56 Tom Tags

Oh my aching fingers! I just used a
ball point pen to emboss 56+ copper
tomato tags (goey black ink galore)!
Two sadly never made it Livingston
Perfection and the Russian Oxheart.

Day 1 - What a great day the first day in always is!

The rhubarb looks good - so does the garlic.
... darn thistle though (I'll let it grow a little more & collect it for tea) ... it always bites me no matter how far away from it I get I always seem to back into it.

I planted one raspberry cane last Fall and two raspberry canes today

(thank you Lyn)! ... there's a hole waiting for the soaking Tayberry.

Thought the daffodil needed a drink too (after I knocked it sideways

with a tomato stake so I had to pick it & bring it home for my table :)

I told Mom about my Tayberry planting. She mentioned that her grandfather

had planted it on their farm - the farm that had burned to the ground - the one

where everything was lost - no nobody died but it was one of the family's defining

moments ... they called them black raspberries and her Dad used to always try to

get to the berries before any of the kids could (oftentimes they beat him to it -

but sometimes to their utter dismay they would happily arrive and find it bare)!

Marilyn from Lot 60 passed by my gate on her way home after toiling away for

the whole day in her beautifully manicured garden and asked if I'd like all of the

rest of her tiny pea seedlings. I've had such poor luck with peas so I was thrilled!

Thank you Marilyn - here they are all tucked safely into their new pea bed. But I

was lazy and naive and foolish - believing it would rain at midnight like predicted.

It's morning and I've just gotten up and looked out the window - no rain - I turned

the television on and now I am foolishly expecting rain again - it's due any moment

now ... Burlington's been hit already and blah blah blah (lesson learned) ... ?

Catch of the Day

Ahhh - now I will rest (or not) ... the umbrella looks like a rabbit - BLAaaahhHHhhH!

Well here's a little more entertainment ... not that you are

amused by the same things I'm amused by but ... here goes

... it's the biggest bee I've ever seen in my life ... & it almost

flew right into my camera lens while I was filming it's debut!

... not to mention that I then thought it was going to fly right

up the leg of my pants so I got shaky and hit the stop button.

I'm off to the allotment now

... but before I go, this just caught my eye because I happen to have planted Thai Basil and a number of other plants on the Plan Bee List

... see you later!

all potted up

My shelf is the top one.  I spent half the day potting up seedlings into larger containers.  My plants are doing really well so far.  Best year ever!   Below are some of potted up plants I'm taking home to baby in south-facing windows!

maybe I'll buy the monkey tomorrow

Today I got outside onto the roof after watching 5 hours of the Ten Commandments - intermittently - and planted a big pot of two types of arugula, a pot of nasturtiums and spinach and a pot of mixed lettuces I picked up in Whole Foods in Portland last year.

The chives are up and the sage looks like it's come back bigger and better than ever

   

(and I think I have some big onions)!

I think my strawberry plant looks ok.  In the pot on the right, I planted some Renee's Electric Blue Sweet Peas I just got at Fiesta Farm Nursery yesterday.

Oh - and I potted up a little 6-pak of Thai Basil as well - I don't know what happened to my Lemon Basil that I thought I bought ... looks like maybe I'll have to go back for that tomorrow ... and maybe I'll buy the monkey (hook)!

I didn't buy the monkey

I went with Barry and Gayla to Fiesta Farms and we poked around a bit and came away with a few things.  Gayla was all about the Victorian-coloured, pale, frail as tissue, petunias and whisker-faced little violas; Barry got some red nasturtiums with inky black splotches and I got a Tayberry cane (half raspberry half blackberry).  I told my Mom I got it and she said, "Oh that's going to just go crazy in your garden - you'll have to be careful!"  I can't wait!  I got a few packages of seeds as well.  Some spinach with a surprise extra freebie ... parsnips!  I got some Lime Basil and Thai Basil.  I almost bought a little monkey (now I am very upset with myself that I didn't get it)!  Really UPSET!  It was a little barrel of monkey's-type metal hook that hangs off of a pot and you could hang another pot (with a handle off of) ... not a real monkey!



I went to Lee Valley afterwards because I had to return some stuff for the greenhouse and I got some peanuts.  I don't know what I was thinking because it says on the package that you have to air dry them and then roast them ... I'll have to research this and add it to my To Do List now - as though it isn't already right out of control.  I also got a little bucket with an apron around it that was on sale ... probably because it's a bucket with an apron around it and it's kind of stupid.  But I think I'll be able to use it and it will be kind of practical.  I wish I'd gotten the monkey instead of the peanuts.  Isn't that always the way - sometimes!  It reminds me of barrel of monkeys and my brother used to play with them - they were like his friends.  I'm pretty sure he used to talk to them.  At the time I was thinking of getting it for my boss/co-ordinator because of the One Minute Manager idea where you try to figure out whose monkey something is and then you try to get the 'monkey off your back' ...

After all the shopping I headed over to the greenhouse with my tray of plants that needed to be repotted. I thought I'd brought my chart with what was what but I didn't so I repotted it all up using coloured straws not knowing exactly what anything was other than same coloured straws are now in with similar plants!   I hope they're happy.  I gave them each a little poop.  Mushroom Poop?  That doesn't sound right ... maybe it wasn't poop afterall.  Compost.  That's it.  Mushroom Compost.   Oh Boy - you don't want to see the tray I left at the greenhouse.  It was a real mess ... no straws ... just plants!

Someone please give me a clue!

the shelf with the red cups on it is mine

The shade cloth is now up in the greenhouse.  When I went it was a dreary rainy day - not much light getting in on the south side.

Two Soiled Trays + One Aerogarden Seed Starter Tray

DONE - well almost - and now sitting on top of the florescent fixture which is nice & cosy warm

I decided it would be very fitting to plant my tomatoes during Earth Hour; but I got a call from my friend Barry and we talked gardening in the dark (on phones that had batteries that were charged from before the hour began) ... fitting?


I didn't start planting until 9:30 pm on the button and was in bed by 3 am ZZzZzZz ... I still need to label the cells and this won't happen until I can take the plastic lids of the trays (I like to label straws and slip bamboo skewers inside as the plants grow).   Mind you - they are all numbered on my Master List ... and I was wise enough though to mark the bottom of each of the two large trays holding all the little dirt-filled cells so I'd know which end of them was where ... AND ... I eventually realized that I needed markers poking out of the cells I was about to plant ... in both trays ... since it was hard figuring out after the seeds were covered which were planted and which were waiting to be ... and I was doing double duty on two trays that looked identical as well as doing the aerogarden seed starting tray which were marked going the opposite way to the soiled cells (sounds like they soiled themselves - I know - but it was I who soiled them ... 'and No ... they don't need a diaper change')!

I kept myself on my toes for over 5 hours adding serious depth to the number 11 growing on my forehead between my eyebrows.

Two shots of the seed starting tray for the aerogarden.   There are 70 sponges with organic growing medium in a styrofoam bed floating on water which I'll add organic fertilizer to in two weeks. 

 

Once the sprouts are up, I'll remove the plastic and the lights are on a timer for tomato growing so I can actually go away for two weeks at a time (which is why I got this because theres a Bienniale Conference I like to attend that is always held at the end of March)!  And once the tomatoes are planted into deep cells and hardening off, I'll plant herbs in the aerogarden and they'll last me 4 months.  One day I'll get the shelf unit so I can hang it on a wall and regain some precious counter space.  This year I am paying close attention to how well the seedlings do in the aerogarden and in soiled cells (as well as at the community greenhouse). 

I got a BIG one

I just had this photo e-mailed to me from my greenhouse watering buddy ... the whippersnapper there is doing well.  Thanks Gary!

4' Monster Lights

Well they are up!  Those lights I bought on a whim that dreary day sometime in early February when I found myself in the local hardware store asking about florescent grow light set ups.  The first person I asked didn't have a clue what I was talking about and I must say I was somewhat relieved because I hadn't written anything down nor made any definite decisions about it was I thought I wanted.  Then around the corner came this other guy who didn't know I'd just been served and he asked if there was something he could help me with.  I was just trying to be polite and explained that since I didn't really know what I was talking about it would be pretty useless trying to explain what I needed for my 40+ types of tomato seedlings (yes back then it was 40+ and now it's 56+).  Seems he was some sort of an aquarium expert and he said he knew what I was talking about and I left with a $153 receipt for an order he placed by phone to his supplier after he took of for about a half hour on me.

About two weeks later I got a call and had to go pick the 2' x 4' four-tube monstrosity of a fixture up that  I've been walking past it in my hallway for a few weeks now.  Today I finally decided to see if I could at least begin to try to see if I could put some of the bits together and get it to light up.  No problem.  I even got the little on & off remote gizmo I thought was a timer thing rigged up to it and it works too ...  so I suppose I can keep that bedside so I don't have to get up to flick the switch off & on before I go to sleep and when I get up in the morning.

I put the whippersnappers in my front window (squint and you can barely see them at the far right) with the eggplants & peppers.  There is plenty of room for the sage (one just came up so it's been put under the light) ... and the basil seeds and edible flowers I planted yesterday will go under too as soon as they sprout!

Almost Ready

I visited the greenhouse today and took a few little seedlings from my cups to bring home.  

I've added the little batch of parsley and a few other wanton seedlings to the collection hanging 

under the florescents in my kitchen.  

I am going to pot up some eggplants and peppers growing under the aerogarden lights to bring to the greenhouse and put in a south-facing window at home and see how they all do.   They are all really going gangbusters under the aerogarden lights. Time to leave the nest guys.

And finally I got the chain from the hardware store that I might need  to hang my lights ... just in case I can't just lean them on something so they light the shelf I am setting up on a table in a south window upstairs ...  a little redundant since this new monster has four 4-foot tubes ... but I'm thinking I might be able to use it to just augment the sunny sill.  I'll have to make sure the timer is set so my home doesn't glow from afar in the middle of the night.

I've hauled the new lights upstairs and I've lined up cells in trays ... everything this year is being planned around 56 varieties of tomatoes ... two trays with 72 cells each - heheh - that means each tray gets the whole shebang and more.  Oh the anticipation of seeing all 56 seedlings together and deciding what will go in the remaining 16 cells.

I planted three little self-watering potlets of sage.  I call them potlets because they are so small that I just 'know' (I think) that I'm going to have to pot up within the month which I don't really think is the best use of my time ... but they are self-watering and quite cute ... if I remember from last year, sage is quite small & cute so I am hoping to be able to get away without potting up!   Intellectually risky business - this gardening!  

I like planting a few seeds in deep cells and clipping the one or two weakest seedlings when they come up (often I wind up gently wiggling them out and planting them in another pot ... and I know I said I don't like potting up - I just realized that's what I am doing ... hmmm ... it felt good saving the little guys and almost as good being so thrifty and super good giving them away because they're extras ...  and I really like bottom watering & fertilizing (which I'm just getting the hang of with the deep cells under the aerogarden lights now.  The tray takes a bottle and a half of the container I am using now ... I was enjoying using the squirt bottle to moisten the tops of the dirt but heck sometimes that's just too much work so I've experimented and found what it takes to do it solely from the bottom.  Each day means adding a little more ... but I've got the hang of it now that I took the time and did that experiment.)

unidentified tomato seeds sprouting

Last year I saved some seeds ... or rather I had every good intention of saving seeds but partway through I must have gone to bed and totally forgotten about them (oh - I remember now ... I was waiting for them to get all foamy and when they got that disgusting I was so grossed out I just put a lid on the jars because I think there were fruit flies and whatnots in with them by this point) ... well I found the jars about a week ago and was about to soak them so they could be put in the dishwasher and I decided to number them and soak some of the seeds and redry the others after getting them unstuck from the jar bottoms.  I numbered the baggies I put them in and now they are all sprouting and I can't remember what they are but I am really hoping there's an Elberta Peach coming my way again this year.  I'll know if one of the tomatoes plants is really fuzzy (heheh) fingers crossed!

so enough about the whippersnappers ...

I counted my tomato seed packages yesterday and gave them their own 3-ring binder [it's red (for tomato red) --> I'm using a big brown binder for the seeds I've planted and am following the progress of <-- in dirt (get it) ... and I just put my notes and info for the greenhouse in a yellow (sunshine-driven) coloured binder].  If I don't do this, I just know I'll wind up at school someday with seeds instead of grade sheets ... I use the school colour (blue) for those binders now!  but I do digress now don't I ...

I wrote out a planting plan yesterday and lined up my pots ... I sorted my seeds and got them all back into their little slots from which they'd strayed during last year's planting frenzies ... and I counted them all ...

AND I have 56 different kinds of tomatoes this year (including the 'whips' ... I came by 21 types last week when a fellow & self-proclaimed tom addict, too, and I traded ... so now I've got yellow, red & black grapes, green tomatoes, orange ones, fuzzies and potato leafs, determinates and indeterminates and some the size of blue berries - there's one I'm going to put in sugar and dry and one I'm going to hang upside down indoors so I've got tomatoes ripening on the vine until December and a few I'm going to make sauces and pastes from and there's a bunch for the freezer ... and those for eating ... I am so hAppPPpy

YES of course there'll be beans & peas and lettuces and zucs and pumpkins and violets and naturtiums and calendulas and basils and all that BUT there's going to be a main attraction at the zoo this year ... my basizillions of tomatoes (I sure hope it's going to be a good year for them) ...

Oh I am just so hAppPPpy

give 'em some fish fert & they grow an inch?

Not exactly an inch nor 'give 'em an inch and they'll take a mile' neither ...  but those whippershappers are really living up to their name ... I measured them yesterday morning and the tallest were 4 inches.  This morning the tallest are 4.5 inches.

I've just potted 4 whippersnappers up and I'm taking them to the greenhouse to see how they do there.  I'm giving two away to volunteers - maybe they will have different  outcomes (and if theirs are better I'll ask what they did so I can learn more).  I really buried them up to their ears and left about 2 inches so I can even add more soil once the stem grows again ... I am believing this will help them develop really strong roots and super strong stems!  No more coddling ... they'll take what they get at the greenhouse (and I won't be around to see what that is unfortunately as I am trying to stay away and let others on the Watering Committee do their jobs - guess it's a little like letting kids go off to Nursery School ... except I've got a bunch back home if anything happens - so I care ... but not so much really).

Letting the tray down 2" & fertilizing day

I weakly fertilized everything again today (first fert for whips which range from 1" - 4.5").

FINALLY a tiny cayenne pepper

seedling(s) poking heads out of seed coats (I just carefully pried two off)!  So now there's a total of three actually.

Some eggplants are about 4 inches tall and the sweet peppers are doing almost as well.  The Jalapeno Peppers aren't too much smaller than the rest.  I've now watered twice using the Schafer Fisheries fertilizer.

The Whippersnappers are doing so well - I'll have to transplant really soon and lower the trays as they are touching the florescents already.  I wonder how the little beheadling will wind up doing?  I'll make sure I label it so I know.

14 of 15 Whippersnappers UP

Two more whippersnapper tomato seedlings just popped up overnight. I now have 14 in total - out of 15 planted. And the little beheadling is going to make it! I thought he would (well not right when his head came off and the seed coat with the two leaves in it were laying in my hand - but rather when a couple of days later it looked like something green was bubbling out of the end of the stem top! He's sporting two true leaves now - so it looks like those first two (fake) leaves must have been what came off and the little central area where the true leaves come out of wasn't damaged. I'm no scientist - but that's what it looks like to me.

Photos to follow at some point - later ... yeah yeah - I know (trust me - he's cute)!

the little beheadling

I don't want to speak too soon BUT the little beheadling seems to be growing a leaf out the top of the stem now!  Weirder things have happened - right?

This is not the beheadling but a poor photo of some in another pot (Pot #3) that have already begun to develop their first true leaves!  That only took 10 days!

Here I am acting quite surprised at the whipper's when my eggplants & peppers have been going great guns for a couple of days now but they were planted a whole week earlier so the whippers ARE doing well (I won't foist poor photos of eggplants & peppers on anyone right now ... dang I wish I could figure out how to use this camera ... I'm an experiential learner ... and possibly even a flukin' fraud whose whole profession is about to take a tumble)

Whippershappers - two steps forward & one back

In the 1st Pot I inadvertantly beheaded one of my sprouts trying to help the seed casing off :( ... (that makes 3 instead of 4 in Pot One) in the 2nd pot there's another little new sprout struggling out of a seed case (I put a water drop on it so it will soften and maybe that will help it :)  (that makes 2 in Pot Two) and in the 3rd pot there's another little sprout coming up too (that makes 4 in Pot Three) ... Total 9

I made a note to myself to soak the seeds next year before they go into the soil so that maybe the seed cases are less difficult for them to emerge from (three cheers for the 10-Year Journal from Lee Valley because I am actually using it for things like this and can find notes to myself at this time of the year without too much scrounging on my belly around on cold cement floors in the garage where I tend to store a fair amount of obscure & random gardening stuff)

more whippersnappers UP

Friday
In the first pot, there are 4 sprouts, in the second there is now 1 sprout and in the third pot, there are 3 sprouts.  Total of 8 whippersnappers so far!

All of the other seedlings are doing well.  No hot cayenne peppers yet.

Thursday

Five whippersnapper (tomato) seedlings are up ... and I do mean UP as well as up. I have been eyeing the florescent light in my kitchen for quite awhile now thinking it either needs to come down or I need to use it for seedlings. So guess which idea won out. I've rigged a light plant tray up underneath it with twine and it is providing light now for my seedlings! I knew I ordered those two extra grow florescent tubes for a reason! Whippersnappers are usually up before any of the other tomatoes (not just because they are the only ones I've planted so far) but because they are early determinates. This type of determinate can be grown in containers because it is a low-sprawling vine which means I can grow it under lights indoors for a fair length of time before it needs to go outdoors. It will take off quickly once it is set outside and produce numerous sweet, pink-red, oval cherry-size fruits. The reason I know this is that I have been following other tomato growers blogs during the past couple of years and taking notes so that I can try what they have had successes with