Tuesday, January 14, 2014

seed catalog season

Yes, we've been flipping through the catalogs that find there way here, both from companies we've bought from, and from some we've never heard of before. I'm told we are going for 100 tomato plants this year, so maybe we are done seed shopping! That is going to take a lot of room, so we might be expanding the garden more than I had planned for.

New plants for this year- still mulling that over. Last year we did a lot ( too much) cabbage. We put up a lot of cabbage in various ways, and I did my first batch of kraut, but did not tend it carefully, so it lost its crispness. Taste was ok, just not that palatable.

Anyway, we will try a couple new varieties of dry beans this year. My sister in law grew some flat green beans (Roma) we really liked, so I think we will try them also. We've been saving back bean seeds for a few years now, so we are expanding the bean planting each year also. We were surprised by how the lima beans (our first try at them) finally came through late in the fall after just sitting there all summer, so we'll keep them on the list.  I don't think we'll try sweet potatoes till we move.

So yeah, the catalogs tend to get us excited about the upcoming garden year, and Jonny's is one of the best.  I'll bet I saw 20 sticky notes hanging out of it tagging selections. I have already set up the sawhorses, plywood and heat mats in the basement.   I will hang the grow lights when it gets a little closer. Major project for this year besides expansion is redoing the deer fence to a more permanent structure. Next year will be when we finish the terraces in the east yard, start the terraces and cold frames on the south slope, and redo our asparagus and rhubarb beds.