Disaster strikes! and greenhouse growth

Janet harvesting greens

Oh dear - a disaster in my greenhouse...The shelves we so lovingly put all our transplants from Saturday, collapsed Sunday. They had their feet on uneven ground and just tipped and flipped all the seedlings over. Paul was here to fix a handle in the greenhouse and I shooed him away. Just as I was setting up the first shelf - the second set of shelves buckles and collapses! Aargh! But I kept my cool and methodically picked up all the upended plugs and set them back in trays. Paul came out a bit later and finished the job - he also was handy at fixing my faucet in the kitchen which was loose. If you need a good handyman in the metro Detroit area give me a buzz...

Tonight I took my friend, garden designer and lecturer Janet Macunovich, to the OC greenhouse so she could take pictures for a vegetable gardening class we are teaching together this week. (By the way, she's got a great gardening website Garden A to Z which has a neat gardening forum). We both harvested a bag of greens each and will have salad tonight for supper.

Bed one - started in September

The beds continue to grow well. Fertilized all the plants with Kelp this last Saturday and the Nasturtiums have appreciated it and have taken off. Just read a good recipe for Nasturtium Pesto with walnuts and Parmesan cheese so I think I'll try it - maybe for my brother Chris on Valentine's day. I've been wondering what to do with this plethora of nasturtium foliage that is overtaking the corners and center of bed #2. I'll try it and get back to you all on the blog on the taste of the pesto.

Propagation dome

 Meanwhile, the babies are doing better in their warmer site as you can see from the picture at left. I purchased five propagation domes for the seedlings - they are about $3 each from Greenhouse Megastore and available elsewhere. There is finally a haze of green on the seedling trays. Janet counted the trays and multiplied by the number of cells - I have over 1900 plants growing! She mentioned I'll have a bit of work bumping them all up to larger containers. No kidding! Not every cell is filled so the number is a bit high but it gives you a good idea of how many plants we'll have this year. I still have seeds coming from Specialty Seeds - about 30 varieties so that will be another 1000 plants and then the annual flowers and vegetables. I think I'll be scrambling in April and May. Oh well, goes with the gardening territory.

View of  the OC greenhouse

To have enough room for the upcoming seedlings I am going to try and get another bed at the OC greenhouse. I need room for another 30 flats I calculate and I thought with the other two beds I'd be pulling spent crops by now. The crops have been so slow that they are just now coming into bearing. So, until the big greenhouse at Vicki's remains at a warmer temperature I think I'll have to get another bed. I only hope they've slashed the prices or will give me a volume discount!