The Modern Victory Garden

I popped out to the garden this evening after getting home somewhat late from work.   The light was fading fast but I managed to take a few progress pictures of the plants I put in the ground almost two weeks ago.   The weather has been cool and we have had heavy rains but they are growing well despite that.   The broccoli and cabbages actually like the wet and gloomy conditions.                  

 And the chinese cabbages and other greens are obviously not too unhappy to be out in the cool and damp elements either.            

The rhubarb is really starting to take off as well.   It will not be long before I can begin harvesting from these plants.      

I have several 6-packs of celery and swiss chard starts that I have been hardening off this week and they are ready to go into the ground.    It will have to wait until Saturday though as the bed requires prepping ahead of time and I need more daylight hours than is available in the evenings after work to do that and the transplanting process too.   I am starting the hardening off process with my tree kale plant as well.   It needs to get into the ground soon and is in need of some stake support, as the stems are getting quite tall on my cutting start.         

Inside the house and shop I have lots of trays of seedlings going. The ultra  early started tomatoes were planted on January 22nd and were previously potted up to larger containers on February 26th.   They are now so tall and lush that they can only be placed under my main light set up in the shop.                  

These plants will go into the garden sometime around mid to late April with a protective covering over them to keep them warm during the early season coolness and to keep them from getting soaked by spring rains.   In the meantime, they require one more potting up which I hope to get done either Friday night or on Saturday. Once they have settled into their new pots I will begin the gradual hardening off process for these plants.             

 The Sungold cherry tomatoes are already starting to flower!              

I also have another large group of tomatoes that were started almost three weeks after this first ultra early group.   They are looking very sturdy and large too.                          

Weather forecast for the coming weekend is a mixed bag.   I really need to plant my potato patch but I think I may wait just one more week in the hopes that I get a stretch of a little drier weather to do it in.   I cannot go any longer than that though as the seed potatoes have been sitting inside the house to chit in the warmer conditions and have developed some nice sprouts.   If I wait too long those sprouts will get unwieldy and will break off easily when the seed potato is handled.                       

I hope all is going well with your seedlings and early garden planting.        

Laura

kitsapfreedomgardener