A Cold Spring-March 4, 2014

As an old adage states, "Timing is everything".  Well, timing certainly is playing a major role in this year's garden work. The cold, wet winter turned into a cold, wet spring with little relief in sight as March became April.

Luckily, I was quite busy with other activities so the garden planting schedule took a bit of a back seat.  The end result is that starting later was actually a lot better for all concerned.  I didn't need to use growing lights at all, as the sun was up high enough in the sky when I finally started my spring seedlings.

The two greenhouses made it through the winter and early spring without a problem.  I have learned not to plant summer crops in the greenhouse, thinking that they would survive without supplemental heat sources.

After we bought our Pleasure Way Class B RV and took a trip down to Florida, Georgia and South Carolina, I began my planting schedule in early April.  This is at least a month later than I usually start.  I did begin three tomato plants in February, but that was all, just three.  That made it easy to keep an eye on them and give them the needed attention to grow despite the cold weather.  The sunroom with our great pellet stove was the ideal spot for the tomato plants during the day and then at night they came into the kitchen.

I did buy some lettuce, broccoli and kale down in Georgia that I planted into the greenhouse by the pool.  That greenhouse gets lots of sun all day long and along with the garlic that I overwintered, these plants are doing very well now.

I found a surprise when I opened one of my cold frames and found a spinach plant from last winter doing very well.  The lettuce I had grown lasted until early December, but this spinach did very well and I had a very nice spinach omelette.

I have started the second cycle of seedlings (128) including corn, cukes, and parsley.  I will start one more cycle next week.

In the meantime, plants are going back and forth from the greenhouse and growing very well.  Here are some photos from the greenhouse.

Tomatoes started in Feb now being carried to the "Kitchen" greenhouse daily.

Seedlings in their second transplant stage

Seedlings just brought out after being on heating pad for a week. Corn and Cukes are the first to pop up.  There are 128 cells in this tray.

The second greenhouse by the pool has plantings brought up from South Carolina.  These are the Broccoli and Kale plants.  Also in the ground are seeds for carrots, spinach and radishes that should be done before the other plants mature.

Garlic that wintered in the greenhouse is now growing quickly