now it's spring

despite the slightly cooler than normal temperatures, i truly feel it is spring. on monday, dale and i planted eleven flats of plants. eleven flats times 72 plants per flat is...792 plants. granted some flats have empty cells because the seeds didn't germinate, but nonetheless, a lot of plants were planted. we planted three flats of swiss chard, one flat of collards, one flat of cauliflower, four flats of head lettuce and two flats of cabbage. (please note - every flat is a different variety. for example, the swiss chard varieties were northern lights, virgo and rhubarb.) that took us all day. and now that they are outside exposed to all the elements, we had to make sure every row we planted in had hoops, clear plastic for covering and weights to hold down the plastic. we are still having some nights in the 30s and we have to protect the plants as much as possible. if we waited until there was no more risk of freezing and frost (about mid-may in this area), we would never have enough produce to sell at our markets, all of which begin sometime in may.

today, was another big planting day. dale and i planted four flats - two flats of kale, one flat of broccoli and one flat of cauliflower. and again, had to make sure there was enough plastic covering and and weights for everything. then we planted 24 pounds of spring onions. we plant spring onions from spring onions, as opposed to starting them from seed in the field.

on the schedule for tomorrow is - plant the rest of the spring root crops, which will be direct seeded in the field. the root crops include - carrots (red, white, orange, purple), turnips (gold, white, purple and white, red), beets (purple, gold, red, white) and radishes (red, white, gold, pink, purple). three pounds of shallots are also on the schedule. (shallots are also planted from shallots, not seed.) hopefully the ground will not be too wet to plant salad beds. salad beds are direct seeded in the field and used to plant the lettuce blend, mesclun mix, cilantro, cress, spinach, arugula and rhubarb swiss chard (for salad mixes to add some color). (spinach will switch to amaranth greens in the summer, since spinach doesn't like the heat.) this will be the first planting of the season for salad beds, though they will be planted every other week throughout the year. the beds are about four feet wide and every planting will be about 90 feet long.

that sounds like a lot of planting, and it is, but it is only the beginning...