Coming Sunday, I consider visiting a local event for swapping clothes, plants and seeds. No idea why they combine clothes and plants, but never mind.
I have way too many alpine strawberries grown from seed, as I sowed a lot (in pots) and they all sprouted and thrive. So I could try to swap a couple of these for seeds or so.
I also have some seeds that I bought the wring type of, as sometimes when I quickly order pack of seed, I just add a couple of other packs from memory, without paying proper atttention to my wishlist. So now I have several pole beans (yellow and Berlotto), while I wanted bush beans. Maybe I can swap these seedpacks as well.
My microbush tomatoes are almost outgrowing there 0.5 liter yoghurt containers. We still have 3 weeks to go before most plants can move permanently outside. I want to use 8 liter flower buckets for those tomatoes (I can get those for free at the grocery store). But those need a tray inside the house, and I don't have many og those.
I swapped the strawberries that were in the living room, growing big fast with the ones upstairs that were growing slowly. Mostly to slow down the fat growing ones. They can be planted out in the beginning of June, so they need to last for another 5 weeks and I don't have so many pots, as especially no trays to put them on.
All the chilies are now in those 8 liter flower buckets. Still I have 4 bell peppers to go, which were sown later and are still smaller. My oldest chili (cayenne) now has it's first red pepper. The Braz starfishes are just growing fast with very big leaves. They are a different species, C. Baccatum, while the rest is C. annum.
I sowed squash/zuccini and one pumpkin. I sowed two seeds of each and will keep one. I read everywhere that squash plants are so productive. But my squash plant last year, and 3 years ago was not that productive. I think that may be the result of the plant not being a productive hybrid, standing in only 10 liter buckets and not getting enough water. And not giving the plants enough compost material. This year, I want to collect a good pile of horse manure + straw, that is dumped reasonably close to our house, and use that for the squash buckets. I also bought two much bigger, food grade buckets, so now I have 3 pots that are around 20 liters.
I am not sure my artischokes will turn into something at all. They all seem to have stagnated, buth the ones in the 8 liter pots, as wll as the ones still in small pots. I filled the pots with a mixture of soil and sand and try to not water them too much. The artischokes are just a bonus if the work out at all.
I put the carrots, turnips, radishes and chard outside. They were all started in milk packs in a plastic crate indoors. But standing in the cool room upstairs with little sunlight, they are all thin and leggy. I put the crate under a roof. But two days ago we got a new pack of snow and despite the roof, the plants are all covered. Next day when it melted, I "rescued" them by taking the milk packs out of the plastic crate. I also removed the pack of snow from the top of the milk pack. In some cases, the leggy plant followed along. So yesterday, I decided to sow the whole bunch again in the same pack, now leaving them outside. Apart from the radishes that survived the treatment. These are also all bonus plants.
Upstairs I have a lots of green chicory (Grumola verde) and Valerianella locusta, that are now growing many leaves. They look completely similar for the moment, although they beling to different plant genuses. I have been harvesting the first couple of leaves from them. All those plants are pretty close to the window.
Also growing well are the asparges. Several are now growing a first aspargus stem. And all of them have a long stem with leaves. I think I will need to repot those once again, as they also have 5 weeks to go before planting out. They are still in tiny pots, standing closest to the window.
I moved the large crate with lettuce upstairs to a more prime location on a desk, where I hope it will get more light. Still standing furthest from the window. They grew a couple of leaves, but sort of stagnated after that. I hope they will restart soon. They were just supposed to be a easy to pick early harvest, just like the radishes and turnips. But if there is no sufficient light, that just doesn't work at all.
I repotted some of the basil to bigger pots and 5 or so plants per pot. I few of them are coplanted with chilly, and I want to coplant another bunch with each tomato.
My kale plants are growing slowly. Maybe they would actually do better in a cold room. But I soon hope to move them outside anyway.
