I'm potting up my starts today, what's your plans?

I need to put my outdoor plants back outdoors. I think we're past the cold nights.

Nice!

I’m semi glad there’s still some snow and too moist to spring clean the garden. Don’t have the okay from the doc to do anything too strenuous yet. Hence the tiny bucket of dirt -.- multiple small trips. I would be getting very itchy looking at the nice weather and pile of shit to do haha.

It snowed a good 5cm/2” last nigh, but most will melt as it gets above freezing during the day.
- Is it normal to have snow at this time of the year? Here, the flowers are blooming, the trees are putting out new growth, and the birds have returned from their winter habitats.

Put in a few more fruit trees and pruning others. Got some peppers and luffa seeds germinating

FYI instead of rock wool you can just use cotton balls, it's like 1/20th the cost. Looks like you are going to put them in the dirt anyway

It was my understanding that cotton holds onto water too well. It has a higher risk of damping off, and I don’t think it would wick properly with humidity dome/trays.

I also use it for hydroponics, so can’t have stuff breaking down and clogging up equipment.
- yea for hydroponics I'd stick with rockwool / coco coir / perlite but the cotton is fine if you're going into the ground.

New this year for me: four blueberry bushes, two thornless raspberries, one thornless blackberry, a goji berry bush, two dwarf cherries, a fig tree, an elderberry tree, and some sunchokes. Also redoing a sizable portion of my drip irrigation. I wanted to rip my maypop vine out and put a self fertile kiwi in its place but time slipped away from me.

I always do the usual tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, strawberries, onions, herbs, pollinator flowers, etc.. Putting in a new 2 foot by 20 foot raised bed as well for more annuals. Weirdest annual I’m trying this year is a tromboncini squash that’s supposed to be vine borer resistant.

My pluot tree is starting to put out its first fruit this year, so that’s also exciting.

My yard is less than a quarter of an acre, so I’m definitely getting close to all I can fit in it.

Nice selection!

I've grown Tromboncino before. They're tasty, very hardy, and climb without any coaxing if you give them something to climb up. Their shape is also highly amusing.

Just in case you haven't heard, raspberries - and I assume blackberries - spread pretty aggressively. I put one in my raised bed two falls ago. The beds are 4' x 8' and I planted it at one of the long ends. The next season I planted some pepper plants in the far end of the bed. The raspberry bush had overtaken 3/4 of the bed by the fall, but it hasn't tried to escape the raised bed (yet?).
- Yeah I have a trellis set up for them to spread. Doing a living mulch with them using clover, strawberries, green onion, and dill.
- I tried the burying a tote in the ground. I’m sure my Neighbor has shoots coming up…. I find them in my turf, but those get dealt with when mowing, but the flower bed… god they get about 12’ down it and I gotta keep on top of them.
  
  I’m gonna give it one more year before I start actually trying to remove it. I pruned it properly start of last season and got great yields. Birds loved it haha.
That’s quite the amount of fruit trees! The wife doesn’t want more, she doesn’t want all the critters that come with them unfortunately.

I want to install an in ground system, but I’ve also never heard of anyone here doing it. I’m sure the pipes would get water infiltrated and burst during the winter. Cant winterize them the same way you can sprinkler systems.

We are just about to plant our outside garden! We have done a massive pruning project these past few months, after about a decade of deferred pruning. We've removed hundreds of pounds of biomass. Now we are replanting with lots of native plants to hopefully have a more biodiverse backyard, which should also look a bit better than having like ...five mega bushes. They were getting dangerously close to tree territory.

I dug out a blueberry bush with a woody trunk that was as wide around as a grapefruit. xD

Oh jeez.

I installed turf because that’s what you are supposed to do apparently. I’ve since slowly seeded it with clover and am slowly changing it all over to mulch/beds/natives. I’m gonna keep a little strip of actual grass/clover though I think.

My plans: I got super lazy and didn't start any seeds this year. I had the flu the week I wanted to do the starts, so I obviously missed that week. Then I just... didn't start anything. I'm going to buy starts from our local garden center (non-big box) and I'll put seeds for the usual bugger things directly in the ground.

Honestly, this will probably work out fine this year. One of my raised beds is 100% raspberries now. One of the others has two artichokes that may or may not have made it through the winter. I didn't do enough research and didn't realize they're perennials and won't flower their first year unless you cold harden the seedlings. Those things are big, but they certainly are dead down to at least ground level.

Hey that’s what my depression did to me last year, missed my starter window. HD was expensive, but is what it is sometimes.

You’ll get through it growmie.
- Thanks! I might be in the land of denial re: depression, but I've also had too many other things vying for attention. We have two younger kids, so sunlight hours are usually split between them and my job. Once they're asleep I have 2-3 hours to do all adult things: talk to my wife 1:1, hang out with friends, meal plan, game, unwind, etc. They do like the garden, and help, but they're only in it for a portion of the time it takes to actually do anything.
  
  Us all getting sick cost us two weekends. My wie it a deer and I had to get her a new hood and replace a headlamp, which cost another weekend.
  
  The reason why I prefer seeds over home cheapo starts is to have more variety of plants. We do have a local nursery that has an epic selection, but they're a little further away. Stating seeds is also fun, and like you said it can be cheaper if you're somewhat judicious about how many types of seeds you buy.

Literally anything other than gardening 🥲

That’s unfortunate. Supposed to be “moving” but nothing strenuous, so at least I can spend all day doing something like this.

My surgery couldn’t have came at a more perfect time really. Would have sucked to have my plants ready to go and be stuck not being able to plant them after frost.

I couldn’t install a green house though. The timing wouldn’t work well by the time I will be able to build it.
- My issue is I'm literally moving states in a couple months, so everything has become about making that happen. Wouldn't get a chance to enjoy any plants before then anyway.
  
  Gardening (or any outside time) really is the perfect thing for recovering, glad the timing worked out. Maybe you could get a greenhouse set up for next year?

The Brownies? I need context. If you are planting fresh baked brownies, I have another use for them. ;)

Just trying to be Meta.

Just to show the process. Cups are doubled cupped with the top having a hole cut in it to prevent water logging. Use a stick to move the rockwool cube over.

After they settle I’ll start thinning out, but I also don’t know if that’s necessary for flowers? I’m only gonna have one tomato and pepper per, but does the same apply to purely decorative plants?

And into their new home until hardening off time.

@SchmidtGenetics Kein Alt-Text.
https://mastodon.art/@Curator/113587867567399133

I’m sorry, soapbox or grandstand somewhere else.

I get it’s a disability aid, same time, people don’t provide translations “in a public place”, same can be applied to images. There’s images in public, there’s not alt text of those is there?

If there’s not an automated way, than that’s what people should spend their energy on, not bemoaning to try and force people to do additional stuff. Not everyone has the extra time when they post. It’s not ableist.

I have carpal tunnel any additional typing beyond necessary is painful. There’s more than one “ableist” perspective. Forcing me to type extra falls into the same category, but I’m not out in public griping about it.
- @SchmidtGenetics Bad excuse for ableism.