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Late bloomers
15.2 years ago fall crops Leave a comment
Last February my 7-year-old daughter and I attended the Northwest Flower and Garden show for the first time, which is back on next year if you haven’t yet heard the good news. During our visit my daughter purchased a single dahlia tuber from Swan Island Dahlias.
We carefully followed the detailed planting instructions and it grew to about 5 feet by the end of the summer, though there were no blooms emerging. With Fall coming upon us we both were getting a little worried we wouldn’t see anything this year. Fortunately the plant finally started sharing some late blooms while the rest of our garden is more in the dying off state.
How to determine your seed germination rate
15.2 years ago germination, seed saving, seed storing, seeds 1 Comment
Whether you are trying to determine if those seeds you have been stored for 3-4 years are still good or questioning your ability to harvest seeds on your own testing germination is a great way to take away from of the guesswork and avoid disappointment next spring.
The process is very simple, I believe I did the same thing in second grade during our plant section. Though that was to observe how a seed sprouts/roots the concept is exactly the same.
Take a wet paper towel and place 10 seeds on it and place the wet paper towel in a Ziploc bag. After a few days (or weeks depending on the normal germination rate) check back on your seeds and count how many sprouted.
In my case six out of ten of the jalapeno seeds sprouted. So just do the simple math using the following formula:
Germination rate = (# seeds sprouted/# total seeds sprouted) X 100
So in my case:
(6 seeds sprouted/10 seeds total) X 100 = 60% germination rate
Of course the more seeds you use in your “trial” the more accurate the results will be for my purposes the error rate is good enough for me.
If I was a seed seller this would be disastrous since most distributors have germination limits (90-95%), but given these are for my own use and I have about 300 more seeds that I will use no major loss. Though I will need to remember when I plant these out I will want to plant 2 seeds per cell to have good odds one of the seeds will germinate.
Another option is to give your 4 year old a handful of seeds and a pot full of dirt and see if most of them sprout. Much less scientific but my daughter didn’t seem to notice.
Peppers sprouting in grow box (time lapse)
15.2 years ago indoor growbox, peppers 2 Comments
Well slightly more exciting than watching grass grow but for something that takes several weeks to complete is definitely worth a watch. If you watch carefully you can even see the automatic watering in action.
Joining the sprouts is a mature pepper plant which has been flowering and daisy seedling my 7 year old planted hoping it will flower as well.
Do have have to follow the directions on the back of my seed packet?
15.2 years ago garden planning, seeds 8 Comments
Though the advice on the back of a seed packet gives some great information, they are recommendations and their advice may not exactly apply to your garden.
First is row spacing, many times you read something like “plant seeds 3 inches apart in rows 1 foot apart” This brings up some immediate logic of why can the plants be 3 inches apart one way but 12 inches in another. This sort of thinking the premise for intensive gardening techniques such as square foot gardening. This is where instead of growing your plants in rows you plant them in a grid pattern making best use of your growing space.
Now even these spacing requirements are actually optional. All plants compete for resources to survive. This can be sunlight (or even shade from sunlight), nutrients, water, airflow, etc. Depending on the quality of your soil and frequency of watering you can push the limits of your growing space. Assuming you add some fresh compost easy season and possibly do some side dressing with an organic fertilizer like fish emulsion or alfalfa pellets you can easily reduce this space and still have high yields. I did just that with my cherry tomato plants whose seed packet is above. I planted these about a foot apart and got great growth and yields.
One other factor is how you grow. If I was growing my tomatoes in cages my foot space probably wouldn’t even be technically possible but since I grew them on a netting this allowed for spread out much more naturally and provide adequate sunlight and airflow. Keep this in mind when growing sprawling plants such as cucumbers and squash using some vertical space can free up the valuable growing space on the ground.
The last factor depends on when you are going to pick them. If you are growing onions to simply pick as green onions you don’t have to give then the 3-4 inches needed for their bulbs to grow. You could easily plant an inch apart since you are going to pick them before they are competing for resources. A similar idea is growing for micro greens, plant picked when just a few inches tall.
Though I wouldn’t say to completely ignore the back of your seed packets, just make sure to use it as a guide not a requirement.
Harnessing power from trees
15.2 years ago electronics 2 Comments
Some UW researchers have determined that if you add a couple of similar metals in a tree it produces electricity. Though only 200 mV so we won’t be moving to tree power anytime soon. Though the articles mentions some applications such as detecting environmental conditions or forest fires.
To me the most interesting part is they don’t exactly know the cause of this voltage, though they theorize that “there seems to be some signaling in trees, similar to what happens in the human body but with slower speed.”
Alternative seed saving containers
15.2 years ago cheap, seed saving, seed storing 2 Comments
When I am storing seeds for months at a time my homemade paper seed packets work great, but for seeds I seem to use many times throughout the year I was looking for a new option.
My solution was small plastic/metal resealable containers. They are small and do not take up too much extra space and securely close so now worries of reaching into my pocket do find it full of seeds (had this happen more than once) They are also water resistant (if not waterproof) so now worries about setting these down on some moist soil soaking the seeds.
You probably have many of these containers lying around your house from other products (prescription, OTC drugs, food containers, etc)
Unfortunately (I guess fortunately) I do not need prescription drugs too often and wasn’t smart enough to save any of my past containers so I opted to get some from an online supplier. This particular one many options for specifically for seed saving containers at very reasonable prices. I am also considering using these when I share seeds with others as gifts.
What sort of creative options have you used to store your saved seeds?
