Rainy Days

God made rainy days so gardeners could get the housework done. ~Author Unknown


New Jersey is coming out of a long long stretch of gross weather. Inches and inches of rain fell on the entire north east. Before that we had along stretch of really cold weather. My family and I took a advantage of being stuck in doors to get started on the indoor planting. We moved the wintered plants and thwe worm bin to the sun room. All of the seeds I started and the greenhouse came upstairs too. My wife and I spent too much money at Lowes (on the lowes card) and got just about eveything we need ( at least for a couple weeks). the dining room is shaping up.

My beautiful, 24 week pregnant wife made this totally awesome light house for the seedlings and cuttings that Im trying to root. She Rocks!

The kids each got a spray bottle to make sure the plants stay happy. Our Frost Free date is right around the corner!

The Plants Point of View

My green thumb came only as a result of the mistakes I made while learning to see things from the plant's point of view. - H. Fred Ale

I aspire to develop a green thumb following this sage advise. Many times I feel as though I do more wrong than I do right. I do try however, to observe life more and more from the plants point of view. I have been gardening for about 4 years now and I finally bought a soil pH/nutrient test.

I'm curious to see where my garden soil stacks up. I will test the garden, front yard, dog run, worm castings from the bin and the potting soil i made this weekend. (Peat, Vermiculite and Plant tone Organic 5-3-3 measured to taste and mixed.

My daughters bought Aster, Poppies and Petunias and I couldn't help my self I bought cucumber , plum tomato and cherry tomato seeds. The tomatoes got their start this weekend and the flowers will go in homemade milk container pots when the weather breaks. Which by the looks of things wont be until later this week. Seems like South Jersey got off a little better than Chester County PA in terms of snow.

Busy Weekend

The weather still stinks out. Almost the entire country is still caught in lower than normal temperatures. It was cold (40 degrees) on Easter. That didn't stop me from going to Lowe's and spending too much money. 3 cubic Yards of Peat, 1 bag of Vermiculite, 1 10lbs bag of Plant-Tone 5-3-3, one jar of Rootone, some peat pots and seeds. Spinach, hot peppers, basil, oregano, parsley. I fertilized everything in the garden , radishes, the wintersown seeds, and all of the lettuce. This is my first foray into using any kind of fertilizer, I really hope it doesn't burn the plants. I really hope this plant-tone stuff is not a harsh fertilizer. I read a number of publications that say don't let the fertilizer touch the plants. I didn't do that. Also, I took cuttings from each of my azaleas, my neighbors rose, my blueberry bush and our holly tree's out front. Each of the cutting got dipped in Rootone and planted. It will be between 2 and 4 months until they get moved so you wont here about them for a couple months.

I also thinned my lettuce in the green house. The lettuce is really scraggly and I'm not sure if I planted it too shallow. I will have to figure that out because I'm gonna start more.

All I know Is that I want the weather to get nicer. I'm running out of room in the greenhouse and I need to get stuff into the sun room. If anyone reads this and has any stories about Espoma's Plant Tone, I would love to hear them. If the fertilizer hurts my precious tomatoes, I might cry. The wintersown seeds are doing great the pots that didnt germinate got pepper seeds to we will see.