[dante]

We tried to start seedlings inside this year, and between somewhat general neglect and a crappy growing season in April (they were moved outside to a portable greenhouse) they've pretty much all failed... Miserably. HOWEVER the self-planted sugar snap peas that we found growing out of the side of the garden are doing incredibly well. ~4' tall or so, flowering, and we'll probably even have a few peas in another couple weeks. They must have fallen from one of the plants from last year, and we didn't notice it till they sprouted in late March.

We did *absolutely nothing* for those. Didn't water them, didn't cover them when the temperatures got down to ~25deg, didn't turn the soil over first, didn't fertilize the area, etc. So, we're wondering whether we should just try that with all of the early-plants? Obviously there is always the danger of frost, but should we just plant them (peas, string beans, swiss chard, lettuce/salad greens, beets) in the fall and let nature take it's course? Anyone have any experience with this?

For the rest we'll probably buy seedlings from our local nursery, as it's practically as cheap as trying to start peppers or tomatoes from seeds once you figure in potting soil, plastic trays, etc.

 

[bizutch]

We have given up on seed for the time being, but I'm plotting using the actual seeds from the plants we have in the ground to start some true originals next year. Watching food documentaries will paranoid the Tee Total Fack out of ya...

 

[Bushwhacker]

We did a winter sow of a bunch of different perennials, some which needed a stratification period, various herbs, medicinals, some root veggies and a bunch of other crazy stuff in order to cull some older stuff out of our seed bank. We had nominal success with some of the flowers and medicinals...it may have been old seed or it may have been the conditions. We had good success with the root crops, some broccoli , spinach, mustard greens and our collards over wintered and we got a couple good meals from them before they went to seed.

The summer garden stuff is doing well even though due to lack of time and some materials I wasn't able to get the greenhouse done this winter. Our house was almost to cold to start seeds indoors so as soon as the weather seemed decent, I ghetto rigged an old plastic kiddy pool and a big window into a makeshift cold frame. We cleaned house of all our old seed this year so we overplanted everything and still ended up with a decent amount of plants. I even used my own blend of seed start mix, that stuff has turned out to be dynamite, I have tomato plants in 20 oz drink cups with roots growing out of the bottom. I'll post up a couple pics tomorrow.