Before I write about this spring's planting, I need to summarize the pantry and root cabinet outcome since the last Garden Note post (January 2010). The winners in the root cabinet storage category are-- Carrots, Potatoes, Onions and Garlic! Carrots are clearly number one since we used the last one in April and it was still as fresh when I pulled them the previous November. The damp sawdust kept them very alive. Squash as a little disappointing. Next time, I will stick to butternut squash and not so many of them too. Acorn squash and buttercup squash rotted quickly after a couple of months. I will also keep a few beets in damp soil or sawdust to replant for seed. The three beets I kept in the garden for seed did not survive the winter; however, I did find one carrot that got missed and it was still alive!
As for this spring's planting, I planted peas, spinach, raddish, and marigold on April 18. I tried the broadcast sowing method on the above items (except the peas). Yesterday, I planted some parsley near the spinach. Today, I tilled up the summer squash patch and planted three hills with three seeds each. Last year I had way too much summer squash with six hills of four seeds each. I am still trying to eat up the pickled squash!
I planted the hybrid tomato seeds from last year's crop in yogurt cups on or about April 26 or so. They sit nicely on a party platter on top of the wardrobe in the family room. It's near the ceiling, away from cats and warm enought to sprout. They are about three or four inches and very lanky, so I added more soil around each one. Currently, they are being conditioned to the outdoors for a few hours at a time on the craft cabinet on the porch. Conventional wisdom says you can't use hybrid seeds, but these produce just fine and seem to be more resistent to fungal infection than the non-hybrid seeds I tried last year.
