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You are here: Home / Veggies & Edibles / Growing Challenge: First planting of 2008

Growing Challenge: First planting of 2008

February 29, 2008 by Andrea Bellamy 3 Comments

The Growing Challenge pushes us to grow a little more food than we have before: a minimum of one additional type of fruit or vegetable than we did last year, and to grow it from seed. This here is an update on my progress.

After attending Seedy Saturday this past weekend and walking away with more seeds than was advisable, I am trying to get my seed stash in order. So many seeds, so little space to sow.

Yesterday I put in two varieties of edible pod peas – Sugar Snap OP and Mega OP – both from a old stash of West Coast Seeds. Since they produce in 98-115 days, I put them in my raised beds where my tomatoes will eventually go (in June). I’ve never done this before, but my idea was that I’d boot out the peas when the weather starts getting too hot for them, but just right for tomato seedlings. Talk about a hard-working plot! Crossing my fingers that this will work.

Here’s what else I picked up at Seedy Saturday:

Rouge d’Hiver lettuce, Red Russian Kale and Lacinato Kale (growing kale is new to me, and was part of my initial commitment to the Growing Challenge). I also bought a bag of 150 shiitake mushroom plugs from local fungi master Western Biologicals (they don’t have a website, but the product is similar to this). I am so excited about these mushrooms – I’ve been wanting to try this for ages. Expect a step-by-step post on the process of starting the mushroom plugs in the coming weeks.

Related posts:

Default ThumbnailThe Growing Challenge: expanding my vegetable-growing horizons Default ThumbnailGardening events February 20 – 24, 2008 Default ThumbnailTomato order 2008 Default ThumbnailMushrooms!

Filed Under: Veggies & Edibles Tagged With: growing challenge, kale, lacinato kale, red russian kale, seedy saturday, shiitake, west coast seeds

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. kate says

    February 29, 2008 at 1:32 pm

    I wonder if there’s any way not to come away with more than enough seeds!

    It will be fun seeing how the mushrooms grow. That is exciting.

  2. Paula says

    February 29, 2008 at 7:14 pm

    I thought that you were having a baby sometime soon? I am jealous of your planting. Yesterday it snowed,and today it was 10+…ah Calgary. I did find some sedum coming up green under the mulch!

  3. Andrea Bellamy says

    March 5, 2008 at 10:03 am

    Kate – I think you’re right. If you go to these events, you should be prepared to go overboard. ;)

    Paula – Yep – 6 weeks to go. When can you start planting in Calgary?

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