Well, I just cleaned up the mess of dirt and dead plants in the laundry room and stowed away the lights, and I think it's time to start up again! I ordered a ton of seeds from Burpee. I did actually look through what I already have, and it's quite a lot, so I didn't duplicate any of that, but I still managed to reach more than $60.
I made a little schedule for myself, broken down by week between now and May. To make the spreadsheet look nicer, I put one thing for each week, but in reality I'll probably do several at a time. Space under the light is always the limiting factor, even though now I have three lights. Really, I just need more shelves. Maybe I should stop at Lowe's and get like, 2 more. I also need to get lots of seed starting mix! I go through that stuff like crazy. Get 2 bags.
I am looking to do a few things differently this year. I'm starting a little earlier, which maybe isn't the best idea. But I'm totally ok with starting Coleus in January, because it does need a lot of time, and it makes a pretty nice houseplant in the meantime. I got some nicer varieties of Coleus, not the generic mixed pack like I did last year. I think it will look nicer to have a few large-leaved plants of the same variety instead of looking like the coleus section of the store. I'm also planning to start some Radicchio and Kale in January. I know those things say they're supposed to be directly planted in the ground, in the spring, but I don't want to. I want them to get lots of good growth early, so I can put them out in like, March, and have nice plants in April.
I'm also trying an annual Rudbeckia, Indian Summer, which also is supposed to be started quite early. I was admiring these plants in the garden centers last year, but they seemed too expensive for an annual. A $5 pack of seeds is worth a try.
The big new thing for this year is starting my own tomato plants. Yeah, I'm gonna do it. I bought 3 different varieties- Brandy Boy, Sun Gold and Patio Paste. I'm a little nervous about this, because Mike McGrath makes such a big deal about it, but it shouldn't be harder than any other seed starting, right? Just start them under good lights about 8 weeks ahead of time, keep the soil moist, move them to larger containers as they grow, maybe feed them some worm castings when they get big enough... I'm just concerned because they require a much longer lead time than the other things I've done successfully, like Basil and leafy greens.
This year, I also have a big tray of containers from some nursery starts that I bought last year, which should be really good for seed starting. I'm wondering, should I start my tomatoes directly in those? If I start them in those tiny 6 packs, I'll have to transplant them up after a few weeks, and I hate doing that. A bigger container to start with would mean I can wait a lot longer before transplanting, have fewer transplants overall, and I think it would be less likely to dry out. The downside is that it takes up more space. Starting in the little six-packs allows you to fit more units under the lights, but if everything goes well, all of those little things are just going to get bigger, aren't they? It's a kind of hedging your bets, assuming a portion of them won't make it.
I'll start them in the larger containers, what the hell, let's be optimistic. I really can't remember how many of them I have, but I think the whole tray is about the size of the shelf... no, I think it's like, 30" long, because it fits on the shelf outside, and probably 12" deep, and I'm thinking 3x6. I've got 3 varieties of tomato, and originally I was going to do one six-pack of each, but I certainly don't need that whole tray filled with tomato plants. Or even half that many.
Um, I only have 10 of the six-packs, so I pretty much have to do the tomatoes in these other containers. I will need to transplant things up by then anyway because I will have run out of six-packs. So, if I start the Coleus this weekend (assuming the seeds arrive by then), I will probably want to do 4 six-packs, 2 of each variety. The one I really want, it's only got 12 seeds per pack, so I'm only putting 2 seeds in each pod. And they're like, 50 cents per seed, which seems high... I guess that means they're definitely going to work, right? And, ok, do I really need 24 Coleus? Well, why did you buy all those seeds if you didn't want that many? And yes, actually, I personally need at least a dozen, and the rest I will give away to people at work, my neighbor, mom, Drake, whatever. Everyone loves Coleus.
If the Coleus gets started this weekend, that's 4 six-packs, then 2 of the Radicchio, 2 of the Kale, 2 Rudbeckia, and that's all 10! After like, 4-5 weeks, I may want to start on some other stuff, like Romaine and Bok Choy, so maybe the Coleus will be ready to transplant?
So let's just see how this goes. I think I know what I'm doing at this point. It's just a question of keeping everything watered and hopefully not leaving it for very long.
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