Taking stock and planning - spring 2020

[Happy]

Just sharing a little hack I have done that seems to be successful. My home runs on the cool side and given that it is completely ripped open in the middle of this never-ending renovation I was struggling with finding a nice warm spot to get my seeds to germinate. I have a brinsea brooder plate that is not in use. I put it on its side on the top of an old cabinet and piled all my pots in front of it on cookie sheets. I then tented it in very light weight clear plastic, making sure it doesn't actually touch the brooder plate. Its holding a perfect 27C...about 10 degrees warmer than the house. Once sprouted they will move to my grow lights and I will start another round of seeds. I will have far more than I need but if I have the seeds and the space then I will find someone to use them.

[TomK]

Well..this year we are moving to a raised bed scheme in a properly fenced garden...I will still have regular more traditional growing for potatoes and garlic and the big 'punkins' but i hate weeding so trying to minimze...having said that, I am a tomato nut i guess...29 varieties this year...why not 30, I have no idea but i got some seeds given to me by good people here and am looking forward to see the results...there are the faves i always grow and the newbies will basically be one plant just to see how things are...I have started them all and the cabbages, peppers and brussel sprouts just cracked the dirt...when i built this house we put in an infloor heating system but one that has the heating tubing stapled to the underside of the subfloor...easy to maintain and get at...it also is able to warm the basement when it runs which is basically now when i really don't want to overheat my main floor with the woodstove...but what it does is make the area where my seedlings are nice an warm...i have home made grow light frames with height adjustable lighting using daylight spectrum bulbs...they seems to work fine and each unit uses 35 watts the heat of which warms the tented frames nicely...last year i gave a try at selling my excess seedling stock at the annual Hort. society sale and had a good time of it...Covid-19 is putting the kybash on that this year i fear so I will have scads of plants that will en dup in the compost...sad really...but I also learned thT there is a prime window for starting stuff...its now..this week...i am a week ahead of schedule but i dont think i will suffer as i did in past years with jumping the gun at end of Feb...and another thing...the old timers always said, "wait for the full moon at the end of May/ early June to plant anything that frost might take out...good advice...

[KimChick]

DH just got seeds planted to start indoors. Our garden has an electric fence around it, and it's been pretty good so far. When DH turned that part of the field into a vegetable garden, all the rocks were placed around the inside perimeter to help deter the bunnies. We stopped growing corn so raccoons would not be as tempted, too. The chamomile that I grew last year has reseeded, so I'm happy about that.