Beginner Gardening Tips Blog

One of my vegetable garden experiments was the Black Calypso Bush Bean from The Cottage Gardener. The seedlings that were not attacked by squirrels yielded a fair amount of seed pods, but I wasn’t sure when to pick them. When they first started to develop, I ate them as I would a sugar snap pea and they were delicious, but they were green and did not resemble the black and white seeds I planted. Patiently I waited for them to mature even further and I finally got the beans pictured here. Unfortunately some were left on the vine a little too long. But at this stage, these ones were a little tougher to eat and I didn’t know what to do with them.

I went to the Cottage Gardener site (which I should have done in the first place, duh!) and the description recommended using them for baking or soup making. Now I don’t quite have enough for a hearty soup, but I may throw them in to one with other beans to see how they taste!

Do you ever find that you discover a word or a new invention and all of a sudden, you see it everywhere? Well  yesterday, Anja, CanadianGardening.com’s web editor, was telling me about seed tape, a handy little invention that allows you to quickly and easily sow your seeds in a row, equally spaced, no fuss, no muss! Well today as I was scanning some design blogs, I came across a way to make your own. Linked from Craftzine.com, this slideshow on the instructables site shows you how to do it step by step. I wonder if this would keep my squirrel “neighbours” (I say “neighbours” in lieu of the expletives I call them in private), away or if they’d have a field day pulling out these strips and dragging them around the yard…

Despite the rather chilly temperatures this past long weekend, I still managed to get out in the garden and cross a few tasks off my list. It’s not very often I have two straight days in a row to get things done. So with a new pink pair of gardening gloves that I got for my birthday, I set out with my basket of tools to weed, plant, prune and dig.

This is what left me with a sense of accomplishment:

1. We planted two five to six-foot cedars: I bought these about a month ago and have been waiting for a chance to dig them in. Fingers crossed that they make it. They still look lovely and green.
2. I dug out a ton of dandelions and other annoying weeds that magically appeared after all that rain we got these last couple of weeks. Talk about eco-friendly pest control, it was also a workout!
3. Give my boyfriend a pair of loppers or pruning shears and I come back to a twig with a root, so I kindly pointed out what I wanted pruned and how. Lorraine Flanigan’s article on how to prune spring-flowering shrubs, was helpful for my forsythias.
4. I spread around some compost in a couple of my beds to prepare them for the lovely plants I have in store for them.
5. I’m not sure if it was the fungus gnats or the fact that they’d outgrown the little peat pellets, but all of a sudden, my seedlings were looking sad and limp—and they didn’t need water. So I transplanted my seedlings into bigger pots until I’ll be able to plant them right into the garden.
6. I have always felt bad about tossing away those wooden mandarin orange containers, so this winter I kept them because I knew they’d come in handy for something. And in one of them I planted salad greens. Yesterday the squirrels made a couple of holes in it, but if things start to grow, I’ll take a picture.
7. I had some herb plants I was trying to protect from frost, but I just couldn’t wait any longer, so I planted them.
8. I dug out a ton of lily of the valley and their network of roots—they are so pretty and smell so nice, but they’re a pain in the butt every spring when they’re in the middle of my garden and I’m wanting to plant things. So I had to be ruthless.

And that sums up my list. A few tasks down, a few hundred to go!

The other day, I wrote about horror movie I woke up to when I saw my precious seedlings swarming with flies. I immediately wrote to Anne Marie to solve my bug dilemma. Apparently the mini “fruit flies” are really fungus gnats and are a frequent greenhouse or indoor garden occurrence. Anne Marie says they are more of a people nuisance than a plant pest problem, especially when several fly up in your face when you are watering your plants.

Here are Anne Marie’s tips for eliminating my fungus gnat problem:

• Soils that are high in organic matter and are kept damp are particularly attractive to fungus gnats. The entire life cycle lasts about 4 weeks.
• The best way to reduce the population of fungus gnats is to let the soil dry out between waterings and especially on the surface.
• A more effective method is to cover and seal the soil area with plastic wrap (or a thick inorganic mulch) to prevent the adults from getting to the soil and laying more eggs.
• If needed, yellow sticky cards can be purchased to monitor the number of fungus gnats around plants. Place the yellow cards near the soil surface.
• Investigate any open bags of soil before using them to see if they are harbouring fungus gnats.
• The potentially damaging part of the life cycle is the young larvae. These look like small, white worm-like things that are 5 mm long and feed on the roots of plants.
• It is only if they are numerous that they cause any problems for plants (and mainly young seedlings or greenhouse transplants).  The adults are the dark mini flies that like to be pests and fly in your face.

So, I’m going to try and let them dry out a little and I’m going to pick up some of the yellow sticky tape. My sister had to buy some recently because she brought home an herb with a white fly problem.

Jessica Ross, over at EcoLogic on Homemakers’ site is having a different problem. Her seedlings aren’t growing anymore.

Is anyone out there having problems with their seedlings?

Help! I brought in some plants the other night because of the frost warning and the next day my seedlings were swarming with what looked like mini fruit flies! I’ve asked Anne Marie Van Nest to come to the rescue and will let you know when I hear back about her advice! Sigh. And some of them were doing so well!

Our seed packets

My seeds finally arrived and last weekend my sister and I split them up so we can each test our green thumbs and nurture little seedlings into food this season. Today I got around to planting some of the seeds that can be started indoors (and as an experiment, some of the ones that recommend you start them outside—what can I say, I’m impatient!). I’m so excited to see what will decide to grow!

Here’s what I have started:

• Chives
• Florence Fennel
• Black Hungarian Hot Pepper
• ‘Champion’ Collards
• Cilantro
• Mesclun Greens
• Black Calypso Bush Bean

After a random draw to determine the winners of the seed storage box, the winners are… Sandy and Corky! Congratulations! Please email me at hgwebeditor@transcontinental.ca with your full name and address and I will mail you your prize.

A few years ago I went to PEI and bought a packet of lupin seeds. When I got home, I put them in a “safe” place and couldn’t find them for two years. I now try to keep everything gardening-related together in a little desk drawer, but this sweet little box turned up on my desk recently and I just had to share.

The Kitchen Garden Box from Quirk Books is like a recipe organizer, but the “recipe” cards not only hold veggie recipes, there are other helpful seed-planting tips and tricks, as well. There are 10 reusable seed envelopes, but you could also file your own in there and keep everything together in one place.

How do you keep your seeds organized? Post a comment below and you could win a Kitchen Garden Box of your own. I’ll randomly pick two winners next week.

Note: Open to all residents of Canada, except those in Quebec. Not open to any Transcontinental Media employees, their families, or any other persons with whom they reside.

My sister and I chose our seeds from the heirloom seed house and plant nursery, The Cottage Gardener in Newtonville, Ontario. It was important to us to choose heirloom and organic varieties.

It would have been easy to go crazy and pick one of everything, but we had to realize that we can’t start everything from seed. I simply don’t have the space, and as Anne Marie said, not everything does as well from seed. So, I’ll be hitting the nurseries, including my usual spots–the heirloom vendors at the Evergreen Brickworks Farmer’s Market and Richters–for the seedlings of the veggies I’m not starting early.

But back to my seeds. My choices include cosmos, one of my favourite flowers, and experiments like white-stemmed pak choy and Detroit dark red beet. My sister chose a lot of herbs, which I’m game to try out, as well. Here is a list of what we’re planting:

•    Dill
•    Florence Fennel
•    English Thyme
•    Black Calypso Beans
•    Common Chives
•    Roman Chamomile
•    Cilantro
•    Champion Collards
•    Black Hungarian Hot Peppers
•    Arugula
•    Cosmos
•    Detroit Dark Red Beet
•    White-Stemmed Pak Choy
•    Mesclun mix (a gift from Canadian Gardening writer Lorraine Flanigan)

I have never started my seeds indoors before. Sure, I’ve thrown a few in the ground over the years to see what would come up, but I always worried I didn’t have enough space or light to sow them inside. I had varied success with my veggies last year, but my sister and I both realized that the long wait for our peppers and tomatoes had a lot to do with planting them too late in the season. This year we’re determined to get a head start.

We decided to order seeds together, but plant in our own respective homes. I’m going to sacrifice the windowsill in my home office and the space around it. My sister’s apartment is a virtual greenhouse—her lemongrass is a tree!—and her husband built her these awesome shelves for her seed pots. I figure my odds of fresh herbs and veggies increase with both of us planting the same thing. If one of us fails (most likely me), we have backup.

But where to begin? I find seed catalogues so overwhelming–especially when looking at 10 tomatoes with the same description. Cross-eyed and confused, I turned to Anne Marie for some advice in choosing what to plant.

Here are her helpful tips:

•    Look for flowers and vegetables listed as award winners. These are some of the best ones to grow.
•    Good plants to start from seeds indoors include tomatoes, marigolds, sunflowers, squash, geraniums, lettuce, sweet peas, cosmos, morning glory and basil.
•    Sunflowers, squash, lettuce, sweet peas and morning glory are also good to sow directly outside, too.
•    Not all plants are worth starting from seeds. Some are better divided or started by cuttings. (Good call, I’ll reign in my list!)
•    Buy the size of package you can use in one year.
•     If packets contain less than 10 seeds then expect to pay premium prices because they have to be collected by hand, the plant is rare, or the plant only produces a small number of seeds.
•    Beware of packets that contain 1,000 seeds for a low price such as $2.49.
•    After your seed list is assembled a little time searching on the Internet can give you the specific details about how to sow them–when to sow i.e. days before planting them outside, to cover or not to cover (light vs darkness), ideal temperature for germination, days until germination, etc.

Someone recommended a seed company to my sister, so we both compiled a list and our seeds are in the mail! I just have to buy my little seed starting pots and I’m good to go!