Category Archives: Seed Starting

The 2023 Gardening Season has Begun!

The 2023 garden has officially started. During the first week of February, I set up my Juwel Biostar 1500 cold frame outside (see pic below). I currently have no plants inside of it, but very soon my lettuce seedlings will be the first plants to go into it. Lettuce seeds were planted inside under grow lights on February 20th. In another 7 to 10 days I will start seeds of celery, kohlrabi, brussels sprouts, and broccoli inside. Around the middle of March I will start all of the rest of my warm season seeds like peppers and tomatoes inside. I like to start all my seeds inside under grow lights to speed germination. After the seeds germinate, I will move them to the cold frame outside, if the weather cooperates.

Most of my fall seeded lettuce has survived the winter under the plastic covered hoop (see pic below). My fall planted top-setting onions have started to push new green growth through the soil (see pic below).

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Juwel Cold Frame in the Garden, Picture Taken 2-21-23

Overwintered Lettuce Under the Plastic Covered Hoop, Picture Taken 2-21-23

Top Setting Onions Pushing up New Growth, Picture Taken 2-21-23

2022 Garden Review and Last of the Garden Harvest

Well, the 2022 gardening year has come and gone. I was able to harvest the last remaining carrots, on December 19, 2022, just before the below zero weather hit Central Indiana (see pic below). The 2022 garden was a big success, despite the very dry conditions from mid summer to late fall. I tried a few new things in the garden this year, which turned out to be a resounding success. One being the landscape fabric placed under the tomato plants (see pic below) and the other using a bean tower for the rattlesnake pole beans. The landscape fabric under the tomatoes kept the leaf blight in check. I have been battling this leaf disease for many years now. In 2022, I had the best tomato crop in about 7 or 8 years. Also, last year, I tried a pole green bean (rattlesnake) which I had growing up a bean tower which was purchased from Gardener’s Supply Company. This tower worked really well and the beans grew and climbed like crazy on it.

Now is the time to be planning your 2023 garden. I will be ordering seeds and plants over the next few weeks. With any luck, the cold frame will be going up in the garden in about another month.

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Last of the Nantes Carrots Harvested on 12/19/22

Landscape Fabric Placed Under Tomato Plants

Outstanding Corn and Tomato Harvest, Fall Garden Planted

Can you believe it is already August 9th. The summer is really flying by!! The garden finally received some much needed rain last night and this morning, Hooray!!! The last of the the Silver Queen white corn was harvested on August 3rd. It was a most excellent corn crop this year. Harvest started on the Roma tomatoes for real on August 1st. I probably harvested at least 30 pounds of tomatoes and was able to process and freeze 10 containers of tomato sauce. The six plants are still absolutely loaded with ripening tomatoes. This is certainly my best year for tomatoes in at least 6 or 7 years. Harvest continues on the jalapeno, hot banana, and super chili peppers. I have been drying the super chili peppers and freezing the others. The 5 poblano pepper plants are producing some peppers, but not as many as I like. Harvest also continues like crazy on the Rattlesnake pole beans. These have really produced well for me this year. The celery continues to produce well, despite the dry conditions. I have had to water these plants quite a bit. The fall garden is starting to take shape. The spring planted broccoli plants were pulled up and were replaced with more broccoli seedlings about 3 days ago. The raised beds were planted with broccoli, cabbage, cauliflower, and kohlrabi seedlings over the last few days and lettuce seedlings were also transplanted out into the garden. Scarlet Nantes carrot seeds were planted out in the garden the last week of July and have since germinated. This seed bed was watered well and then covered with boards for 3 days to help keep the seeds from drying out. The carrot bed is now covered with a row cover to give it a little shade in this hot and dry weather. As the weather cools a little I will remove the row cover. Happy Late Summer Gardening!!

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Three Very Full Bags of Roma Tomatoes Ready for Processing, Picture Taken 8-1-22

Last of the Harvested Silver Queen White Corn, Picture Taken 8-3-22

Silver Queen White Corn Ready for Eating, Picture Taken 8-2-22

Many Roma Tomatoes Still on Plants. Notice the Row Cover Over the Carrot Bed to the Right, Picture Taken 8-5-22

Late July Garden Harvest, Drought Continues

Well, the drought continues in my area of Central Indiana, but I did get about an inch of rain yesterday morning, which was much needed. Harvest has started on the Silver Queen white sweet corn about 5 days ago. Fresh sweet corn is fantastic!! What I don’t get to eat fresh, I will freeze. The corn will only stay good and sweet for about another week or so. About a week ago there was storm that blew down some of the corn. Luckily, it only blew down a few of the plants which were ready to be harvested anyways (see pic below). I have been harvesting the last of the broccoli side shoots. These plants will be pulled up in another week to make way for my fall broccoli transplants. I will be sowing bush green bean seeds, where my spring planted onions were growing, very soon. I will also be sowing carrot seeds either today or tomorrow. Harvest continues on all of the peppers, pole green beans, celery, kohlrabi, and cucumbers. With the cucumbers, I was able to put up 7 jars of refrigerator pickles. Harvest has also begun on the roma tomatoes, with many many more to come over the next few weeks. I will be harvesting many of these tomatoes within the week to start making and freezing tomato sauce. I will hopefully be transplanting broccoli, cabbage, cauliflower, kohlrabi, and lettuce seedlings out into the garden in another 10 days or so. My brother and I have been raising 4 new egg laying hens since late February, 2 Barred Rocks and 2 Rhode Island Reds. They are now about 20 weeks old and all have started to lay eggs. We now have a total of 7 hens. All are laying eggs except the oldest one, which we have named “white chicken.” She is over 7 years old (see pic below). Fall will be here before you know it!

Silver Queen Corn Blown Down by a Storm, Picture Taken 7-23-22

My Spoiled Chickens Enjoying Some Leftover Corn Cobs. Their Name Are: White Chicken, Ruby, Rosie, Aubrey, Abbie, Tipper, and Domino, Picture Taken 7-24-22

Summer Garden Harvest Update, Fall Seeds Started

Well, it is now official, most of Central Indiana is now in a “moderate drought” according to the U.S. Drought Monitor. Needless to say we need some rain, but we did get at least some about 5 days ago, which helped a little. Despite the drought, my garden continues to produce an abundant harvest, as long as I keep up on the watering. The spring onion crop this year might be a record for me. The Red Candy Apple onion produced about normal, but the yellow Candy onion looks like a record harvest as I have some truly gigantic sized onions (see pic below). The harvest on the Red Norland potatoes looks to be near a record as well this year (see pic below). The Tango celery is growing really well (as long as I keep the plants watered) and harvest has started on these as well. The spring planted lettuce has finished for for now, but I will be transplanting lettuce seedlings for fall harvest in about another month. Harvest on my green beans has started. I am trying an heirloom pole green bean this year called Rattlesnake. It has started producing harvestable sized beans over the last week or so and I have been very impressed with this bean so far (see pic below). It also looks like I will have the best crop of Roma tomatoes as I have had in at least 5 or 6 years, as I have been able to keep the early blight in-check this year. I tried using landscape fabric under the tomato plants this year, and this seems to have helped. I anticipate harvesting many tomatoes in about another month or so. The broccoli harvest this spring has also been pretty good. All of the main heads have been harvested, and now I am enjoying the many side shoots that have been sprouting. The white Silver Queen corn is growing like crazy right now (see pic below) and harvest should start on in about another 3 weeks, YUM!! I have been harvesting Hot Banana peppers and a few Jalapeño peppers.

Even though it is only the middle of July, it is not to late to start planning your fall garden. I started seeds of broccoli, kohlrabi, cauliflower, and cabbage on July 3rd in cell packs. They have since germinated and are growing on the covered back porch. I will be transplanting these seedlings out into the garden on the first or second week of August.

Yellow Candy Onion Nearing Harvest, Picture Taken 7-9-22

Red Norland Potatoes Harvested From One 4ftx4ft Raised Bed, Picture Taken 7-13-22

Silver Queen Corn Growing Nicely, Picture Taken 7-9-22

Mid May Update – New Blog Feed Email Provider

Been very busy in the garden over the last week. All of the spring garden has now been planted including transplanting of all the celery, pepper and tomato seedlings. I am trying something new this year with the tomatoes. I am using black landscape fabric around the plants to see if it reduces the leaf disease issue that I have had over the last several years. Harvest continues on the lettuce, which is growing like crazy. There has been a little bit of slug damage on the lettuce, but it is not too serious at the moment. Harvest also continues on radishes and green onions. The potatoes continue to grow nicely in the raised beds and in the grow bags and some of the vines are approaching 8 inches tall. Cucumbers, bush green beans, and bush lima bean seeds were also recently sown. I am trying a new pole green bean this year called Rattlesnake. It is an old heirloom variety. I will keep you posted on how it performs. The Silver Queen white sweet corn seeds were sown about 9 days ago and they have already emerged. See pictures of some of my garden plots at the end of this post.

If you are reading this blog post via email, then you might have already noticed that I have a new blog feed provider, followit. You might want to customize how your feed is delivered to you by visiting followit through the link provided in the blog feed email. My old feed blog provider, Feedblitz will no longer work. A few of you might also be receiving emails from Feedburner. I will be deleting my Feedburner account soon so you will not be receiving emails from Feedburner after it is deleted.

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Pepper and Tomato Seedlings Recently Planted, 5-17-22

Kohlrabi, Broccoli, Brussel Sprouts, and Some Late Seeded Lettuce, 5-17-22

Spring 2022 Update – I am Back!!

Happy Spring 2022 everyone!! I am finally back to blogging. I retired at the end of August, 2021 and I should have more time to devote to this blog, although I am busier now than when I was working. The spring weather, so far, has been very wet and cold. The weather seems to be turning more favorable thankfully. I planted 201 onion transplants on March 21st (Candy and Red Candy). My poor onion transplants have suffered through flooding rains and very cold temperature (with a low of at least 18 degrees one of those mornings) but have come through this weather relatively well with no protection. I was finally able to side dress the onions with my homemade organic fertilizer about 10 days ago. Lettuce seedlings were transplanted into the garden on April 4th and have been mostly covered with a plastic covered hoop since then. Red Norland potatoes were planted in 2 of the raised beds and in 4 grow bags on April 11th. Two 8-foot rows of peas (Green Arrow) and a small patch of radish (Champion) seeds were sown on April 12th. Broccoli (Packman), Kohlrabi (Kossack), and Brussels Sprout (Jade Cross) seedlings will be transplanted out into the garden in a few days. I was able to overwinter a few lettuce plants and I started harvest on those about 5 days ago. The fall planted topsetting onions are just starting to get some good green growth and I will hopefully start harvesting them, for green onions, within a few weeks. I currently have celery, pepper and tomato seedlings growing in the cold frame. Most of those seedlings are still relatively small, but they won’t be transplanted out into the garden for about another 3 weeks.

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Lettuce Seedlings Just Transplanted on 4-2-22

Topsetting Onions (Top) and Candy and Red Candy Onion Transplants (Bottom) Growing on 4-2-22

Mid Summer Garden Update

Sorry for the delay in writing another garden update. The mid summer garden continues to grow and produce fairly well. The onions were harvested about 2 weeks ago and the harvest was decent. Two rows of the yellow Candy onion developed a leaf disease and most of those plants did not grow very big or rotted in the ground. The tight spacing and the very wet May probably was the cause. The other rows did not seem to be affected by this. The harvest on spring planted broccoli is just about finished. I have been harvesting many side shoots from these plants over the last month. Harvest started on the celery.

The Silver Queen white corn is growing really well and harvest should start within the week, YUM!! Harvest continues to ramp up on the hot banana peppers and the first harvest of cucumbers will be starting within the week. Harvested the 4 large fabric bags of Red Norland potatoes. Harvest was fair with about 8 to 10 pounds of potatoes harvested out of these 4 bags. Will be harvesting the potatoes out of the two 4ftx4ft raised beds in about another week.

I have planted 2 empty garden areas with green beans over the last 3 weeks. The roma tomato plants continue to have issues with a leaf disease, but will continue to water and fertilize them in hope on getting a decent harvest. Seeds of broccoli, cabbage, kohlrabi, cauliflower, and lettuce were started in cell packs on July 4th, for transplanting out into the garden in the first and second week of August (for a fall crop).

The weather has been pretty hot and dry, but received some much needed rain over the last 2 weeks, but more rain is needed. Will have to start watering the garden again if the dry conditions persist.

Happy Spring – I am Back to Blogging

Happy Spring!! I am back to blogging about my garden after over a year hiatus. Wow, things are really crazy in the world today. Nothing like getting back into the garden to take your mind off of things, at least for a little while. I have been busy in the garden over the past few weeks. I planted 189 onion transplants out into the garden on March 25th. About a week they were side dressed with some good organic fertilizer. They are currently doing well and starting to grow new leaves now. My top setting onions that were planted out into the garden last fall are really greening up and are about 3 to 4 inches tall, so it wont be long before I starting harvesting green onions. Red Norland seed potatoes were planted out into the 2 raised beds and 4 fabric bags about 1 week ago. I have been harvesting Sierra lettuce for about the last month that self seeded last fall and overwintered under a plastic covered hoop. It overwinter remarkably well this year. I have started all of my lettuce, broccoli, kohlrabi, and pepper seeds indoors and they are all in the cold frame now. I will planting out my lettuce seedlings within the next 3 or 4 days. I have been waiting for the weather to warm up a bit. The low temperatures dipped below freezing the last 2 mornings. After planting out the lettuce seedlings, I will be keeping them under a plastic cover hoop until the weather warms up. The broccoli and kohlrabi seedlings will be transplanted out into the garden in about one week. I planted radish seeds about one week ago and they have already germinated. I also planted my pea seed about the same time, but they have not germinated as of yet. I currently have 7 hens, but only 5 of them are laying eggs right now. I added 4 hens to the flock last spring, 2 Rhode Island Reds and 2 Isa Browns. All 4 are laying eggs like crazy.

Tim's Square Foot Garden Blog

This is where you can keep up to date on what is happening in my square foot garden, so check back often for updates!!