Seed Starting Phase 1

Blooms in the garden this week:

So last week , as I was trawling through the internet to find something that will tell me when exactly to start what kind of seeds , I found this Chart . I was pretty excited to follow that, And it was sunny saturday in a long time.

I started these last weekend:

I am excited that this year I have the seeds for White and Blue Indian Pea flowers . They remind me of my childhood. I am especially excited by the White Indian Pea seeds since they were a gift from my grandmother from her wonderful garden in India. She is a passionate gardener and I sometimes think even though I am relatively new to gardening, the strange familiarity I seem to feel when I garden is something I probably inherited from her and the many summers I spent in her garden.

2009 Review and 2010 Plans

2009 was a good year.

I was on vacation for 2 weeks in June and then again for 5 weeks in October,which was great fun! But it also took me away from gardening for long periods of time.

The vacation watering worked and all my plants survived.

The bell peppers did really well , but I did not count how many . Note to myself for 2010: Count harvest.

On the flip side, there werent as many tomatoes as 2008.

The eggplants, okra ,cucumber ,bitter gourd , chillies did not do as well. So I have been pondering about this…

I think I need to use fertilizers, the right amount at the right time. I have not been doing this at all for some plants though I did use kelp meal with the bell peppers and tomatoes on an occassional basis. Also I threw in washed egg shells into the soil in the containers when I have some.

I wanted to stay away from using fertilizers , but I have been learning.

Watering the plants in traditional terracotta pots drains away nutrients . Also, the tomatoes have been in the same containers for 2 years now and probably had used up all the nutrients. The potting soil I used for the other plants probably did not have enough nutrients to start with.

So the plan for 2010:

1. Figure out a good organic fertilizer and the intervals at which to use it.

2. Plan amount of sunlight required by each plant so I can maximize space in the balcony.

Plan for 2010

Note: WordPress had automatically treated some valid comment posts as spam and I did not realise that.

I have fixed that now and I apologise for not approving them sooner.

Garden Log iPhone Application

So I have not been posting for a while now, I was on vacation for a month and half and plus it is winter and my garden has been quite neglected.

So I spent this time taking the idea of the blog further by building an iPhone application called GardenLog which I can use to track my plants and log what I will do right and wrong this year  to use in the next.

I am excited today,not only because the seed catalogs have started coming in , but also because the iPhone application is out for sale now at iTunes , Click here to get this application in iTunes.

Here is what you can do with Gardenlog:

• Add a plant with the germination and harvest times from your seed packet.
• Click or Add a picture of your window sill pot or place in the garden where you put the seeds in , this way you can remember the spot in your garden where you planted it last year
• Come back to add new stages when the seed sprouts, is transplanted outside , has flowers  and finally when the fruits of your labor appear.
• A graphical view will give you a single year snapshot of the plant stages and the month in which they appeared, allowing you to plan for the next year’s garden. It also tell you how many days you have left for the plant to germinate or for harvest.

Plant List

Add a Plant with germination and harvest time

Add a Plant Stage

Add another plant stage

Graphical View

Graphical Snapshot with germination time

Contact me gardenlogapp@gmail.com or in the comments section for a promotional code for the application. I have 30 codes to give out on a first come first serve basis.

Tomato Harvest

Tomato Harvest

Its been a HOT week

Well its SUMMER in Sacramento. We all know it when we talk about the temperature in the 100s. And when it takes hard work to cross the street at 4 pm.

Nothing much developing in my garden these days, expect for the Jasmine.I don’t have pictures of the bell pepper harvest which amounted to 4 peppers.

There were a couple of cherry tomatoes that we ate off the plant so I don’t have pictures of them as well, but I did take a picture of the Okra.

Thought I would share some flora from my vacation in Peru as well.

Okra

National Flower of Peru

Begonias in the Jungle

Corn

Coffee Beans

I really liked that plant with the red leaves

Peruvian Veggies

Natural Dyes from Plants

I do not know the names of some of the plants above. Expert Opinions as well as speculations are welcomed.

Surviving the 2 week Vacation

And the plants did pretty well.

The watering solution:

I used plant nanny ceramic spikes with wine and plastic bottles, watered the plants really well  and for terrcotta pots made sure the outside of the pots were wet too. I then wrapped all the terracotta pots with black plastic garbage bags with some water at the bottom. I used some of the bags as mulch for the plastic pots as well.

And I came back to find bell peppers and tomatoes as well as chrysanthemums (?).

Wrapping the pots in Garbage bags

Bell Peppers

Bell Pepper

More Bell Peppers

Chrysanthemums

Tomatoes

Eggplants in the earthbox

Events in the Garden this Saturday

There are what I think to be spider mites on the fuchsia(After spending sometime on Google). They completely killed the mint that was right next to the fuchsia. I  noticed the signs, but I just thought it was because it has been so hot here lately.The fuchsia flowers were dropping at a faster rate the past 3 days. Usually there is a hummingbird that visits the fuchsia every morning and he did not come because there were no flowers.

Last evening I decided to have a look and found the mint to be gone completely. I have salvaged the fuchsia and sprayed the Neem oil concoction on it. I am hoping it will survive.

Fuchsia leaves with Spider mite trouble

On a happier note , the black eyed susan is blooming:

Black Eyed Susan

And here are the Bell peppers:

Bell Peppers

Sunflowers, Marigolds, Jasmine

Here they are:

Marigolds

Sunflowers

Star Jasmine

Jasmine

Vacation Watering Update

The vacation watering apparatus is working quite well, looking at the wet soil around the plant. It has a small ceramic cone that goes into the soil in which you fill in water and close it with the green mushroom-like lid. The tube attachment from the lid goes into a water container.

Automatic Plant Waterer

Automatic Plant Waterer at work

I am also trying out the plant nanny with the water bottle attachment. This one has a ceramic cone and a green spike that attaches to the bottles. The green spike fits into the ceramic cone.

Plant Nanny

So far so good.

Although I still have some more plants to vacation water. Drip Watering from buddygarden seems interesting, I want to try it out.

Baby tomatoes and Bell Pepper flowers

So the tomato plants from last year have already started flowering and i can see the first baby tomato:

Baby Tomato

And the Bell Pepper flowers are out too:

Bell Pepper Flowers

This is one of 4 plants I had from last year and they have survived winter pretty well. The new blossoms do get aphids. This year I am trying Neem Oil on the leaves and so far it has been working pretty well.