Works the same as a heating pad right?
We are preparing our spring garden this weekend. We started last weekend. I can’t wait! Planting strawberries, corn, beans, peas, cukes, lettuce, tomatoes, borage, basil, and a bunch of silly pretty flowers because hubby has a bees.
I also have a plum tree to plant and several more ‘bee food’ native landscape type things.
Ugh! I need to get off the computer…
I found seed potatoes at my feed store. Planted those in my compost piles yesterday! YAY!
[QUOTE=Katy9532;6827141]
Works the same as a heating pad right?[/QUOTE]
for the cats or the plants?
The cat hasn’t grown in over a year, I am not holding out hope for the plant either…
Here is the basics of winter sowing, put the containers * milk jugs* some place the cat cant sleep on them http://www.agardenforthehouse.com/2010/12/winter-sowing-101/
[QUOTE=Katy9532;6827180]
I found seed potatoes at my feed store. Planted those in my compost piles yesterday! YAY![/QUOTE]
D’OH! <smacks self on head>
Why didn’t I think of that?
I am gonna do the same!
Although I may wait a bit since it is still pretty frozen here in the Midwest.
I got the posts concreted in for my garden area. It’s a start. :lol:
I need to put up some fencing to keep the ducks and geese out before I can plant anything but I did get some blueberry bushes that I am going to put in whiskey barrels this weekend.
Found onion sets and seed potatoes at the feed store (they haven’t had them in the past). Yay. So those all go in this weekend… 
Actually worked a bit in the garden today! I am attempting to rein my strawberries in from their plan on world domination. Putting in pavers between the rows this year and completely encasing it in bricks. Also attempting to eradicate dock. Small chance of that happening but at least the root makes a satisfying snapping sound when I stab it with the shovel!
Spent more time working in the garden today. I have been working the same plot for 8 seasons now and can’t believe how much of it is still clay! I deeply mulch every fall then turn it over in the spring mixing the mulch in. Then when I plant I mix garden soil and compost in the hole before planting. It is almost like the clay eats all the good stuff I add in over the course of the year.
I’ve been winter-sowing a lot of cool-weather stuff in water jugs these past few weeks; will be starting my warm-weather stuff (tomatoes, eggplants, peppers, okra) inside this week or so.
Me too! I have lettuce and broccoli in pots and lettuce in the garden. Putting the peas in the garden in a couple of days, I sprout them inside first. Can’t wait to start reaping the bounty!
It’s looking like the temps might be warm enough now to really get going so I started doing some prep work this weekend. I raked a massive amount of leaves, cut back some bushes, and did some other general yard work. Next up is getting the herb and veggie beds ready.
Last year my very unproductive veggie garden yielded next to nothing (ugh, horrible summer) so I fenced it off last fall and let the chickens have at it. I LOVE it! Usually I have to go nuts weeding the beds but those ravenous little birds have it ready to go. Just gotta loosen the soil and add some compost. I’m going to move their run early this week and get that ready to go. I’m also going to add some compost to the herb garden then I’m going to dig out an unused and ugly space on the side of the house, add some compost to that too and plant some Roman Chamomile and Prostrate Rosemary as productive ground cover.
My fun and special project this year is going to be a mushroom patch. I’ve got a couple of tractor implements to move, then we’re going to clear out the area, spread a nice deep bed of compost over it, and we’ll inoculate it with mushroom spawn later this summer. I’m SUPER excited! I think I’m going to do Oyster mushrooms and hopefully Maitakes and Reishis as well. I need to do some more research on that though to see what will work best on compost.
Our goal this year is to get our little farm to be as productive as possible. The mushrooms and veggies are part of that. I also need to get my chicken situation sorted out as they aren’t yielding nearly enough eggs for how many I have. The solution will definitely involve processing some roosters and probably selling off some hens and replacing them. I’m working on picking a good heritage breed right now and I’ll repopulate only with those. We’re thinking about adding ducks as well. Lastly I’m hoping to try again with bees. I’d like to build another hive and get a couple of packages. Basically we’re working to set up the infrastructure so that hopefully next year we can get a farmer’s market stall and generate a little income with this place!
The lettuce is seeded in the raised beds (the weeds are sprouting, why shouldn’t lettuce?), two types of peas are starting to sprout and then will be planted out, and three flats of seeds including 5 types of tomatoes, 2 kinds of squash, three types of beans, cucs, several types of onions, 2 kinds of broccoli and I don’t remember what else are sitting in trays of the grow light tower waiting for sprouts. I have seed potatoes, onions, shallots, and garlic to put in too. Unfortunately I had knee surgery 2 weeks ago, so I can’t seem to get much done in a day.
None of the mushrooms you’re interested in are grown in compost on the ground. Maitake & Reishi mushrooms are grown on inoculated pieces of hardwood, & Oyster mushrooms are grown on blocks of inoculated sterilized straw.
RedmondDressage, maybe try contacting the mycology dept. at the UW (they even have hours each week where you can bring your mushrooms in for identification). I bet they would be happy to advise you on any mushrooms that would be happy growing in your compost bed. You can also get local logs and inoculate them to grow the ones you mentioned. We have so many good native mushrooms as well. The spring varieties should be coming up soon.
My hubs has built a 6’x4’ raised bed for me to play in this year. Living in a condo, I am restricted to a containers and a very tiny area. I currently have lettuce, kale, spinach, and swiss chard in pots on my front porch and am starting to see little baby sprouts on the lettuce and spinach. Not so much on the kale and chard…I may have killed them by starting too early 
I will be winter sowing my summer veggies this weekend and I’m super excited.
Can anyone tell me when (located in NC) I should plant my butternut squash and spaghetti squash (from seed)? This is my first year for both of those as well.
My plans for the raised bed include cukes, tomatoes, Jalapenos, sweet peppers, rosemary, thyme, eggplant, butternut squash and spaghetti squash, summer squash, and zucchini. I hope it all fits. Most of these veggies are the bush variety or those recommended for container gardening. According to the square foot gardeners it should…but I’m skeptical!
[QUOTE=Bacardi1;6880351]
None of the mushrooms you’re interested in are grown in compost on the ground. Maitake & Reishi mushrooms are grown on inoculated pieces of hardwood, & Oyster mushrooms are grown on blocks of inoculated sterilized straw.[/QUOTE]
Boo! I tried hardwood plugs a few years ago and didn’t get anything so I probably won’t do that again at least at present. Are you sure about Oysters though? I’ve heard about quite a few people growing them in their compost piles and bins, that’s why that was the first species I started looking at…
Kestrel
RedmondDressage, maybe try contacting the mycology dept. at the UW (they even have hours each week where you can bring your mushrooms in for identification). I bet they would be happy to advise you on any mushrooms that would be happy growing in your compost bed. You can also get local logs and inoculate them to grow the ones you mentioned. We have so many good native mushrooms as well. The spring varieties should be coming up soon.
Great idea! I will definitely talk to them. I will see if I can learn a little more about our local shrooms too. The only edibles I’ve foraged for are Chanterelles in central WA, I don’t know a lot about what grows over here.
It’s been done, but is the least recommended method. Apparently they perform best in a sterilized medium.
Yesterday I put in two kinds of peas (pre-sprouted), three kinds of small radishes, big daikon radishes, four kinds of carrots, parsnips, three kinds of beets (2 red and 1 golden) mashua (a type of Peruvian tuber), Walla Walla Sweet onion starts, and five kinds of potatoes (yellow Finn, Yukon Gold, some small red ones, Purple Majesty, and Peruvian Purple. In a few days, I’ll start hardening off the bean plants and squash. The seeds I started inside are almost all up. The warm season plants will be inside for quite awhile to come. And spring will officially be here next week, but won’t really arrive for another 3 weeks or so.
