Archives March 2009

For the past 2 weeks the North Country sky, ponds, lakes and corn fields have been full of geese. These are the Canadian geese that fly south in the fall and return north in the spring. Seems like when the ground and water is open they tend to hang around but this year with the cold and moderate snow cover they headed further south. The noisy flocks are sometimes hundreds strong and they can cover 180 degrees of the horizon.

At night they bed down near water or often in vacant corn fields, picking up the remnants of last seasons corn crop. They also pick the freshly spread manure. Cow manure is no more than parcialy digested hay and grain and the birds have a good meal picking up the parts the cows didn’t use.
Another good sign is the ice is finally melting off the mill pond. At this writing the water is just beginning to show through.

And the cherry on the top is the nice warm and dry weather we have been having. The absents of rain has allowed the ground to dry up as it thaws and that means no muddy path to the greenhouse. Even the hole in front of the greenhouse door is dry. Last fall we removed the pavers from in front of the door so that when the frost heaves them we can still get the door open.

This week we are finishing up the geraniums and started about 500 tomatoes for the cooperative extension bucket gardens. We use ” Early Girl” which is a determinate variety that are perfect for containers. We start them right in 6 packs, 8 packs to a flat to save time and trouble form transplanting them from bulk flats. The seeds are gently buried about 1/4 inch deep, watered and covered with clear plastic wrap. We check them every day and uncover them as soon as they begin to poke their heads out of the mix.

So the rest of this week we will finish the geraniums and start the marigolds. We start them just like the tomatoes, in the packs. If one plant fails to germinate we just pull one from another pack. In the past we would plant many seeds in one bulk flat, then transplant them into 6 packs when they sprouted. This is time consuming and tedious work so last year we planted directly into the 6 packs with good results. As I remember the old bulk method was a result of not having enough space for starting seeds but now that we have greenhouse space that problem no longer exists.

A quick look at the weather shows at least 6 days of 40 to 50 degree weather with sun so it looks like our luck is holding. The only problem is we can not leave a hose out at night because it would freeze, so we must drag it in every night. This would not be a problem but for the fact that the hose is 150 feet long and fairly heavy. Maybe we could just try leaving it out once…

The lupins soaked overnight in water to soften the outer seed coat. In fact some of the seeds came completely out of their skins. We ended up with a flat of 36 each yellow, violet blue and Russel mixed. There were enough left over to fill another flat of misc.

This year we are using the 2 inch jiffy pots filled with regular ProMix. These are the same pots we are using for the zinnias and the fancy lettuce. We bought a huge box of more than 5000 so we are trying to find good uses for them. By using these pots we hope to avoid problems with shock in transplanting. When the seedlings are ready to pot up we can just set them in the new containers, or directly into the ground.

We also started about 12 flats of safari marigolds. These are smaller and make a nice little compact plant. This year we are planting them directly into the 6 packs. In the past we have started the seeds in starting flats and then transplanted them into the 6 packs. The trouble is we end up spending too much time re-planting them. It is much easier to use good seed and if one cell is empty we will just pull one from another to fill them up.
If we have any partial packs we can just pot them up in 3 inch pots and hand them out to budding gardeners.

All of the first level benches are full and we have one raised bench full on the sun side. Phyllis dug the planks out of the snow and we will probably put a raised bench together tomorrow to accommodate the zinnias I plan on starting. For the life of me I can not figure out what possessed me to put the planks where they would be buried in snow. Not only that but the cinder blocks we use to set them on are also buried.

Phyllis went around this morning with the pyola oil and sprayed for bugs. I was only able to fine one critter but there may be more hiding. Now that we are on a regular 7 day spray schedule they are few and far between. One of the problems of keeping the greenhouse warm in the winter is the bugs, and especially because we bring plants in from the herb garden.

The pyola oil is nothing more than emulsified canola oil with a small bit of pyrithium. I was reading that we could probably make our own by adding just a little bit of dish soap to canola oil. The soap will allow the oil to mix with water. Then we could add the pyrithium when we make it at about 5% per batch.

The pyola works great but it costs about $25.00 per quart and a quart only lasts 5 or 6 weeks. However it’s can be a small price to pay to avoid having the state inspector find mealy bugs.
Since we began the regular spraying there has been no sign of aphids or any flies except for a few fungus gnats.

Anyway things are looking up and we look forward to getting back out there tomorrow.