Seed Starting Time

According to Pat Welsh's Southern California Organic Gardening February is the month to start planting warm weather plants indoors to transplant outside later. So today (instead of studying for the CSET-I am so good at procrastination) I started my first set of plants for my summer garden.

Jason built me a nice grow rack and light set up with room for 90 plants. I started my first 45 this week and in another week or so I will start some more. That way there will be some staggering for my crops so hopefully I won't get all of my produce at the same time. For the last 2 years we have started seeds inside with limited success. This year we are hoping that the grow lights will help us get healthy plants so plant outside so that we can have a big garden with lots of different plants.

We get our seeds from Peaceful Valley, Territorial Seeds, Seed Savers, and Johnny's.

Here is what we have planted so far:

• Pruden's Purple Tomato
• Gold Medal Heirloom Tomato
• Bull Nose Bell Peppers
• Miniature Chocolate Bell Peppers
• Jelly Bean Tomatoes (our most successful last year-yummy)
• Orange Banana Tomato
• Thai Hot Chile Pepper
• Hot Pepper Blend
• Purple de Milpa Tomatillo
• Andy Hot Pepper
• Black Cherry Tomato
• Sweet Pea Currant Tomato
• Black Tomato
• Cherokee Purple Tomato
• Santo Coriander
• Brandywine Tomato
• California Wonder 300 Bell Pepper
• Monica Tomato
• Orange Blossom Tomato
• Granadero Tomato
• Celebrity Tomato
• Traviata Eggplant
• German Chamomile

We will directly seed beans, cucumbers, squash, watermelon, zucchinis, and beets in the garden in the next few weeks. In the meantime at the garden we are finishing up the winter radishes, cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower, garlic, and onions. I am looking forward to this year's garden and the preserving to follow!