mid sized cold frame
saved rain barrel water
- 9 beans, scarlet runner pole (Heirloom, 2018)
- 15 beans, black turtle dry (Heirloom, 2018)
- 15 corn, Dakota black (Botanical Interests, 2020)
- 15 corn, sweet Golden Bantam (Territorial, 2021)
- 15 corn, sweet Hopi blue (Territorial, 2021)
- 15 corn, pencil cob (Heirloom, 2018)
- 15 melon, Lilly (Territorial, 2021)
- 15 melon, honeydew (saved from grocery, 2018)
- 15 squash, acorn (saved from grocery, 2018)
- 15 squash, butternut (saved from grocery, 2018)
- 15 squash, butternut (saved from grown above, 2019)
- 17 sunflower, evening colors (High Mowing, 2021)
- 29 sunflower, enchanted garden mix (Heirloom, 2019)
I am really squeezed for time, but still trying my level best to grow as much food as we can this year. Although I had a great germination rate for the first batch of peas, many of the seeds I’ve been starting since then have a much slower rate of germination and I only have so much cat hazard free windowsill space. So I’m now relying on the quick and dirty cold frames.
One one hand, I’m so glad I have them. On the other hand…it broke 80°F (~27°C) here yesterday, and the seeds I have moved outside that were still in water in the smaller frame seen above…the water was VERY warm by the end of the day when I was doing my evening water of the plugs. This concerns me. It’s not like the water was boiling, but since I’ve not done this before I have this fear that it’s somehow warmer than the soil would be. Which when I write that seems crazy thinking, but the water certainly felt warmer than the plus soil.
Fortunately, this morning I found the old thermometer in the same bin where the wood for the cold frames was when I was pulling more wood out for the medium sized one, so that’s now inside the medium sized one as can be seen in the picture. I forgot that none of the mid sized windows have screens! If it gets too warm today (predicted is 71°F which is 10° cooler than yesterday), I do have the hardware cloth/screen frame I used to sift compost that I could put on top to at least keep critters like the bunnies away from the seeds. (Yes, I found a way to attract the wild buns finally. Can’t remember if I mentioned that yet. If not, I’ll write about that another time.)
In truth, I’m doing the best I can with what I’ve got. So I’m just going to have to hope for the best this year!
The second set of seeds I had started three days ago are also out there as the weather has been ridiculously nice. I need to dig one of the larger windows out of the garage today for today’s batch of seeds. It’s really tight in the small cold frame right now, and I still haven’t gotten my hands on more stakes to better secure our little plastic cloche we bought for the way too early tomatoes. I knew I had uploaded a picture of it, but apparently didn’t have time to write/finish the post it was intended for back in May 2021. *chuckle*
Although I am not surprised with how out of the norm the weather is right now, I’m trying to roll with it.
I have also started doing slightly larger batches of seeds, depending on how many I have and how old some of them are. I figure if they all germinate, I can always give some starters away locally or maybe plant them out front and hope folks avail themselves of whatever grows. Time will tell!
