Seeds or Seedlings? Seeds!

In between trips out to the barn to check on Toka, we’ve been trying to get organized for spring. One big task is planning the garden and what we will be planting this spring. We try to grow as much as possible from seed, as opposed to seedlings, although we always end up grabbing a seedling or two at the farmer’s market or farm store if there’s something that just didn’t start off well, or something we didn’t think of earlier that looks particularly good or interesting.

This year we’re ordering our seeds from two sources: Fedco and John Scheeper’s Kitchen Garden Seeds. Below is the list of what we’ll be planting. This list doesn’t include the seeds we’ve still got from last year (mostly squashes and greens) or our potato selection. We like to visit the Fedco tree sale in person in the spring to collect our saplings and pick out our seed potatoes, and that’s the plan this year. Last year we planted several rows of potatoes with the last wrinkled potatoes remaining in our root cellar, and had very good results, but because of last year’s blight, we want to start this year with a clean batch of seed potatoes.

This year we’re trying to experiment with companion planting, and we’ve added an abundance of flowers to the vegetable patch. We’d love to hear from you, what you’ll be growing this year, and any thoughts (or tips) you have about what’s in our garden.

FEDCO

Multicolored Pole Bean Mix
Beer Friend Soybean
Spring Treat Yellow Sweet Corn
Halona Muskmelon
de Bourbonne Pickling Cucumber
Amsterdam #2 Carrot
Scarlet Nantes Carrot
Red Cored Chantenay Carrot
Danvers Carrot
Purple Haze Carrot
Harris Model Parsnip
Lincoln Leek
Arugula
Shuko Pac Choi
Broccoli Blend
Pingtung Long Eggplant
New Ace Sweet Pepper
Flavorburst Sweet Pepper
Heirloom Tomato Mix OG
Jewel Mix Nasturtium

JOHN SCHEEPERS KITCHEN GARDEN SEEDS

Hero French-Crested Marigold Mixture
Royal Russell Lupine Mixture
The Irresistible Cutting Flower Garden
Gourmet Rainbow Radish Mixture
Sugar Ann Snap Peas
Touchstone Golden Beets
One Kilo Chinese Cabbage
Totem Belgian Endive