Gardening, Fitness, and Heath Series, part 3
Starting seedlings indoors can be a fun experience, especially since it is still winter. It’s cool knowing that you are getting a jump on the season and you are protecting your investment of awesome organic produce by protecting them from the cold winter nights.
According to averages, the last frost that occurs for the year in Memphis is April 7. Realize that this is an average and you don’t have to be exact about it. Do your best to be around the date and you will be fine. Using the date April 7, you can plan your entire growing year if you know how many weeks the vegetable matures and what climate it prefers. Some vegetables prefer cooler weather, hence the reason you see more of them in the spring and fall. Examples of these include broccoli, lettuces, and greens. Some vegetables prefer the summer months. Examples include tomatoes, summer squash and eggplant.
The earliest vegetables you can begin right now is broccoli. Cauliflower is second but since it isn’t as tolerate of the cold, broccoli can get a head start. Broccoli has a 16 week growing cycle from seed to harvest. Since it can tolerate some degree of cold weather, you can start it 12 weeks before the average last frost. You don’t want to plant broccoli too far into the warmer months because they will produce their yellow flowers too quickly and they will be pretty inedible for you at that point. For Memphis you want to start broccoli indoors around January 14. If you want to create a continuous harvest, you can start some of your seeds around January 14 and more around January 28. The transplant date to your actual square foot garden is around March 3 and March 17 respectfully. Cauliflower gets started a little later and has a 14 week growing cycle from seed to harvest. Start cauliflower seeds around January 28 and a second harvest around February 11. Realize that both cauliflower and broccoli will be ready to be harvested at the same time. So, what that said, only plant as many as you know you and your family will eat. Don’t be the gardener that plants so much they have to literally give all their hard earned produce away because it will spoil otherwise.
One broccoli or cauliflower will take up one entire square foot from your garden. If you recall, there are 16 spaces in an entire square foot garden. So, you will need to plan accordingly and you might want to have more than one box. However, you will harvest both vegetables around May 5 and May 19, so you can always harvest and immediately replant something new as soon as you harvest.
Now, let’s talk about some of the potential problems with starting seeds indoors. I mean, isn’t it as easy as putting a seed in a cup filled with dirt? Well, in some ways it is, but you need to consider a few things to make sure you are getting the most successful plants possible. First, if you want to have 8 broccoli plants to be in your garden, realize that not every seed you put into the ground is going to germinate. For example, I wanted to start with 8 broccoli this year so I started 10 seeds. It just so happens, I only got 7 to be successful. This is a pretty good percentage, but not all 10 sprouted as they should have.
If you want to skip the Jason Beam method of using Potting Blocks, you can use Mel’s method of starting seeds. You will need a small plastic container and you need to poke some small holes in the bottom. Fill it with vermiculite. With the container on a saucer and add water on the saucer. You should see a change in the vermiculite’s color. Pinch a few seeds with your thumb and forefinger and place into the container. Try to space out the seeds in a way that gives room, but you should have plenty of room to create plenty of seedlings.
Once the seeds have sprouted, transplant them into a seedling tray (or styrofoam cup) filled with the Mel’s Mix of 1/3 compost, 1/3 vermiculite, and 1/3 peat moss (Or the Nature’s Earth garden soil). You want to more them as soon as you see the first two leaves appear. Carefully loosen the vermiculite with a pencil and lift the seedling while grabbing one of its plant ears. Create a hole in the seed tray and carefully transplant the seedling. That’s it for now! When you transplant into the garden, you will need to take a pair of scissors and clip part of the roots to keep the plant from stunting and being root bound.
For the Potting Blocks, I used a container that doesn’t leak water such as a chicken stock box and cut it into half to use the Micro 20. With the soil I bought, I added a little water and simply put the Micro 20 into the box of soil to charge it full of soil. I then placed the small blocks on the 1/2 stock box container and released. If you don’t want 20 seedlings, keep the best formed blocks and remove the rest. Place one seed in each block. Remember, more than likely, not all will sprout so do 20% more than you actually want in the garden. That way, even if all sprout, you can choose the best ones to perform well in your garden.
After you have placed the seeds in the micro 20 blocks, you should put a black bag over the broccoli or cauliflower for 2-3 days until they sprout. Apparently, these seeds prefer the dark and need it before sprouting, so do so to get best results. For both the Mel method and Potting Block method, you want to have a temperature of around 65-70 degrees inside your house.
Once the seeds have sprouted you will want to transplant them to the Mini 4 Soil Blocker that has the Micro 20 pins. This allows you to simply pick up the micro 20 blocks and move them into the Mini 4’s without touching the ears of the plants and possibly killing the plant.
The last thing I am going to mention in this post is light. If you don’t think your plants are going to get enough light with the window you put them close to, them you might want to strongly consider getting shop lights. You can get some at Home Depot for $10 bucks a piece. You can hang them to your ceiling with a chain so that as the plants grow, you can move the light up. Don’t get sold on having to get “plant light bulbs.” Get the “Natural Light” bulbs and they provide the full spectrum of light them need. Finally, make the whole system foolproof and get a timer to hook the lights up to. Let the plants get 16 hours of light a day since it is much weaker than the actual sun.
Provide a little water every day to you plant babies and you will be ready to transplant into the garden in no time!
Seeds to consider starting around January 28: leeks, green onions, and red onions!
See also:
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