Dawn, Actually we are at 26 degrees and still have a lot of snow on the ground. The highest temp I noticed today was 32, so we aren't getting much melting. They are saying 13 for tonight with snow again tomorrow night. So far, we are not in the heavy snow forecast area and the forecast is 2-4 inches for us. Of course, that is a day away and we know how those things can change.

A few days when the sun was shining, the snow melted enough to pack down some, and to melt off streets and walkways that had already had part of the snow removed.

Al laughed last Friday when I came out of Walmart and told him we had more food at home than Walmart had. I haven't been back, but I am sure it will take them a few days to restock because they were really low. A neighbor called from there today to see if he needed to bring anything to us from there, but I told him that we were pretty well stocked.

I do feel sorry for the animals in this brutal weather though. I am amazed everyday when the chickens are still laying eggs. Al's step-grandmother (97 this week) always wants to know about the chickens, and she is amazed when we are still getting eggs. I got 9 eggs today from my 13 hens on a day that didn't get above freezing. They are truly the 'working girls'. They do spend a lot of time inside on these cold days tho......and the pen is awful. LOL

I have had something strange happen here. My wife had told me she could hear something under the house. It sound like it was hitting heavy metal.

We live in a double wide moble home, it has (4) 12" I beams under it that are 60 ft. long. My hearing is very poor so I never heard anything.

I had the skirting off in three places where I had been doing repair work before it turned so cold. I went out two days ago to check things around the house and found tracks in the snow leaving from a 2x2.5 ft hole I had left in the skirting so I could get under the house. I know it sounds crazy, but they look like deer tracks. The stride was too long and the prints too small for it to be anything else.

I asked in another post if dogs or cats stepped in their front tracks with their rear feet when they walked. I guess everyone thinks I am crazy, but it looks like a deer was sleeping under my house when the snow fell. The tracks lead from that hole straight to the deer crossing at the edge of my lawn.

I bet that is what DW heard under the house and why the skirting was pushed out.

I know knowone will believe this, but really I dont drink or smoke the funny stuff.

Larry

P.S. I closed the holes because I am afraid I will see pink elephants coming out of there next.

Wow, Larry, that's one crazy deer! I'm not anything near a deer expert but that still sounds like some strange behavior. Maybe his wife kicked him out of his house?

Carol, our girls are laying well, too. We only have six hens right now but they've been averaging four eggs a day through all of this below-freezing weather. We give them extra corn but, other than that, nothing special. No light, no heat, just the open-air coop, their regular feed, and the extra corn. Once the daylight gets longer and it warms up, I wouldn't be surprised if they started laying bacon to go with the eggs.

Diane

Larry, maybe you had a wild boar?

Jo

Jo I have never seen a wild hog around here, there is a lot of woods and I have seen most other critters. I first thought it was just a dog, but those were not dog tracks, plus, a dog with that long of a stride would have made larger tracks.

My south garden (Close to where the tracks were) looks likes I am raising wild hogs. It has been covered in tracts all winter. I'm not sure that planting Elbon Rye was a good idea. There had been two deer killed almost in front of my house this winter, and a car wreck. The kid driving said he was dodging a deer and lost control and hit a tree in my son's yard.

Larry

Carol and Diane,

Our chickens are laying well too and they do lay well most winters, which isn't exactly what all the books on poultry-raising tell you to expect. We have a broody hen setting on eggs now, but it seems kind of early for that behavior.

We give away lots of eggs to our friends because the hens produce many more than we can eat in any sort of timely manner. It isn't like we can save the eggs and let them pile up in the extra fridge and use them later, because there will be too many eggs later on as well.

Our Wal-Mart had trucks bring in food on Sunday and was in the process of re-stocking but had plenty of bare shelves. Hopefully in yesterday's better weather, lots of trucks arrived and they were able to restock the shelves for anyone who needs to stock up on more stuff.

At our Walmart, they have onions and cool-season crops outside in the garden center, where they were exposed to single-digit temperatures last week and will be exposed to them again with this next storm. I have no idea if any of the plants are still alive, and I sure wouldn't buy onions that had been exposed to as much cold as these have been. Lowe's and Home Depot moved all their cool-season transplants indoors or covered them up with frost blankets, but WM didn't.

Larry,

I have seen deer do strange things, so it wouldn't surprise me if that happened. Sometimes deer come and stand outside a window and look into the house. I know this happens because they leave behind their deer tracks. Our first couple of years here, the silly raccoons thought maybe we'd feed them, so they'd sit on patio furniture on our wraparound porch and knock on the windows to get our attention. I never fed them, though, because I don't want to encourage them to hang around. Raccoons are a huge problem here if you grow sweet corn.

For about our first 5 or 6 years here, an old doe who lived on our property would bring her newborn fawns to my garden every spring while they were still teeny-tiny. She'd leave the fawn on the edge of the woods, where there is about a 6' clearing between the edge of the woods and my garden fence. The doe and fawn would stand there staring at me until I spoke to the doe. I'd say "It's OK, mama, I'll look after your baby" and the doe would leave, but the fawn would stay. Maybe thirty minutes later, she'd come back and get the fawn. I never understood it, but I always felt like I was babysitting that fawn until mama returned. I marveled at the way she trusted me not to harm her babies. This same old mule-headed deer would stand on the edge of the woods and scream at me in cold weather if there wasn't any deer corn out in the feeding area. As soon as I put out the corn and went back inside, she and her fawns would come eat.

I don't know how to answer your question about dog or cat tracks. We have multiple dogs and cats so I never see a clean trail of pawprints left by only one animal and I've never studied them closely.

I think Jo might be onto something because feral hogs aren't shy about coming up close to a house. Usually, though, if you have one feral hog you have a lot of them. They can be very destructive too. I think it likely you had a feral pig or a deer seeking shelter from the cold, and who can blame them.

As for the pink elephant......I don't think they're native to this area, but that doesn't mean some people don't see them. : )

Dawn

Dawn, I love reading all your posts, especially motherly-interaction with wildlife, so touching. You are contributing to mother nature so much! Thank you-Chandra

Chandra,

I love wildlife but I never planned to interact with them as much as I do. Sometimes those encounters can be dangerous.

I do love living here and I do love the wildlife, but some of the wildlife scares me.

That old mule-headed deer died in 2009 and I miss her, but several of her children and their children still live here. They have a place they regularly bed down at night and trails they use year-round. Most of her children don't have the mule-headed look, but at least one of her does does have that look, and she gives birth to twins about every other year just like her mother often did.

Before we moved here, I thought a deer was a deer was a deer and they all looked the same to me. After more than a decade here, I now know that if you see the same deer all the time, you learn the differences in their appearance and you recognize the regular ones. To a lesser extent that is true with coyotes too because their coats can vary quite a bit in appearance, so I recognize some of the coyotoes that frequent our property.

The wild animals that see me outside a lot get used to me the same way I get used to them and after they get used to you, they let themselves be seen out in the open a lot.

My all-time favorite wildlife that I've seen since moving here are the eagles. They often live along the river and sometimes one or even two of them together will fly over our property. That's pretty cool.

Dawn

Larry, I found a website with photos of animal tracks that may help you to identify your "critter". Deer and wild boar are both cloven-hooved (hoofed?) animals as opposed to the rest of the mammals you would likely see around Oklahoma (toes are more distinguishable in their tracks).

Susan

Here is a link that might be useful: Deer and Similar Animal Tracks

Susan, Thanks, It almost has to be deer tracks. I checked my gardening beds yeaterday and they are covered in deer tracts. It appears deer love Eldon Rye.

I may have to do container gardening this year and place the containers on top of the house to keep the deer out of them.

Larry

Don't know if I'm a loud to do this but here goes. Is there anyone on here that lives near Shawnee or Meeker?? I have been trying to learn how to garden in OK with out to much success with different seeds. I have tried growing corn for a number of yr.s now to no avail. I need the secret for this achievement. Will the posts come up in my e-mail like Face book or do I have to show up here to get the answers I need?? Thank you.

William

I started mine TODAY. I enlisted the kids to help. It was messy and there was a lot of fighting. Now they (the planted seeds, not the kids), are on top of my fridge in little dixie cups covered with plastic wrap.

I am worried that they will all die because I have never done this before.

Jo

Jo, They are easier to raise than kids, so I think you will be OK. They want to grow, so you are just helping them along. First rule for me is this: As soon as you can see a sprout, remove the cover and stick the plant's nose in the light. Not touching, but almost. Keep telling us what is happening and we will try to help.

William, the posts can be made to show up in your email. When you post a message you can check the box to have that done. When you reply to someone's else post you won't see the other posts like facebook, but will have to log in here.

Concerning corn. Corn is a heavy feeder, needs a lot of nitrogen. We use chicken litter. Also needs consistent water at the roots, but too much rain on the silks can prevent pollination by washing off pollen. You also should plant in blocks of at least 4 (and 6-8 is even better) rows because that also aids in germination and ear fillout. For more specific advice give some more details about the type of failure you have

Three days later, and my cucs and peas have already sprouted!!!

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Now here come the questions.

My cucumber sprouts look white and fuzzy. Is that mold or are they supposed to look like that?

I have removed the cups with sprouts and placed them under a shoplight in my unheated garage. I have the light on chains and adjusted to about 1" away from the seedlings. Temps there don't go to freezing, but they get close.

My second option is a south facing window inside the house that gets fair sunlight (a row of evergreens planted 30 feet away prevents full sun on the south side of my house).

My third and final option is on a tall shelf in a heated mud room of my house. It gets decent natural light from large East facing windows and glass doors, and there is a shoplight over it too, but it is fixed to the ceiling so it would be about a foot away from the seedlings.

What is my best option, where would you put the seedlings?

Thanks!

Jo

Jo, Cukes are a summer crop and they grow fast so I really don't know what you are going to do with those. It sounds like you have planted several things with differing requirements. The peas will probably be OK in the cool garage, but other things might favor the mud room. depending on the individual crop.

I TOLD you I was gonna mess this up (laughing). Yes, I started ALL of my seeds. Oops. I planned on growing the cucs in Grow Bags or contaainers since I couldn't find a nematode resistant variety. They are a small bush type. Maybe I can keep them indoors in Grow bags until it warms uP?

I can always start a new batch in a few more weeks.

Jo

I have seedlings! I planted a bunch of tomatoes (15 different types oops!) a couple weeks ago, & when I checked on them last night I had about half that had sprouted. Plus I did a few different flowers, & some of them have sprouted. Now to just keep them alive until they can go outside.

Jo, I wont be much help because I have started so few seeds inside, but every time I did if I did not have a sunny window I had to place the shop lights very close to the plants, like a max of 2" away.

I am facing some of the problems you are. I started to sprout pepper seeds on the 11th., some are sprouting now and I am not sure what to do with them. I was planning to fix a grow station in our bath room but DW said she almost fell over the junk I had in there so I moved most of it to the shop. It is just an unheated pole barn, most of it is a dirt floor and I dont have any way of heating the plants yet.

I am sure DW would let me move the stuff back in but I have already modified it to where it wont fit into the house.

I will get out this evening and try to rig up some kind if heat. I do have the thermostat and rope light fixed but no cabinet for the plants. I have not tested the rope lights to see if the 51 watt will heat a small cabinet in a cold ambient. I may have to hook up the shop lights through the thermostat also and use the heat from them.

Sorry I did not answer you question, I spent more time crying about my problem.

Maybe someone here can straighten us both out.

Larry

I hit upon a VERY temporary solution.

I piled a bunch of stuff up on the cabinets of my mudroom so the cups of seedlings are higher and closer to the light. Now they are in a heated room and in good light.
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However, this will only work for a few days. Once the other forty or so cups start to sprout, I won't have room for them all unless I can rig a new system to raise the rest of them.

Will they die in the garage?

Don't we all deserve a nice greenhouse? ;) I wish we were all in the same town, then we could pool resources and start a big community greenhouse. I am such a hippie.

Jo

Jo, that is a nice idea about living in the same town, but we would be fighting over organic mater:)

Larry

Jo,

You already know it was way too early to start cucumber seed indoors, so we'll skip that and move on to what to do with them now.

The OSU-recommended date to transplant cucumbers into the garden is April 10th-30th. Keep in mind the April 10th date is recommended for folks in more southern and southeastern parts of the state and you're in the northeastern part of the state so most years you'd need to plant a week or so later than that.

Cukes sprout really fast, so I usually start seed about 3 or 3 1/2 weeks before I am planning to transplant them out. So, if I am shooting for an April 10th planting date, I might start mine around mid-March. Even if you were in southern OK, you'd be a month ahead of yourself right now with your current cucumber seedlings, if you know what I mean.

Trying to keep them inside from now until mid-April may not be practical. They will grow to an unmanageable size pretty fast if growing in indoor temperatures.

If you are growing bush cucumbers that will grow on in pots, you might be able to put them into their permanent pots in the next week or two, and carry them outside in the mornings after the temperatures rise above 50 or 55 and move them back inside at night before the temps drop into the mid-50s. This might work if our weather stays nice and warm without a lot of cold days between now and mid-April. How likely is that to happen? Probably not terribly likely.

You might be able to salvage your current seedlngs if you can protect them well enough outside. You have to consider two things: (a) their minimum air temperature needs to stay above 55 degrees, and (b) their soil temperature needs to stay above 60 degrees or they can stunt and stall. How could you meet those needs? If you can fill up your pots that you're going to grow the cukes in and then keep the pots somewhere so the soil doesn't cool down and is warm enough for them (check the soil temp with a standard kitchen thermometer), you might be able to keep the soil in the right range.

If you can keep the air warm enough around them, they might survive, thrive and produce. You could do this if you had a greenhouse, a tallish cold frame, or could build a low tunnel over them, using PVC 'hoops' and 4mm or 6mm clear plastic Eliot Coleman style (go to the website of Johnny's Selected Seeds and look at their low tunnels). Maybe you could figure out a way to line up all the pots and build a low tunnel over them. You could use conduit but that requires a conduit bender and while conduit would hold up better under snow, we're going to assume we've had all the snow we're going to get this year, so PVC is the best choice. For added protection if you cover the plants with a frost blanket type row cover underneath the clear plasic low tunnel on cold nights, they might stay warm enough. You also might be able to make a temporary somewhat tall cold frame by using rectangular hay bales as the 4 walls and laying an old door or window over the top. Be sure to remove the top once temps are warm at mid-morning so your seedlings don't roast.

In general, it is recommended that you not direct-seed cukes in a garden until your soil temperatures are at least 60 degrees. Right now, the three-day average soil temp for bare soil in Tulsa are not anywhere close to that. When I checked this morning, the 3-day average soil temp in our county was at 39 degrees and you know how far south I am.

Honestly, if the cucumbers were mine, I'd toss them in the trash and plant new seed around mid-March if the weather is looking good for moving them outside sometime after about April 10th - 17th. Cukes spout quickly and are so easy to grow that I don't think it is worth all the effort it would require to keep them alive and thriving right now. However, if you're determined to do it, I wish you luck.

Dawn

If the cucs die I'll be okay. I DO have a PVC frame system set up in two of my beds, so in a few weeks I will move them out there under plastic if they are still alive.

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As a back up, I will start new seeds mid-march.

I am more worried about my pricier/more precious tomato, bean, pepper, and pea seeds, and keeping them alive. I hope I can!

The snow melted enough today for me to measure and graph my garden... (19 raised beds!). I am getting EXCITED for 2011!

Jo

Jung Seed sells those compact seed starting kits that are extra tall and only 9 inches across. . . Anyone ever try those? They're 2 for $27ish and hold 49 plants each. I'm really tempted to buy, but not sure I can wait much longer to start my seeds.

So glad to see cups and press-n-seal and other people's set-ups!!! Makes me feel better about my own.

On a side note - anyone have experience planting edamame or Little Gem romaine in Oklahoma? Never tried those two and might have to give it a shot this year.
Lanna

I have some heavy trays and domes that I got from Johnny's years ago and they are really nice but since then I have just bought the tray and dome cover at Atwoods for a couple of dollars. They are good for a couple of years, and very cheap.

Any Romaine that I have tried grows fine here in the Spring but our weather gets too hot for lettuce very quickly. Edamame, I haven't grown. I have a pack but have never had a desire to grow it.

Jo, With the tomato and pepper seedlings, they should be fine if you provide them with adequate light indoors or if you can carry the tomato plants outside during the day and inside at night. (Remember to harden them off to sunlight gradually!) Peas ought to be alright too since they can go into the ground in March, which isn't too far away. The beans will have similar issues to those you'll have with the cukes, and since beans grow so quickly, you may have a hard time holding them indoors until air and soil temps are warm enough for them.

Lanna, I haven't tried Jung's Compact Plant Trainers, which I assume are the ones you're referring to, because you don't need a germination dome that tall. It is recommended that you remove the germination dome as soon as your seeds sprout, so the tallness of it won't matter since it won't be in use. If you leave the germination dome on the flat for a longer period of time, your plants are at high risk of suffering from damping off or other diseases because the germination dome will keep them too humid and will prevent them from having good air circulation.

I've grown "Little Gem" here as a winter and spring crop and it has done just fine if you start it really early so you can harvest it before the temperatures crank up and get too high in May or early June. I haven't tried "Little Gem" as a fall crop because our fall weather often stays too hot for it for ages. For fall romaine, I normally plant "Winter Density" which not only thrives in cold weather but which also shows good tolerance of warm weather. A Romaine that lasts longer for me than "Little Gem" in spring is "Jericho".

Like Carol, I've never grown Edamame. I have a seed packet of it too but when I start planning the garden, something else always has priority and the Edamame gets left in the seed box.

Dawn

I have grown beer friend Edamame here for the past two years. I just plunk the seeds in the beds in the spring, and they have always done well.

Jo

I grew edamame last year right next to the green beans. It grew well, but you need a lot more than I planted (20') for any real harvest. We probably got a total of 6-8 small bowls worth. I do I think I got it in a little late though, so I'm trying again this year.

Megan

That's what I was thinking on the Compact thingy - why so tall? I went ahead and bought a jiffy starter pack at wally world to go with my old, cracked ones:-)

We really like the lettuce wraps we've had at restaurants that have smaller lettuce leaves with chicken, etc. inside. That's the only reason I was thinking Little Gem. I've never been able to grow lettuce in our garden. Should I start it inside?

If I don't have grow lights, is it too early for me to start seeds indoors? Before, I'd just throw seeds in the flats and see what happened - now, I don't want to mess up my chances!

Thanks for all your help:-)

A tall germination dome could come in handy for someone who is raising flowers from stem or leaf cuttings, for example. Or, for someone who is experimenting on a small scale with grafting tomato plants onto a special rootstock, the tall germination dome might be usable in lieu of a germination chamber, although you'd have to cover up the dome to give the grafted seedlings darkness, I think.

I also think that people in some states that are much colder, generally, than ours (like Wisconsin, North Dakota or Alaska, for example) could find them useful. Suppose they are starting seeds in a basement or mudroom that's unheated or only minimally heated. Those folks might need to have their seeds on a heat mat and have the tall germination dome overnight to keep their seedlings from coming very close to freezing.

For simple seed-starting, though, the germination dome may be useful up until the time the seedlings pop up out of the ground because it holds heat and humidity inside but after that it can be a problem. Once the seedlings are up, the dome should be removed to facilitate good air flow and moderate humidity. With young seedlings, too much moisture, high humidity or poor air flow can lead to damping off, which is a group of fungal diseases of several kinds that wipe out seedlings.

I almost never use a germination dome at all. So far, I've started 72 varieties of tomatoes and about a dozen different lettuce packets (some are mixtures of up to 14 varieties in one seed packet), didn't use a germination dome or heat mat and everything has sprouted and is growing just fine. I rarely lose a single plant to damping off indoors and I start several thousand seedlings inside each year. So, I don't know that I even believe a germination dome is necessary 98% of the time when you're starting seeds indoors under lights or in a very sunny window.

You can start seeds indoors without a light if you have a really bright window with a southern exposure, but you may have problems with legginess.

You can start lettuce seed any time now that you want, indoors or out. I started my lettuce last week inside on the light shelf and am moving the seedlings out to the sunporch tomorrow. I intend to leave them there until temps drop into the mid-20s because temps those cold can freeze them back. If our 10-day forecast looks good next week, I may transplant the lettuce seedlings into their permanent home which is a large cattle feeding trough that allows me to raise them high enough off the ground that the rabbits can't eat them.

The OSU-recommended planting date for lettuce is Feb. 15th-Mar. 10th, so you can plant anytime in that time frame. We have to start lettuce early here in order for it to have time to produce a crop before the heat causes it to bolt.

I've linked the OSU Garden Planning Guide for you. It has recommended planting dates, and lots of other helpful info, but there's a few veggies that aren't on it.

The OSU-recommended time to plant lettuce seed is Feb. 15th thru March 10th, so go for it! I like starting lettuce indoors because it germinates more quickly in warmer temps, but then I move it outside as quickly as possible because, quite frankly, I need the seed-starting shelf for other things I'm planting. As soon as the lettuce goes out onto the back porch, I'll start peppers in the 'bare space' on the light shelf.

I've linked the OSU Garden Planning Guide for you. It gives recommended planting dates and other helpful info for many, though not all, vegetables.

Dawn

Here is a link that might be useful: OSU Garden Planning Guide

Well, that explains my lack of success with lettuce! Thanks!

I have great success with germination of all seeds I have sown couple of weeks ago without any dome or heating mat. i guess its about 90% seeds germinated. -Chandra

Yeah me too. I've never had seeds come up so fast. Less than a week and all of my cups are sprouting. I guess it's a combo of the soiless seed-starting mix, the heat from the top of the fridge, and the saran wrap that made them sprout so fast. Got all that great advice here!

Jo

My Lil Fat Boys got their first trip into the Great Outdoors yesterday to enjoy 6 hrs. of filtered sun and very light breeze while setting on the north side of the wooden fence between the house and garage. Most all now have their first set of true leaves and in another week I'll thin them to one plant per cell. Once the second set of true leaves develop I'll repot into larger cups. Tomorrow I'll begin alternating watering with Peter's Professional and just regular water. In a couple of weeks, when they are more 'Photogenic', I'll post a picture...

Keith

Keith,

My plant babies....all 20 flats of them are outside for the fourth or fifth day today. I'm having to do a lot of creative placement to allow them to get the sunshine they crave without being beaten to death by the wind, which seems to be getting stronger as the day goes on.

Twenty flats sounds like more than it is because the tomatoes are in large cups and each tomato flat only holds 15 cups. I think the 20 breaks down to 8 tomato flats, 7 pea flats, 3 strawberry flats and 2 lettuce flats. I carry them back onto the sunporch after they've had enough wind and/or sun for the day, and lately they get their fill of wind before they've had enough sun, but they can get the sun on the sunporch without the wind.

Most of my tomato plants have 2 to 4 true leaves and a few are putting out their fifth leaf today. They seem to be growing more quickly than in previous years, probably because I moved them outside into very warm and very sunny weather while they still were pretty young. I guess they'll come inside tomorrow evening since our overnight low is supposed to dip into the 20s.

I'll put them in the dining room instead of carrying them back upstairs to the lightshelf, because the light shelf now is full of flats planted with various seeds of herbs, veggies and flowers....and even if the light shelf wasn't full, I wouldn't especially want to carry 20 flata up the stairs Monday night and back down the stairs Tuesday morning.

I'm ready for spring to get here so I can leave them out or, better yet, transplant them out.

This week, if the soil is dry enough (and I think it will be), I'll be planting potatoes and then the onions as soon as they arrive.

Dawn

I have planted 11 garlic bulbs and that it.

I made a pan to start seeds in and it seems to work fine. I also bought a heat mat because I thought I would be moving my operation out to the shop. I placed some seed in a flat and place it on the heat mat. This morning when I checked them they itseemed too hot. I placed a thermometer in the starting mix and it was 110 degrees. I may have killed all the seeds, but I wont try anything elsr till Wed. I will install a dimmer switch to drop the voltage and start again.

Larry

I killed some seeds this year already with a too-hot aquarium heating mat. Seems I always need to learn things the hard way. Luckily there's plenty of extras.

Dale, OKC

I just started my broccoli and mesclun mix today. I use those aluminum cake pans that have a clear plastic lid and are only $1 at the Dollar Store or they had them for $1 at Homeland last week. They make pretty nice little flats; I've used them before to sow seeds in. Just poke holes in the bottom for drainage. Tomorrow I will do other veggies. I want to do my peas, but am waiting until I get my soil mix on Wednesday and I'll feel more comfortable once I know I can transplant them when they're ready. Pea seeds germinate fast and the roots grow even faster it seems, so they won't be indoors too long. Temps are going to be erratic at best this week, what a typical Oklahoma roller coaster!

Susan

I planted a 72 count flat of tomatoes and placed in a plastic bag. Planted 16 paper tubes of broccoli.
I have about 14 pepper plants up. I have sweet potatoes and onions growing in the kitchen window. I planted Chinese cabbage on the evening of the 17th, it was coming up on the morning of the 19th. I think I killed my cabbage and lettuce with a heat mat. I will try cabbage, lettuce and peas on Wed. or Thu. when I get back home.

I hope to hit the farmers co-op in Mena, DeQueen and Texarkana to see if they have that I cant live without. I will also have to stop at any nursery along the way.

Larry

Larry,

You sound just like me. I have to look at every gardening-related thing in every store and always want to stop at nurseries and just "see what they have". Tim puts up with it, which is a good thing, because he's totally the opposite. He leaves the house with a list and he runs right down the list and does everything on it and is ready to head home and there I am saying "Well, let's stop here just to see what they have...." My "to do" list often includes just stopping and seeing what is in the stores. I don't have to go to the mall (and don't even like going there) but don't expect me to drive past a nursery without stopping!

Dawn

I spotted my first sprouts today. It looks like I've got about 15 little tomatoes and 1 pepper so far.

I started around 350 tomatoes and 266 peppers on Wednesday. They aren't all for us, some are for family and friends and a couple of after school programs. And I like to start extras in case some don't germinate at all. Last year, I had three or four varieties with zero germination (it was slightly older seed). Any leftovers I send with my partner to give out at work. His coworkers gladly took all of the extras we offered last year.

Megan,

Congrats on the little sprouts!

My first pepper sprout was a "Biker Billy" jalapeno, and he beat every other pepper plant by two days. With a name like Biker Billy, you expect to be "first", I guess.

I grow hundreds more tomato plants than I need to grow as well, but never have any trouble giving away the extras. Some of them go to friends in her our neighborhood and others go to work so Tim can share them with his coworkers, but many of them make the trek to OKC in April for the Spring Fling.

I had potted up most of the tomatoes from my first round of seedstarting and those are the ones basking out in the sun today. Yesterday I potted up the rest from that round, and today I started seeds for the second round.

It always freaks out people who stop by the house for one reason or another in the early spring and see hundreds of cups of seedlings lined up on the patio, on tables, on the sunporch, etc. It is fun to have extras so I can say "would you like some plants?"

My poor little plants were shivering in the cold wind when the cold front came through at mid-morning but now that the front, the clouds and the heavy wind have passed, they're sunning themselves and enjoying a beautiful afternoon. Now, if only the soil temps and air temps will hurry up and get to the right level so we can plant them in the ground!

Dawn

Can I pot up into dixie cups with potting soil? I don't have enough big containers for everything I started.

THANKS!

Jo

Jo,

Sure, you bet you can.

Just poke holes in the bottom for drainage.

Dawn

YAY!

I think I might actually have some survivor seedlings this year.

So far so good, they are ALL alive.

Jo

My broccoli and mesclun seeds are all up! Woopee! Doesn't seem like it took very long, and I didn't even use bottom heat nor nuttin!

Susan

Our tomato, eggplant and pepper seedlings seems to be doing good. However some of the tomato and pepper seeds not yet germinated, will wait few more days, but thinking to resow those not germinated. Tomorrow I will transplant those successful tiny plants into individual large pots/cut. I also thinking to plant few extra tomato plants directly into raised beds! Some milk jugs and frost blankets are ready just in case!

Tomato seedling (3 week old)

This is my first attempt to grow seedling at home, please let me know are they in right growth and in good health?

Thank you -Chandra

Chandra, Your plants look beautiful, but I think you would be wasting them to put them outside this early. Carol

Your 3 week old seedlings are HUGE compared to my 2 week ones.

Jo

My one week old plants can hide under one of his leaves, all up but Royal Hilbilly, and no sign they will ever come up. They were planted a week ago tonight so I am not ready to give up hope.

Larry