Greenhouse Goodies

We've finally had a few days of sunshine this summer, which has been enough to get things ripening in the greenhouse! It's so nice to see something edible from my plants after all these months of taking care of them. It's a little mind-blowing to think that I started those tomatoes and peppers from seed almost 5 months ago!

I planted 4 varieties of tomatoes this year - Moneymaker, Lollipop, Patio, and Roma, and the first three of those are just starting to ripen. 

From left to right: Patio, Lollipop and Moneymaker tomatoes starting to show their true colours

I also have two varieties of cucumbers - Marketmore and Early Russian. I'm really amazed at how quickly they've been growing - both the cukes pictured were just flowers a week or so ago. I've also discovered that cucumbers can be quite spiky.

One of my Marketmore cucumbers with a close-up of the spikes and the Early Russian on the right

The squash and peppers are not faring as well - which is not surprising given the dreary summer we've been having. I have one baby squash developing from a plant that I labelled as spaghetti squash, although the fruit looks more like a butternut to me. I also have a few green peppers developing, which may get some colour if this sunny weather keeps up. The jalapenos that I started didn't get any flowers at all this year and all the pepper plants seem quite small to me. This may be in part because of the weather, or because I tried to cram too many plants together, as I tend to do.

I haven't picked anything yet, as I wanted to wait for things to ripen up a little more, but I will post a taste-test update soon!

Giving Seeds a Head Start on Life

Starting seeds indoors is an annual ritual for many northern gardeners. The growing season up here just isn't long enough for a lot of plants to grow to maturity and produce a crop, especially for tropical plants like peppers and tomatoes. So when the ground is still frozen solid and covered in snow, devoted gardeners create their own spring conditions inside with fluorescent lights and heat mats. This is my first year participating in the wild world of indoor seed starting and so far things seem to be going well. Everything we planted so far has germinated, and we've had no deaths other than the ones that I thinned on purpose.

The seed starting set-up on April 11th with lots of tomatoes, leeks, onions, peppers and various herbs

 You can find all sorts of information and advice on seed starting indoors from gardening books and websites, and to be honest, they often make it sound more complicated than it really is. I've mostly been following advice that I got from Pete Amyoony, who put on a presentation on seed starting at this year's Seedy Saturday. Pete is an organic grower with over 50 years of experience, who grows over 100 different varieties of tomatoes every year, among other things.

It gives me a thrill every time I see a new seed sprouting out of the soil, and I've been obsessively checking on them multiple times a day to see how they've grown. Seed starting indoors is very fun to do and doesn't have to be very expensive or too complicated. Here's a run-down of what I've done and why.

1. Growing Medium

These usually have two main ingredients - a water absorbent material like peat, and something gritty to lighten the soil like sand, perlite or vermiculite. Regular garden soil is usually too heavy and not absorbent enough to do the job, and it also tends to have seeds from other plants that could make things confusing. Pete's presentation included a recipe for the starting mix that he uses. Unfortunately, I wasn't prepared enough this year to have any of those materials on hand, so I picked up the only pre-made starting mix that was available from our local nursery at the time. It contains sphagnum peat, perlite, vermiculite and mychorrhizae (these are good fungi that help plant roots).

Happy little tomatoes - about 4 weeks old

2. Light

Why grow under lights rather than by a window? For us, we simply don't get enough sunlight in early spring because we live right at the foot of a hill that blocks all our winter afternoon sun. When seedlings don't get enough light, they grow tall and spindly, making them weak and susceptible to breakage and disease. Growing under lights provides an even and predictable source of energy for the baby plants, helping them grow strong and sturdy.

The light fixtures that I got are just simple fluorescent "shop lights" that you get at any hardware store with two "cool-white" bulbs. As far as I can tell from researching the matter, all seedlings really need is light from the cool end of the spectrum anyways and so far, they seem to be doing just fine. For a thorough review on the matter, check out this guy's site. Since fluorescent lights aren't as strong as the real deal, they need to be positioned quite close to the growing seedlings - no more than 2-3 inches away (5-8 cm).  They also need to be on for a fairly long time. I have my lights hooked up to a timer for 14 hours a day.

3. Heat

Most seed packets will include an optimum germination temperature, which is usually around 22°C. Seeds will germinate at cooler temperatures, but it takes them longer. I bought a heat mat mostly for my pepper seedlings, because they need a temperature of around 27°C to germinate and 18-24°C to grow. Also, the heat mat came with a seedling tray and humidity dome which I can re-use for starting seeds in future years.

4. Water and Fertilizer

I've been watering my seedlings from the bottom about twice a week, by placing the pots or seedling plugs into a tray full of water for about 10 minutes. Watering like this is better than pouring water on the top because it is more even, and doesn't disturb the surface of the soil. Watering from the bottom also keeps the seedlings and surface of the soil from getting too wet, which is a key factor for preventing the dreaded "damping-off" fungus.

Once the little seedlings start developing their first set of "true leaves", they will need some extra nutrients, particularly nitrogen and phosphorous. You can meet their needs by  incorporating composted manure, worm castings or other nutrient rich material into the starting mix, or you can feed them directly once they've started growing. I got a free packet of organic seaweed fertilizer with one of my seed orders, so I've been feeding this to my seedlings about every 2 weeks.

5. Timing

Different types of seeds need to be started at different times. Most seed packets will tell you how many weeks before the last frost date a seed should be started. The Farmer's Almanac is a good place to find out the first and last frost dates for your area. The best resource however, is local knowledge. I started my tomatoes, peppers, and leeks in the middle of March, because that is what most gardeners that I talked to around  here recommended.

It's always good to label what you planted and when. I made these tags out of styrofoam egg cartons

A note on Damping off

Damping off is a pesky little fungus that attacks the stems of little seedlings, causing them all to flop over and die. A lot of the garden advice that I've read involves extreme measures for combating this fungus such as sterilizing all your containers, instruments and seed starting mix. I preferred Pete's practical advice - rather than trying to kill the fungus, simply avoid creating the conditions that it needs to survive. These conditions include low light and a cool, damp environment. The best way to prevent these is to make sure the seedlings are getting enough light and that the surface of the soil stays fairly dry. Water from the bottom, and take humidity domes off during the day to allow for good air circulation.

I am certainly not an expert, and there is still about a month to go before I can put my seedlings in the ground, but so far I am quite happy with how they are doing. I'll be keeping my fingers crossed that nothing goes wrong! The best advice that I can give right now is the check on your seedlings every day (how can you not - it's so exciting!) and make sure their needs for light, warmth, water and nutrients are being met. 

Growing a Community Seed Bank

Last weekend I had the pleasure of attending a workshop on planning for the seed-saving garden, which was put on as part of an initiative to start a community seed bank here in Prince George. The workshop was led by Yvonna Breed, a local organic grower with many years of experience and lots of great advice for those just starting out like me. Here are a few of the more memorable tips:

• Start with feeding your soil. Healthy soil creates healthy plants, and healthy plants will produce strong, healthy seeds. 
• Grow what you want to eat! 
• Keep records in order to remember what works and what doesn't. Some important things to note include dates of planting, transplanting, and harvesting, and yields. 
• A quick and  easy test for pH: wet your soil and add a small amount of baking soda. If it fizzes, it means your soil is acidic (which most plants generally don't like). Alternatively, add a small amount of apple cider vinegar - if it fizzes, then your soil is alkaline. 
• Never plant out all your saved seed - leave some for next year just in case. 
• Just get out there and grow! You will learn from your mistakes.

I also was able to "adopt" some seeds, making our garden a part of a network of living seed banks in the community. The idea  is that I grow out the seeds, and then bring at least double the amount of seeds back after my harvest. I only picked two things as I already have a ton of seeds that I am planning on growing (and hopefully saving) this year, and limited growing space/time to create more growing space. The seeds I picked were Witkiem - a type of broad bean, and an early French orange cantaloupe. I don't really have much rationale for picking those seeds in particular other than that I thought the beans looked cool and I really like cantaloupe.

Saving seeds is an important activity, because it lowers our dependence on a small handful of seed breeders. The more people that save seeds each year, the more resilient the food supply is to massive crop failure and other disasters. Since the closest seed breeders to Prince George are about 700 km away, our growers are at pretty high risk from being cut-off from their seed supply.

The best types of seeds to save are rare heirloom varieties, especially ones that are adapted your climate or growing conditions. Look for "open-pollinated" varieties. Don't bother saving seeds from hybrid plants, as they won't grow into the same variety as their parents, and some hybrids won't produce viable seeds at all.

One of the most important notes about saving seeds is to be very careful of cross-pollination. Different varieties of the same species, and sometimes even different species from the same plant family can cross with each other. In order to prevent getting weird hybrid seeds, plants grown from seed should be isolated by distance, time, or a physical barrier like a screen box. So using my cantaloupe as an example, I shouldn't try to grow any other types of melons nearby, if I want to make sure that the seeds that I get are the same variety as the original.

Resources:  

"How to Save Your Own Seeds" from Seeds of Diversity, which includes detailed instructions for saving seeds and preventing cross-pollination for a variety of garden vegetables. Seeds of Diversity is a Canadian non-profit organization dedicated to preserving biodiversity of food crops, so it's good to support them.

"Seed to Seed" by Suzanne Ashworth, is the one I have at home, and have so far found it to be pretty informative.

ps. Click here if you are interested in becoming a seedster in the Prince George area or just want to know more about the community seed bank

Where it all begins

We're coming up to our second spring at this home. In 2010, we put in a little garden and fenced it off to make it a no-dog zone. We grew a random assortment of seeds that we received as a wedding gift the year before and a few seedlings that were started by a friends. We really had no clue what we were doing, planted way too densely, didn't do much thinning, probably didn't water very effectively and lost a lot of the harvest due to fall frosts. 

In terms of direct food yields, the garden was not much of a success, but in terms of adding beauty, diversity and a place to learn more about growing food, it was excellent. This year, I hope to expand on the successes, and of course improve upon the growing food part. Our fall harvest, though small, was really quite delightful, especially considering that I would have never expected to be getting any sort of food out of my garden that late in the season.

Our vegetable garden  in August 2010

One of the reasons for starting this blog was to share the lessons that I've learned in hopes that others can learn from my successes and my mistakes. I'd like to show that growing food is accessible and easy for all people, including the too busy/lazy/forgetful ones like me.

Some lessons learned from last year's vegetable gardening experience:

·         Consider the mature size of a plant when deciding where to put the neighbours. While dense plantings have their advantages, planting so densely that you forget that there are other vegetables trying to grow under those massive zucchini leaves is probably not the best thing for either plant. Also, dense growing conditions were probably responsible for many of our vegetables going to seed before maturity.

·         We really don't need that much lettuce, or radishes, at one time. This relates to the space issue too, but this year, I'm going to try to sow my salad crops in succession so that there are always some (but not too much) fresh greens available for salads

·         Transplanting is a stressful event for young plants, and there are things that you should do minimize that stress. This includes a process called 'hardening off'. When I transplanted some tomatoes that were given to me last spring, I'm pretty sure I broke all the rules. As a result, those tomato plants didn't grow at all for their first month in the garden, and we didn't have a single red tomato by the time the first frost came in early September

·         Beware of the limits of your growing season! I could have brought some of those green tomatoes inside and hopefully salvaged a few before the frost hit them, but I forgot. So I ended up with mushy green tomatoes that I could find no better use for other than the compost bin. I am now well aware that the average first frost date in my area is right around September 3rd, and will no longer be taking any chances. 

Our last harvest of 2010 on October 23

We have many exciting things in store for this upcoming season, including building a new greenhouse with insulated beds, expanding our vegetable garden, building a herb spiral, further developing our forest garden, and starting a few vegetables from seed indoors.