4 years old now), the usual few different types of tomatoes (Sungold again, for sure! Plus, I want to try San Marzano again), a few varieties of both hot and sweet peppers, the 2 grape plants in their second year (in desperate need of an in-the-ground home), more fruits maybe, Garlic, herbs, etc., etc., etc.! =)

Stay tuned for the list of what I got from Baker Creek this year & a different approach (more custom) to my seed starting.....