Rosefiend Cordell - Garden Potpourri

Garden Potpourri

Gardening Tips from the

Easy-Growing Gardening Series

Easy-Growing Gardening Series, Vol. 12

by

Rosefiend Cordell

Rosefiend Publishing

Copyright 2018 Melinda R. Cordell

All rights reserved. Although the author has made every effort to ensure that the information in this book was correct at press time, the author does not assume and hereby disclaims any liability to any party for any loss, damage, or disruption caused by errors or omissions, whether such errors or omissions result from negligence, accident, explosions, sleepless nights, dropping your phone in the toilet, endless flooding, people telling you spoilers for Avengers: Endgame, that BTS song thats stuck on loop in your head, ticks, deerflies, horseflies, leeches, bulldozer races, or any other cause.

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The Easy-Growing Gardening Series

D ont Throw in the Trowel: Vegetable Gardening Month by Month

Rose to the Occasion: An Easy-Growing Guide to Rose Gardening

If Youre a Tomato, Ill Ketchup With You: Tomato Gardening Tips and Tricks

Perennial Classics: Planting and Growing Great Perennial Gardens

Petal to the Metal: Growing Gorgeous Houseplants

Gardening Month by Month: Tips for Great Flowers, Vegetables, & Houseplants

Leave Me A Lawn: Lawn Care for Tired Gardeners

Japanese Beetles and Grubs: Trap, Spray, Control Them

Stay Grounded: Soil Building for Sustainable Gardens

Genius Gardening Hacks: Tips and Fixes for the Creative Gardener

Design of the Times: How to Plan Glorious Landscapes and Gardens

From Dont Throw in the Trowel: Vegetable Gardening Month by Month .

A t last, help for home food gardeners. The simple, month-by-month layout of Don't Throw in the Trowel will help gardeners grow a bounty of vegetables, fruits, and herbs. Grow luscious tomatoes, zucchini, cucumbers, melons, and more, and enjoy all the fresh produce (and give the surplus to family and friends) that your garden grows using these easy tips. Don't Throw in the Trowel: A Month-by-Month Vegetable Gardening Guide is a fun read for every locavore who wants to cart tomatoes out of the garden by the wagonful.

Even if you've never been a farmer or a gardener before, this vegetable gardening book covers everything you need to know to get started. Here you can find specific information about starting seeds, transplanting, mulching, organic fertilizers, dealing with pest and disease problems, compost, and of course, information about different vegetables and helpful advice on how to grow them. You can also find information about square foot gardening, beneficial insects (and insect pests), easy ways to keep weeds down, and ways to extent the growing season into the winter months using cold frames and floating row covers.

What's more, the methods used in this book are those to save time (and your poor back and joints). Gardening can hurt sometimes as the author can attest after having been felled by a bad back during her horticulturing days. This book is full of ways to keep you from ending up the way she did. Many organic methods actually help make gardening easier. For instance, putting down a thick layer of mulch early in the year helps you keep weeds down, reduce watering, add organic matter to the soil, and keep the plants cool in the summer heat. Grow heirloom vegetables for a reliable, colorful crop and you can keep using the seeds from these plants years after year.

Most of all, this book also leads you on a month-by-month tour of the vegetable garden, so you can keep up with what needs to be done this month and look ahead so you can be ready for next month.

How to Start Your Seeds

I got my seeds a month ago. They arent doing much in the bag, and its a little early to plant, but I just like to take them out and look at them. My daughter takes the bean seeds and goes around the house shaking them like maracas. I like to imagine what the garden might yield, though the little pessimist that lives in my mind keeps bringing to my daydreams images of blight and drought and cats leaving smelly presents in the mulch. And yet hope spring eternal.

Before you start your seeds, before you haul out the pots and the potting soil, take a moment to invest in a notebook. This notebook will be your best buddy through the whole process, recording things like seed-sowing dates, how well each batch of seeds germinated, seeding methods that worked (or didnt), and things you plan to do differently next year. If you already have a gardening notebook, use that. Notebooks are so handy.

Then, get out a calendar and look at the seed packet or the catalog and find out how long it takes from the time you plant the seed until the day you can put the plant in the ground. Then look at the calendar and count backward from your last frost date. That will be the date when you should plant those particular seeds, more or less.

Seed germination rates and seedling growth will vary from greenhouse to greenhouse. Some greenhouses have more light or warmth, while others dont. This will affect how soon your plants will be ready to go in spring. Sometimes the plants arent ready to plant in May simply because you didnt get the seeds in early enough. By keeping track of your planting dates, you can readjust the seed to finished product time next year.

To start seedling flats, I use a sterile, seed-starting soilless mix thats high in vermiculite seeding mixes tend to be a light and fluffy compared to regular potting soils and get a bunch of trays (or flats). I prefer to use those black trays you see in greenhouses, the ones holding the six-packs or four-packs of flowers but they are pricey! Clay pots for starting seeds require more soil than necessary, especially if youre going to end up transplanting the young plants into a different pot. Egg cartons are cheap and easy. Peat tablets (the ones that expand when you add water to them) are neat. If any of these methods work for you, then go for it. The rules you should follow are the rules that work best for you.