First Seeds Sown

Today I sowed the first seeds in the greenhouse. I started 2 flats (144 seeds-give or take) of cabbage and 2 flats of Iceburg Lettuce. In 2 weeks I will sow another 2 flats of those. That way we can keep a steady supply coming in for havest. I like this much better than the way we did the tomatoes last summer. At that point we did a HUGE mass planting. We did get a local nursery to start the seeds for us and then once there were shoots we transplanted those into larger trays and then when those got bigger we transplanted them into the field. It was a huge undertaking because we had 3/4 of an acre of tomatoes that were all ripening at the same time versus being staggered like we are hoping to do with the farm. This way we will have a longer havest time.

Before I started the seeds I thought I would look for a seed sower at the local farm supply businesses. At the 7th stop of my search I finally found one. It's a little flat round thing that has a cover that you turn to allow for the amount of seeds you want to come out and they will slide down this little shoot thing. I had seen some online that looked like ink pens and some that looked like a cross between a turkey baster and a bulb syringe for larger jobs. I really wanted to find one of those so I went to one more place, a popular garden center in Southern Pines. Now keep in mind I was so excited at being able to find the first one I went ahead and bought 3 of the things. At the next place I found one that looked like a syringe with small piece of plastic that would poke out when you pushed the knob on the top. The piece of plastic had a spot cut out in it that allowed for seeds to sit on it and then I could sow the seed.

Now for the review of these products-neither one worked for what I was doing. The first one (the flat round one) didn't have a hole that was the right size. The place marked 1 on the adjustable dial was too small and the cabbage seeds wouldn't come out. The placed marked 2 was too big and about 3 or 4 seeds would come out at the same time. Maybe with different size seeds this one will work better. Now the second one that looked somewhat like a syringe looked like it would work better. But again more than one seed came out at a time. So I had to go back to the old fashion, eye-crossing way and do it by hand. One lady at another garden center suggested something involving 4 parts colored sand, 1 part seed, and a plastic ziploc jewelry size bag. I didn't fully understand this procedure plus just doing a rough image of the math in my head didn't calculate well for the amount of seeds that are going to have be sown. It doesn't seem like a very cost effective way of sowing seeds. Maybe they are doing it differently and sowing them into a bed. But for individual trays it doesn't seem like it would work.

Tomorrow I will be spending the day cutting 3 1/2 foot sections of plastic tube netting. The netting is for the row covers that are coming in on Monday. I will cut these sections and then tie off one end with a zip tie. Jeff has ordered a load of gravel that we will put in the netting. I will only fill it about 1/2 full and then put another zip tie in the other end. Then I will take the tube of gravel and shift 1/2 of that gravel so that there is gravel in each end of the tube. Doing this will allow us to be able to grab the empty part of the netting in the middle and place the rock ends on the plastic row covers to hold them down. Hopefully we will get about 2 or 3 seasons out of these before we have to replace them.

Tomorrow is supposed to be a warm day here so I am looking forward to sitting outside in the sunshine. Robin's bee stuff came in today so she will be down here first thing in the morning to check it out. I can't wait to see her in her beekeeping outfit. I will take a picture of her in it and post it on here tomorrow. I am hoping that I will have time to go up to the farm and work on the cut flower beds. I guess it will just depend on how long it takes to cut all the netting.