seed fever

 We had a few days of unseasonably warm weather last week, making my seed fever spike like crazy.  I've been researching wildly trying to keep myself from jumping the gun and starting things too early.  I pulled my overwintered pepper plants out of the basement and am sad to report they did not make it.  I watched a few more videos on the subject and think I might try again next winter.  Though the peppers didn't make it, this little fellow popped out of the soil the pepper plants were in.

I'm not exactly sure what it is, but I have a strong hunch it may be a sunflower seedling.  I have had mice in the garage this winter, and did find sunflower seed shells in a corner.  I'll let it grow and see what happens.

I've also started a few celery stubs for transplanting, as I do every year.

I brought my greenhouse upstairs and set it up in preparation, too.  I've had this contraption for years now - it's a cheap Job Lots pipe and wire shelving system with a plastic cover.  This year I wanted to give my seeds a better start, so I've invested in some small grow lights.  I attended a webinar last week on seed starting given by our local university's cooperative extension, and I learned quite a bit.  Instead of the old fluorescent grow lights, people are now turning to specialized LED lights.  The ones I purchased are colored; they give off a purplish-pink glow. 

They're designed to either run independently or you can connect them together via included cables, so they all switch on at once.  They came with hardware to mount them to a ceiling permanently, or with zip ties to hang them, which is what I'm doing. 

You can see the plug for the included cables; each light has plugs on both ends. You can either use a stand alone cable with an on/off switch, or a connecting cable that will run lights off one another.

Connecting two lights with the included cables.

Blue lights help seedlings sprout and grow, red lights help things flower.  California Lightworks gives a great explanation of how lights affect plant growth, development, and flowering.  Honestly, I have a hard time wrapping my head around some of the technical aspects of it, I just know this should work better than the plastic cover and a sunny window.  At any rate, the lights are perfect for my setup.  They're just long enough so they don't hang over the edge, and small enough that I can hang two on each tier.  

I'm also trying out some new silicone seed trays.  I love that they're reusable and BPA-free.  Bonus - they're fun colors.  I'm wondering how easy it will be to get the seedlings out of them when the time comes, though.  They are pretty flexible, so that should help.

Next weekend I'll be starting a few cherry tomato plants, some bell and hot peppers, broccoli, cauliflower, and I'm going to try my hand at annual flowers, too.  I have some petunia, pansy, and impatiens seeds on the way.  I have a feeling I may run out of room once these seedlings start needing to be transplanted.

On this episode of Little House on the Prairie...SNOWSQUALL

 If you've never lived in an area that gets a little wintry, you've probably never experienced a snowsquall or a whiteout.  I've lived through a couple.  Once in a plow truck coming down a very steep and winding road, which is probably 95% responsible for my hair going grey at an early age, and twice while outside minding my own damned business.  

Last night at just dark, I finished  my barn chores and headed down the driveway to the get the mail at the mailbox across the street.  I stopped at the edge of the road to let a vehicle go by, then headed across the road.  I was suddenly aware of an intense roaring sound, like a freight train was coming at me.  I looked both ways down the road, thinking I was hearing a big town truck plowing, when I was suddenly surrounded by gusting winds and blowing snow.  I grabbed the mail and turned to head back to the house, and could barely make out the end of my driveway just a few yards away.  I had to struggle to keep myself upright on the snow covered ice that was underfoot while being buffeted by incredible winds.  "This is it" I thought.  "This is how unsuspecting farmers died in the 1700s...I should have put a rope from the barn to the mailbox so I wouldn't get lost."  My mostly rational brain seemingly forgot that I live in a semi-rural neighborhood, not the vast open prairie, and the chances of getting lost in a whiteout were slim-to-none in these parts.

I did make it to the barn and I slipped inside to wait out the squall.  My face stung from the force of the snow hitting it, but I was unscathed.  After about three minutes the squall petered out, and I went inside to my nice warm house.  I think a lot of us forget how much we're at the mercy of nature when we're outside, especially if we're alone.  I've had a few instances where my heart got a pretty good workout, either falling or getting a tiny bit lost or accidentally being too close to wildlife. I kind of enjoy that little bit of drama in my otherwise mundane daily existence. 

February Thaw

 As of today we are at 10 hours and 24 minutes of daylight.  The sun is definitely stronger, and the 40* temperatures have been helping to settle the snow pack and even melt some of the 2-3" thick ice floe that is my driveway.  Here's one days worth of melting.  Gotta love seeing that dirt!

 

With the sun and the warmth, it's hard to resist starting some seeds.  I don't want to start my veg too early, so instead I'm working on catnip, cat grass, and seeing if some echinacea seeds collected a few years ago are still viable.  I've also started a small batch of salad greens that are coming along nicely.

Most of my herbs are still alive, which is amazing.  As much as I love gardening, I'm really not good at it.  I have lost my rosemary, and I'm fairly certain I've killed my lemon grass.  The rest seem to be struggling, but still alive.  I have my pepper plants that I'm overwintering in the basement.  If all goes well, by next month they should be showing signs of life.  I've never tried this before but I'm hopeful. 

I'm not sure if it was from the potting soil or the garden soil that the herbs came in with, but I had an insane infestation of fungus gnats this winter.  They look like fruit flies and apparently they emerge from the soil in damp conditions.  According to a YouTube video I watched, one adult can lay 300 eggs in the soil and they're constantly hatching.  It's almost like a flea infestation - you have treat to kill all life cycles, not just the pesky adults.  The video suggested a dedicated water bottle that has a chunk of mosquito killer, like Mosquito Dunks, in it.  Drop a chunk in the water, let it sit for a day or so, then whenever you water your plants, use that water.  It's the best way to kill off the larvae and the eggs in the soil.  For the adults, there are these wonderful little sticky traps you can put in your plants.  They work fantastically well!

After a couple weeks of this two-pronged approach I'm happy to report there are significantly less gnats.  I'm still using the treated water and have put out a new sticky trap, but at least there isn't a massive cloud of these buggers around my herbs anymore.

 I'm also happy to report that Flea has been doing terrific this winter.  He is moving sound, hasn't had any signs of winter laminitis during even the coldest temperatures, and has been seen cavorting and sprinting around the paddock.  

He's come a long way from the crippled up little mule he's been for the past four years, that's for certain.  He's been on the drug Invokana to regulate his insulin resistance for just over a year now.  There were small signs of improvement within the first four or five months but a few backslides, too. The last six or seven months have just seen him get better and better.  Invokana is a relatively new approach to IR in equines, so we're not sure what the long-term effects will be.  One of the side effects seen in horses has been high trigycerides, which can be life threatening.  In these cases, horses are given a less stringent diet.  This means I can relax a little on the amount and type of hay he gets.  I still have to test any hay to keep it within recommended guidelines, but the hay can be at the upper threshold of percentages for sugars and starch.  When we first started this journey of PPID/IR, Flea would typically do well all year until around the end of January, when he'd start to show signs of being footsore.  He would remain sore and have difficulty moving until around April, when temperatures would start to rise.  I'm holding my breath to see if he makes it through to May this year without issue.  If he does, I'll be elated.  The one thing he's lacking currently is exercise, so getting the track system completed is my #1 priority this spring.  I'll be happy to see both mules moving more, and I'm sure they'll appreciate being able to move outside of a tiny paddock after all these years.