Posted on 02/08/2008 9:13:29 AM PST by Gabz
I seriously tried to cheat this week, because I'm running late, but the only source I found for the article I wanted to post is a prohibitted source, so I'm winging it!
My 9 year old daughter loves to help in the garden and has her own spots for whatever she wants to plant (she is much better with flowers than mom!)
The National Gardening Association has lots of ideas for getting kids interested in gardening at its Web site, Kids Gardening.
This month's feature on the website is a "Parents' Primer" which is chock full of ideas...."find out how to engage your children in outdoor explorations that cultivate their love of plants, gardening, and the environment."
BTTT
Hey, good news! I’ve got teeny little baby lettuces and cabbages popping up in the garden!
They took two weeks to germinate, probably due to the cold snap a week and a half ago... but now we’re on our way to salad.
Bookmarking for later read
Fantastic! S’posed to get cold Sun nite—don’t forget to cover them up!
Watching seeds sprout is such a miracle, and very humbling. I love to watch stuff grow, esp in the greenhouse. You can go in in the morning and stuff will just be a curl. By afternoon, it’s standing up and has two leaves.
We sold a bunch of stuff today. potatoes and onions and lots of baby plants. I tried to caution everyone that bought plants—it’s only s’posed to be in the low 30’s tomorrow night. You can’t take babies from a 90 degree greenhouse/ 50 ish at night and put them out in freezing weather. :( If they were a little bigger, they’d be fine.
I have really enjoyed taking people out in the greenhouse today. Green therapy! Outside weather wasn’t bad here, either. Almost 70 and not a cloud in sight. It could stay like that year round and it wouldn’t bother me one bit!:)
Your hubby sounds like mine. I need to "feel" what I'm doing, not just se what I'm doing.
No, thank goodness. We live close to the center between the ocean coast and the bay coast and on slightly higher ground than those closer to the water, and thus between all the flood zones in this county.
I have never had luck with sunflowers and my daughter really wanted one of the sunflower forts/playhouses but we could never get them to sprout — I’m obviously doing something wrong.
Any hints or tips on growing the sunflowers?
Absolutely, a wonderful word in all ways!!!!
ROFL!!!!!!! That is EXACTLY my attitude.
It's also a learing activity.....in my case for both mom and daughter, it's amazing the things I have learned from and about her while we've been digging in the dirt together.
She's been messing around in the veggie patch with me since before she was born. Her birthday is in July and I wanted to make sure I had a good supply of fresh produce after she was born so I was planting while pregnant, and would have her out there with me once I started harvesting. She'll be 10 this July and is still my favorite gardening companion (along with daddy)
GOOD FOR YOU!!!!!!!
I am so jealous........my favorite garden center is still closed for the season. They won’t reopen until sometime next month.
I don’t know if I have any special hints. I can tell you what I did though. Last year was my first year planting sunflowers.
I took an aluminum lasagna pan (I garden cheap), put drain holes in the bottom, and filled it with potting mix. I scattered seeds on top, covered with more mix, watered, and put the container outside the beginning of May. I’m in zone 6, so you could probably plant earlier. They sprouted pretty quickly. When they looked big enough, the kids and I transplanted them directly into the spots we wanted. Nothing complicated you didn’t already know, I’m sure. Maybe I was just lucky last year.
My daughter seemed to really enjoy gardening. She noticed every tiny sprout in our containers, and got excited when she noticed certain plants growing and flowers blooming. We definitely learned patience last year growing most flowers from seed, which was new for me. It was a blast, we just didn’t get blooms as early as I’m used to. Some bloomed until frost though.
My son wasn’t as into it, but liked picking tomatoes, and was impressed how fast and long the vining zucchini grew.
Thanks — I’ll try that, we direct seeded them in the past.
LOL on your lasagna pan -— I’m even cheaper, I use the previously used banquet buffet table aluminum pans from where I work!!!! Everyone knows to not throw them out. And I just keep reusing them, I have about 30 of them stacked up in the barn.
Try getting it more light; foil to reflect light onto the bottoms of leaves etc might save it. I’ve had a few bay laurels die on me (this is Michigan, so lots of indoor living for non-winter-hardy plants), and it sounds like the same cause.
Well I planted my three fig trees and my langniappe pear tree yesterday. Good sized holes and added lots of compost and Black Kow mixed with a little of the natural soil. I had a companion watching every shovel full of dirt removed and mixed and added back to the hole along with the trees, our female Irish Setter, Cashmere. The male, Aladden, did not take any interest other than to sit and watch from a distance from the hill by the house. I watered them in and decided I would let it settle overnight and add more of the soil mixture today if it was needed then berm them up with some of the extra soil.
This morning my wife calls to me to the kitchen window and says, "watch Cashmere". Cashmere was just going crazy running around the yard with a stick in her mouth. She would stop throw it up in the air then grab it up in her mouth and run some more. After watching for a few seconds I said "Whoa" (not actually what I said) "That is one of the fig trees!" I ran out and called her and she came prancing up with the fig tree in her mouth, the roots dragging in the grass and "gifted" it to me at my feet! We had some words!
The roots were not damaged but she had snapped off a three inch section off the top. The rest of the tree bark did not have any teeth damaged. I could not believe it. I have pruned back the damaged top and replanted it (while Cashmere watched). All the trees now have a wire cage around them.
Apparently she did not like the particular placement of this tree!
I bet she and Aladden will enjoy a fig or two when they produce!
She saw how much you were enjoying the planting and wanted in on the action :)
Glad to hear you were able to rescue it........
Cashmere watches my wife sew! My wife says she is just learning. I guess Cashmere didn’t get the palnting procedure down pat the first four times and needed a refresher!
Wow, you could be a cheaper gardener than me :) Although, I do occasionally use plastic strawberry containers and the like when I sow a small amount of seeds.
I originally purchased the lasagna pans with the clear lids for winter sowing. I put holes in the top of the lids and on the bottom, and put them out in the cold. By the time May came around for the sunflowers, I didn’t need the lid anymore. I’m also reusing my lasagna pans this year. A lot of winter sowers use milk jugs, with holes in the bottom and leave the lid off as well. I’m trying a few this year, just trying to keep them mostly hidden from view so my husband and neighbors so they don’t have me committed ;)
In my area of N Cal we have a problem with gophers literally chewing off the trunk of small fig trees just below the dirt line, so be aware. But we did have enough last year to have a friend sell some at a farmer’s market. She averaged $7.00 for each small basket full which we figured was close to a dollar apiece!
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