[SEEDS] of change

Every year my veggie garden is populated through two different avenues: seeds purchased via the interwebs and seedlings purchased from one of the local collegiate horticulture programs.  The seedlings are purchased from either Cal State Fullerton’s or Fullerton College’s Tomato Sale in March.  Last year was my first year going to Fullerton College’s Tomato Sale because one of the ladies my wife works with is a volunteer with them.  The sale is the first Friday through Sunday in March.  Last year we got there within 5 minutes of the opening and the place was jammed with old ladies and their wagons.  I found these folks are friendly enough so long as you don’t represent competition which would prevent them from loading up on every Early Girl seedling in the place.  So, the sale is this coming weekend!  I’ll post about later though… but, on to my seeds.

So my seeds came in the mail!!!  I ordered from Seed Savers Exchange this year.  I found out about them last summer, so it was a little too late to order anything.  They specialize in heirloom veggies, which I really like to focus on in MY garden; veggies with a history.  So this year’s line up is as follows:

Dragon Carrots (purple carrots)

Russian Pickling Cucumbers (I make a mean half sour pickle)

Golden Midget Watermelons

Stowell’s Evergreen Corn

Joe’s Long Cayenne Peppers (for drying, use in the pickles and salsa/hot sauce)

Last weekend I planted the rest of the Scarlet Nantes Carrot seed I had from last year and some random cilantro seed in the beds where I plan to grow the cayenne peppers.  I plan to plant the purple carrots as companion plants in with the tomatoes once they are in.  I hear carrots love tomatoes…

Had a lot of rain a few days ago so the garden is still a bit to wet to mess with plus its been getting really cold out at night, nowhere near a frost but still cold, so I think I’ll wait to get seeds in the ground for about 2 weeks.  Especially, since we’re supposed to get MORE rain this coming weekend.  Maybe the moisture will keep the wagon/old lady population down…

Waterlogged!!!

**Note: This was originally posted in February 2010 as part of an earlier attempt at blogging**

Now don't get me wrong, I like rain, I really like rain but this year I wanted to take advantage of living in Southern California and get my seeds started early this year.  However, ALL this rain has waterlogged my beds and I think most of my seeds have floated away.  It will be interesting to see where things start growing this spring...Carrots in the sidewalk cracks?

So when I got home today I re-planted some of the beds.  I actually started some seeds back in November last year so I do have a few things growing already.  Alot of things I planted in the fall didn't make it but the carrots and butter lettuce did so that's cool.

I am trying a new seed company this year -- Sustainable Seed Company.  Since I started the garden in 2004 I've used Burpee but I wanted to try a company that offered more organic and heirloom seeds (plus the prices are really nice).  So I am trying to do an all-heirloom vegetable garden this year.  I come from a long line of American farmers who worked their way from Virginia to Kentucky to Missouri to Colorado to California.  Perhaps some of these veggie varieties may have been the same that they ate sometime somewhere.

So here's what I got in the ground so far:
Broccoli (Green Sprouting Calabrese) - I've had trouble getting this started from seed
Carrots (Scarlet Nantes) - I have some of these growing and just filled in the bald spots with some more seeds.
Lettuce (Tom Thumb) - Got a little bit of this growing already and planted some more today.
Spinach (Bloomsdale Long-Standing)

 Scarlet Nantes Carrots

Tom Thumb Lettuce

This is my tiny little broccoli seedling.  We'll see if this one makes it.