seedlings

Still waiting for real spring

April 24, 2021Jen Powell2 Comments

*Our yard. It’s green at the moment, but it keeps raining/snowing, and it’s not very warm out.*

Our weather is still being finicky (not unusual for the Upper Peninsula, but it’s still disappointing). We had an early snow melt in March, with nice warm temps – it got us all excited for an early spring. We still are mostly snow-free, but out temps keep being kind of chilly. Too cold to really do much outside, I feel. We keep getting rain/snow mix precipitation too, so we have woken up to about an inch of snow here and there. I started to clean the garden up a bit yesterday, it was in the 50s, maybe into the 60s. But today it’s colder. We are supposed to get an inch of snow today. But the daffodils are blooming! My tulips are coming up. I planted a new variety of strawberries outside a few weeks back and they are growing now. And my garlic is all up, about 3 inches out of the soil.

I know it will get warmer (and stop raining and snowing all the time) and I’ll be able to do some stuff outside soon. But for now I am just taking comfort in my future garden – a lot of which I have already started in the house. I have tomatoes, peppers, ginger, and a lot of herbs and flowers started. They are all growing nicely.

*Some of my seedlings. These are some various herbs, flowers and cabbage.* *The back of the photo shows some of my onion seedlings.*

*a side view of some of my tomatoes and other stuff*

I’ve been using old mushroom containers as grow containers for my seedlings. I used an awl and popped holes in the bottom of each container, and the mushroom containers are all on boot trays, so any extra water drains onto those. I have about 40+ mushroom trays of plants here. The last pic above is my ginger. I bought a pound of seed ginger from Fedco Seeds ( a company in Maine) this winter. It came in March and I’ve been working on sprouting them. I tried a couple years ago with about 3 roots, from a different company, and didn’t have as much success. This time the pound I bought came out to about 12 roots. All of the roots are starting to come up, or are just about to. I just had to be really sparing with watering, and super patient with them. The ginger is all planted just under the soil in an old plastic planting flat, and that is sitting on a heat mat. The directions Fedco sent said that consistent heat is needed, and to water sparingly until they come up. I give them a light spray once a day. They are prone to rotting until they come up above the soil if they get too much water. I will be putting these in my greenhouse once it’s warm enough outside and they are bigger.

Hopefully the weather will turn better here in the next week or so and I’ll be able to get back outside comfortably. Like I said, the daffodils are starting to bloom, so that is a good sign.

*One of the first daffodils to bloom in 2021 (in my yard).*

Planning & Planting in Early May

May 4, 2020May 4, 2020Jen PowellLeave a comment

We have had a strange spring, it’s finally warming up again. Our weather was warming when I last posted, and then we got more snow over the Easter weekend – about a foot. That melted after a week or so, so we are finally getting into actual spring here. I planted some tulips in the fall and those are emerging now, and our daffodils are getting ready to bloom soon. We’ve been adding some stuff to the yard, planning the garden, and we put up a greenhouse yesterday! Here are some pictures of our farm in early May:

The main garden is getting ready for planting, although we have a while before our last frost date. We put in newspaper and cardboard covered with old chicken bedding as mulch, to try to keep weeds down this year. Next I’ll be turning the actual beds for planting.

Here are the onions, I am starting to harden them off so I can put them in the garden soon. This picture was just before I took them out to the porch to harden off.

seedlings 2 — Some seedlings – these are mostly cauliflower I think.

seedlings 1 — More seedlings. I am growing 10 types of tomatoes this year!

Here are the asparagus. I’m growing two kinds, and planning out their permanent bed – we’ll be putting that in soon.

haskap 2 — I planted some Honeyberries, or Haskap. They are a cold-hardy oblong blue berry, that is supposed to taste something like a cross between strawberry and raspberry.

haskap — Here is another Haskap. I put in 4 bushes. I got these from Honeyberry USA, out of Northern Minnesota.

gooseberry — Here is our Gooseberry bush, I got it a few years ago, but planted it next to the house. It really didn’t thrive there, because it was always crowded by weeds and wildflowers, but it lived. So I just transplanted it into our front yard so it will hopefully do better there. We do tend to get gooseberries from it, but only like 4 or 5 per year so far. Maybe it will get more this year since it has more room. I also fenced it against deer in case they decide that it looks tasty.

elderberry — Here is one of the elderberries – I just put in two trees in our front yard, and circled them both with fencing to keep the deer from eating them. I have attempted to plant them before but had deer destroy them. This time they are protected.

arborvitae 2 — We got some Emerald Green Arborvitae to make a privacy hedge in our front yard – here they are – they are all just under a foot tall right now – they should grow 12-15 feet tall and 3-4 feet wide, so they’ll make a nice hedge.

tiny arborvitae — Here is another view of the arborvitae. We put in 10 in a little haphazard row to make the hedge. We fenced this also, to keep the deer from wrecking them. Luckily this part of the yard doesn’t grow grass very quickly so it won’t really need mowing while they grow in.

Here is our greenhouse! My uncle gave it to me in the fall. He had had it sitting in his garage (had been given it by our other uncle) and neither uncle wanted to use it anymore so they gave it to us. We put it up yesterday, and then extended our dog fence around it (so it will be easier to access from the backyard where the garden is). It’s approximately 10×10 feet. It’s pretty nice, we are happy with how it went up.

wizard — My cat, Wizard was investigating the greenhouse and decided to pose for some pictures.

wizard 2 — Here is another picture of Wizard. He is excited to be able to explore outside without dealing with snow. We are all happy it is spring.

Getting the garden ready

June 4, 2017Jen Powell1 Comment

larger garden — The newly upgraded garden space.

I’ve been planning this year’s garden for awhile, since sometime in February. Over the last few years I’ve learned some things about gardening in the U.P. We have a shorter growing season, so I can’t plant pumpkins or other things that need 110 days, because I most likely won’t get that long. Luckily there are a lot of shorter-season versions of those kind of vegetables out now. I grew some smaller, shorter-season pumpkins last year.

I’ve learned that even though our last frost is (usually) in May, it’s better to wait to put things in the ground. I used to garden in southern Michigan, and I could start my garden at the beginning of May. Here around June 10th is probably best (or after the first Full Moon in June – which is June 9th this year) – we are well past the last frost dates, but the soil also takes awhile to warm up – a couple years ago I put things into the ground mid-may, and my plants just languished there – some wilted from the cold, some died outright, and I had a lot of replanting to do. I’d rather just put the whole garden in once, than have to replace everything.

I doubled our garden space for this year – the last couple years I had a 10×30 bed, this year it is 20×30. I started my seeds in early May, and have some nice seedlings that are now hardening off on the back porch. I tilled the garden yesterday – there are some grass clumps that need to get taken out, and then I’ll re-till it again before planting, which will happen next weekend.

I have three flats of seedlings, and I am making seed tapes for small seeds like carrots, using newspaper. I cut strips of newspaper and then used a water/flour paste to glue seeds at the correct interval – I can lay the tapes down, cover with a bit of dirt, and then the seeds won’t migrate. I won’t have to thin them either. I also have a bunch of stuff that I will be seeding directly into the garden, like corn and beans.

I’m excited for this year’s garden.

April 5, 2015April 5, 2015Jen PowellLeave a comment

My seeds are sprouting! Its exciting. I have them in the seed trays and keep the domes on most of the day, taking them off for a couple hours, just to keep the moisture from being too much – I don’t want any mold to form. They are in a sunny window and also have a grow light.

I’ve got charts for each seed tray, so that I know which plants are which. I have noticed that the strong sunlight coming through the window attracts them a little more than the grow light above, so the tomatoes have been “reaching” for the sun. I have been turning the peat pellets instead of the trays, just so I don’t get lost in my grid of seedlings, and forget what is where. I also decided to try to keep track of germination, or at least how long each kind of plant takes to germinate. Here’s my chart for this round of seedlings:

seed germination chart — My germination chart

I just marked down the date I planted the seeds, and the first date I saw sprouts. It will be helpful in later years in case I come across a batch of bad or old seeds or something.

Most of our snow is now gone also, so I’ve been thinking about how best to start the new garden beds. I’m going to need some cardboard so I can do a lasagna-style garden. It’s a lot easier than digging up grass. Lasagna-style gardening is where you first layer paper (cardboard, newspaper, or paper bags) over the grass, and then layer compost, leaves, and soil to make a garden bed. The compost-type things break down under the growing plants, and the first layer of cardboard/paper keeps the grass and other weeds from growing up into the bed. You end up with a really nice rich soil.

Here is part of my yard, almost completely snow free as of today!

I took this picture out our upstairs window. In the foreground, the fenced bit is our dog run. There is a bit of snow still in the dog run area, and a tiny bit near the woods. My new main garden will be adjoined to the long edge of the dog fence in this picture.