The Start of the Spring Brassicas

I had my brassicas down to be seeded twice. Once for the ones that can handle the cold, and another time a week later for things that don't like to see the colder temps. Chinese cabbage for instance will bolt prematurely if they see really cold temps. They are hardy enough to withstand some freezing weather, but it is better they don't.

On Tuesday I noticed that my schedule said they should have been seeded on Saturday. The later ones, this coming Saturday. That won't happen as Saturday is my husband birthday party. Guests start to show up at 1pm and I have to kick them out at 11pm. So with prep work in the morning it is an all day affair.

But my seeding schedules are really just suggestions for me. They always get moved around because of scheduling issues. So earlier this week I had some time and decided to just do all of the brassicas at once. Oh and the chard, I started them too.

As Granny was saying the other day, the garden will be a real friendship garden this year. This batch of seedlings came from Mac, Granny, and Michelle. And yes a few commercial sources too. Here is the list of what got seeded: Yakotta-Na, Purple Mizuna, Tatsoi, Fun Jen, Komatsuna, Rubarb Chard, Argentata Chard, Piracicaba (recommended to me by Michelle and Ali), Packman, White Stem Bok Choy (from Mac), Chinese Kale (from Mac), Choy Sum (from Mac), Shanghai Bok Choy (from Mac), Ching Chang Bok Choy (from Granny), Senposai (from Michelle), Chinese Cabbage Rubicon, Small Chinese Cabbage (from Mac).

I made 1 1/2" blocks to fill a whole flat before I seeded them out. Then I found I needed about 14 more blocks. So just put them on some lids. I'll move some into the onion space, since about five blocks so far are empty. And I'll put some in with the lettuce once the seeds are up.

I know some of you have much larger operations, but this was a lot of seeding for me. I've planted way, way too much. I tend not to plan my garden out on paper. I was going to do a paper plan so you could see it all, but nope. I didn't do it again. I'm just not that kind of person I guess. I'll plan it out in the bed as I put in my peas (which ought to happen today or tomorrow). I'll put labels in the bed dividing where the space ought to be. I have a lot of space this year (my biggest bed), but I want more onions than last year so they may take up a lot of the extra space. I will end up tossing the extras (unless I can find homes for them, I haven't in the past). I figured it was better to grow too much than too little.

Then I took a look at the other seedlings. The lettuce is doing well. The early onions (the big ones) are doing great. The late seeded onions are coming up well. I planted leeks, bunching onions, and early tomatoes in the little tiny blocks to move into the 2" blocks later. Except for the King Sieg Leeks germination was spotty to non existent. I might have to make a few more blocks and multi plant some bunching onions to fill in. The early tomatoes are just a bust. I have enough leeks up to plant the small space they will get allotted, but not all the varieties I seeded will get in. Those little tiny blocks are just hard to get to germinate. The 1 1/2" ones germinate well, but the little ones dry out too fast when the heat is on in the house even covering them with plastic wrap. I need to do a better job with them when the main peppers and tomatoes get seeded in them. I might just keep the bottom part in a bit of water until I see growth. Overall the 1 1/2" blocks work better than the others for me.

A very sunny garden

And on another front, the weather has just been totally awesome here recently. We had our flood, which didn't affect us personally much. After the rains left, the sun came out and it has been about 60F since. We are getting night time temps in the 40s right now and Saturday it might hit 70F. Wow. What nice weather after such horrible weather. Mother Nature is surely playing with us this spring.