My hardest part is this time too but mine is tilling, moving soil, sore muscles etc. Oie! my neck is tensing up with the though of it. My remedy..HIRE SOMEONE! Or take advantage of the guy friend that is in your Sunday School class with nothing in the world to do! hehehe

I wonder about germination, but I have had pretty good success at most things. Peppers I was never able to germinate. I wonder if I should put two per starter space (my mind is just not working with me today) but I know if two tomato plants come up, I just can't kill the other one. I want to plant both. Call it sensitivity or greediness. I do! lol

hmm....nothing really comes to mind, but the 6 months of relentless complaining from DW could certainly be taken into consideration. Can't a person just be able to stay out in the backyard all the time? Sheesh!

EG

EG,

Hilarious. You don't even find the months out of the garden to be difficult to deal with. Of course, in your climate, you probably don't have a lot of "down" time.

Eaglesgarden - In 2008, I only had 2 months of downtime - but still had to maintain the compost and cole seedlings for the spring crop. This year, i'll garden straight through, with the help of my coldframes. It's a good thing I have an IPOD now with about 450 songs on it, because it'll drown out any unwanted noise. Of course I have to be cautious as to which hair band I listen to while running the weedeater, because some of them make me wanna level everything in sight. :-)

EG

If I had some other plants to concern myself with right now, I probably wouldn't be so obsessive about the seeds germinating. I wish I lived in a warmer place!!!

Of course, as I type this my area is bracing for 12+ inches of snow, and there is more on the way after that!!!

I don't think there's a 'task' I dislike unless crop failure and waiting count.

Then there are squash vine borers. They're the devil's own spawn. Those, I loath. I guess that's a task I don't like. I don't like gouging their slimy, oozing bodies when I dig them out of my squash stems.

Yup, that's the task I don't like. I don't mind knocking the bugs into a cup of soapy water, but I don't like to hear the crunching or the squirting of their bodies.

EG, you can roll your eyes here Mr. I-behead-sqaush-bugs-with-my-bare-hands. ;)

eaglesgarden - the house next door is for sale - come on down!

ribbit - I guess I would be squeamish of bugs if I were a girl, too. But alas, i'm not - so I behead everything! Bugs don't have a chance in my garden.

EG

Watching my babies get devoured by slugs? I put out 72 little guys and 50 were eaten in 3 days. A search and destroy mission followed. A great many slugs knew what it was to be roasted in the depths of the slor that day I can tell you! As for germination, an indoor heated seed mat has helped my tomatoes and peppers.

Here is a link that might be useful: Swarth Gardens

Swarth,

Have you tried "Sluggo" or "Escar-go" to control the slugs?

Yeah I know about the heating mat. My germination is very good, but there is always that nagging worry while you wait days and sometimes weeks (for peppers especially) while they germinate. I have a very warm area of my house (right next to the furnace) and that area works very well for germination.

Eagle,

I'm seriously thinking about it. I just hate to use anything in the garden. However I hate even more to watch my seedlings get munched. However with all the rain we have been having I wonder if it would last long enough to be effective right now. I was out with my flashlight last night and was surpised to see how many were still around.

I HATE seed starting! So finicky and fussy. I have no suggestions other than to ignore Mel's advice, and start more than you think you'll need! LOL! I don't have a great location in my house for seed starting so more often than not I utterly fail at most of the attempts.

I also really hate buying/moving bags of topsoil and/or compost--but it's necessary in our situation because we did a huge hardscaping project over the past 18 months (pool, several patios, a few acres' worth of fencing, drainage systems everywhere, new septic system and so on) and everything is a hot mess outdoors in terms of gardening. I am starting all over with brand new SFG beds this month, so yay!

Oh, about the slugs, I have a totally green, inexpensive, and basically permanent solution! Assuming you are growing your little cuties in a raised bed/SFG, just run a strip of copper all along the top edge of the bed and tack it in place with galvanized finishing nails. The slimy slugs will get a shock from trying to cross it. Voila!
The copper also looks really nice if you're neat about the installation.

nycynthias,
I just bought a wire shelving unit from Target. I bought a shop light and hung it from the top shelf real close to my strawberry seedlings (alpine). When I do my maters and peppers I will probably purchase another shop light to hang over another shelf. Just get some extra S-hooks. I put mine in the basement with a timer to turn on and off. I was also able to purchase a heat mat at half price at my local garden shop. I swear after two days, my seedlings have grown and sent out a second set of leaves.
Keski

SLUGS! SQUASH BUGS! (I dont have another one) OH ICKKKYYY!!! I sure wish I lived next door to you EG. I would have you pick mine off. I had something green, thinking it was a catapilar, on my tomato plants after I had no idea what was making holes in my tomato leaves. It was HUGE!!!! NASTY!! My mother had to pick if off for me. My stomach still turns thinking about it. I was NEVER a bug girl. A friend of mine's son brought me a cup of nasty things. He was so proud. I said "OH WOW! Look at you." and his father said "son, she likes bugs as much as your mom does". He said "oh" all disappointed. Poor guy.

JUST BLECK!!!

EG - I'm going to start packing now. We just got 2 feet of snow, and we are preparing for another foot plus of snow tomorrow into Wednesday...and there is talk about yet another storm in the offing! We are 9 inches short of our record snowfall in a single winter. I have NEVER experienced anything like this before. It's ridiculous! If I lived in Syracuse or somewhere like that, I could understand this winter, but this is just crazy!

jengc - squash bugs and slugs are my two biggest enemies in the garden. But, I think I've worked it all out. I can only hope it goes well for me this year....once the whole winter wonderland melts!

I suppose I haven't been gardening long enough to have any real hates, but I would go with the actual filling of the beds, a necessary evil, but when I add this year, I am not adding Peat Moss, I feel guilty, now I understand what it does, so I will buy the core stuff, this year.
I suspect I will learn to hate weeding this year, as last year very little to do but by the fall, have added unfinished compost to amend, I had tomato plants popping up all over the place, which I left as the frost killed them off, but I will have to use the same compost this spring and fear the same problem, (it's home made, so I can't blame anyone)
I started out not able to kill the bugs, but after I saw what they could do to my babies, I relished the task! still too squeamish to use bare hands but a pair of gloves, handy rock, and a towel does wonders for my frame of mind, :-)
I also learned to like snakes as I never got the evil Squash vine borer, and I am convinced it was due to the snake which took up residence on my plants, when the sun was out.

jengc - if the bug thing really grosses you out, you could wear gloves, I suppose. The only thing I don't pick up is an assassin bug, because they'll hurt you!

eaglesgarden - it's gonna snow here again, too. That's ok, it'll all be over in a few weeks.

EG

EG-I will try gloves as I HATE the buggars but I have found the squash bugs are VERY intelligent! I tried to flick them in a cup of soapy water and when I would position the cup under where I can flick them off, they move to the other side! lol I was very impress, but still grossed out over their looks and the damage they did.

By the way, do they only attack squash plants or all plants? I found them on my tomatoes but never found the same damage they did to my squash.

I have to scroll down when I read your blog. I have to block out that picture of you holding them in your hand ready to behead them. ICK!!

jengc - yeah, they're pretty crafty, but I always get them. I posted a video of me catching some on my blog if ya wanna watch it. They attack all veggies in the cucurbit family, but mainly squash (both summer and winter) and pumpkins. If you found one on your tomatoes, it was only hiding out for a while.

EG

EG,

I don't mind a little snow. But, I just got done digging out of 2 feet of it on Saturday. Now they are calling for another 18"-24" between now and midnight Thursday morning! I am done with snow. Spring can't be far off, it just can't. In the meantime, I have to be careful with my son outside, because I can't see him in certain areas of the yard, because of all the snow!

I think I'll start some cole crops and lettuce to make myself feel better.

Just an update, the news this morning stated that we have already gotten more snow this year than the previous 4 years combined (and are on the verge (about 2 inches away) from the snowiest winter on record in this area. We got 7+ inches overnight, and I bracing for blizzard conditions with another 18 inches before 8 pm tonight!

So much for global warming eh? lol I can't remember seeing this much snow in our area in such a loooooong time. It seems like it has been snowing for a week now!

It's a misconception that global warming will eliminate snow. It disrupts weather patterns and causes weird weather. Some places can have severe drought, others get rained on, hurricanes become stronger and last but not least, it could trigger an ice age. Eaglesgarden and jengc, you are probably experiencing this.(not the ice age, just weird weather.Ha Ha).

Maybe they should change the name to global changing not global warming! lol I just find it odd that this is a normal pattern in weather. What was it, 1980s that they said we were on the way to a new ice age!

Yup I have a readers digest book from 1978 I was just rereading and low And behold man was going to cause an ice age LOL. In the mean time I think we need to garden and changing weather seems to be a fact of life as does talking about it. He he, back to O P on gardening. I hate to water I put in a square foot garden, Mel's mix and all. I like to use soft water as our tap water just don't seem to work for growing. Well we had a dry year here so I was stuck going to the local lake, no problem except my raised beds needed 2 inches of water a week what a pitb. Whats with that? My small in ground bed needed water only twice in the same period of time (about 6 weeks) twelve times for the raised beds.
So what do I hate, watering my garden!

curt :-)

My least favorite activity is building my boxes. I want them 4'x16'x12" slightly recessed into the ground. They're a nightmare to to move into position and set into the leveled shallow trench I need to use because I don't have a descent flat spot in my back yard.

jeremyjs - what? Oh, the building part is my favorite! My entire property is sloped, but I still enjoy building things on it. ( It's a building fetish, ya know? )

EG

Squishing squash bugs. Ick, eww, yuck, etc...