Seeds « The Yellow Farmhouse Garden

April 13, 2019

Florescent lights for starting plants

We’re growing many of our transplants under artificial light using primarily fluorescent tubes and they are doing quite well. It’s not as good as growing them in a greenhouse under natural sunlight of course.

When you stop and think about it, it’s really a wonder that florescent bulbs work as well as they do considering they have to produce those little packets of energy called photos in sufficient numbers to grow a plant. The plant uses that photon energy and builds itself right out of thin air using carbon dioxide with help from water and minerals in the soil.

Plants can gather enough photons only when the bulbs are close enough to the plant. Some beginning gardeners make the mistake of trying to grow seedlings under what looks to them to be bright light but is not for the plant. As a result the seedling start to show symptoms of light deprivation such as stretching toward the light source, abnormal color and general overall weakness.

We have our florescent tubes set up so that they are around three or four inches from the top of the plants, not more than six inches for sure. Since florescent bulbs give off so little heat, setting them that close is no problem. You wouldn’t want to do that with incandescent bulbs.

It’s very important to start out with clean bulbs. Just a little dust collecting on them will reduce the amount light of light reaching the plants enough to weaken them. So make sure you clean your tubes, and the reflector of your tube fixture, for optimum results.

I keep my light bulbs no further than 4 or 5 inches from the seedlings. The gray on the bulbs in this photo is just a glitch from the camera.

After a few seasons of growing seedlings under florescent bulbs you may notice you just can’t seem to grow them as well as you used to. It’s nothing that you are doing differently, it’s the bulbs themselves that are at fault. Florescent bulbs have a limited lifespan usually rated by the number of hours in use and that can be in the tens of thousands of hours. In reality however, bulbs will begin fading well before their rated life span, maybe even after just a few thousand hours. You won’t see it with your bare eyes but your plants will sure know the difference. Florescent tubes are on their way out long before the familiar gray deposits show up inside the glass.

A good policy under typical growing conditions would be to change out bulbs every three years. That way you’ll be sure your plants are getting off to a good start.

Bob

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February 8, 2019

Selecting plants for butterflies

Filed under: Butterflies,Insects,Seeds — Tags: best butterfly plants, Butterfly plants, plants for butterflies — bob @ 1:56 pm

It’s been a long time coming, but more and gardeners are finally becoming interested in growing butterfly gardens. Eleven years ago, almost to the day, I posted a blog trying to encourage folks grow more plants that attract and sustain butterflies. I figure it’s time to revisit that subject again.

Seed catalogs are arriving everyday in the mail now, both in my email inbox and in my outside mailbox. Almost all of them offer seeds for butterfly attracting plants.

This blog is about plants that have flowers that the adult butterflies readily come to for nectar. An even more ambitious butterfly garden is one that includes plants that the larvae of butterflies need to eat, but that will have to be another blog.

Butterflies are looking for flowers that have lots of nectar and a good landing platform for them to cling to. They also prefer small tubular flowers that are especially adapted to the butterflies’ proboscis, their specially shaped tongue that works like a straw. These tubular flowers cannot be too long or the butterfly cannot reach all the way down to the nectar which is usually at the base of the petals.

There are so many plants from to choose from that it can get frustrating. To help you get started , here’s a of list of the more common plants, in no particular order, that attract butterflies:

Thyme; Valerian; Heliotrope; Asclepias incarnata (common name-Red Swallowwort); PhloxAllysum;Verbena, all the different kinds of verbena are good — Verbena bonariensis is very easy to grow here in Michigan; Thistle; Scabiosa; Columbine; Chrysanthemum; Herbs, many of them have good nectar flowers; Milkweed, attracts at least 17 different kinds of butterflies; Queen Anne’s Lace; Liatris, common name Gayfeather; Gaillardia; Butterfly Bush (of course); Echinacea purpurea, common name Purple Coneflower; Violets; Lilac; Yarrow; Rudbeckia hirta, common name Black Eyed Susan; Monarda, common name Bee Balm; Lupine; Marigold; Daisy; and Lavender.

Zinnias flowers are attractive to butterflies, plus they keep blooming the entire growing season.

Other things you will want to consider when you plant your garden is: 1) have a sunny site that is sheltered from the wind, butterflies get tossed around by a breeze fairly easily 2) provide a place for them to “puddle”. Have you ever noticed butterflies hanging around mud puddles? They are slurping up much needed dissolved minerals, sort of like a food supplement, that are not found in nectar. A shallow container of water containing sand and rocks allows butteries to land and puddle. Actually, even just a simple mud puddle is fine, just replenish it as it gets dry.

Bob

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February 1, 2019

Looking at last year’s saved seeds

Filed under: Seeds,Weather — Tags: old seeds, saving seeds, seeds, vegetable seeds flower seeds, viability of seeds — bob @ 1:45 pm

This is the time of year I drag out all of my old seeds from last year and years before that. I always like to take inventory to see what I’ve got on hand before I order anything. We’re in the middle of winter and not all of the seed catalogs have arrived yet.

You would think that after all these years I would have come up with a better system for keeping track of my seeds since I have dozens of different varieties. You know maybe a spreadsheet, color-coded vials, a numbering system things like that, but I don’t.

Some of my current seed collection.

Seeds don’t last forever. In rare cases however, seeds can germinate after decades or even centuries. One famous example is a Judean date palm seed that germinated and grew after 2000 years. Seeds that we use in the home garden typically last just a few years unless special steps are taken to preserve them. If they’re in an unopened, original envelop, they’ll have a better chance of remaining viable for longer periods of time. That’s the principle behind the survival seed kits that are sold on line.

Seeds that are kept dry and in a cool place fare better than those that are exposed to moisture or heat. Located above the Arctic Circle on a remote island, the Svalbard Global Seed Vault takes seed saving to the extreme and is able to store seeds from around the world for expended periods of time. Home gardeners on the other hand, can only do so much. Most of the time we seal up our seeds the best we can and keep try to them away from temperature extremes.

Here’s a chart I put together a while back that you can refer to when deciding whether or not to keep a particular type of seed. I’ve only included the more commonly planted food crops. This assumes that seeds are kept under typical conditions found in a home. Clip it out and save with your seeds.

SEED VIABILITY CHART

Five years	Four years	Three years	Two years	One year
Broccoli	Beets	Beans	Chives	Onion*
Brussels Sprouts	Squash, winter	Leek	Corn	Parsley*
Cabbage	Squash, summer	Lima beans	Okra	Parsnip*
Cauliflower	Swiss chard	Peas	Pepper	Peanut*
Celery	Tomato	Soybean (Edamame)	Popcorn† † may lose viability after one year	* may retain viability for two years
Cucumber
Eggplant
Kale
Lettuce
Muskmelon
Pumpkin
Radish
Rutabaga
Spinach
Turnip
Watermelon

Many people believe that the larger the seed is the longer it will stay viable. Looking at the chart you can see that seed size is not a factor. Compare corn which are large seeds with celery seeds that are quite small. Corn can be stored only for two years before it loses viability while celery lasts five years.

Bob

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January 16, 2019

Selecting squash, pumpkin and gourd seeds

Filed under: Seeds,Vegetables — Tags: Gourd seeds, Pumpkin seeds, Saving Gourd seeds, Saving Pumpkin Seeds, Saving Squash Seeds, Saving Winter Squash Seeds, selecting aquash seeds, selecting gourd seeds, selecting pumpkin seeds, selecting seeds, Squash, Squash Seeds, Winter Squash — bob @ 10:51 am

Under good storage conditions, winter squash and pumpkins can stay edible well into winter. I have a spot in my garage that stays cool, around 50 degrees, through the winter and that is right around the ideal storage temperature for squash. Air circulation is also important and there is plenty of air movement in that spot too. So we have been eating squash on and off for the past couple of months.

One thing I have noticed is that flavor can vary from squash to squash of the same variety. Sometimes there can be quite a large difference in quality. You can buy seeds of the same variety from two different seed sellers and even though the squash looks the same, the flavors may be close but not the same. I think that explains some of the difference in opinion people have when discussing which variety they prefer. I’ve noticed this inconsistency in other vegetables too, especially with certain heirloom tomato varieties.

What I like to do is save squash seed from the best tasting squash and discard seeds from those that are bland or off-flavor. That way year after year I gradually improve my squash. Since the seeds are well preserved inside the fruit until it’s ready to cook, seed saving for me is an ongoing thing until the squash run out. You can end up with a lot of squash or pumpkin seeds in a hurry since each one can have dozens or even hundreds of seeds as anyone who carved a pumpkin knows.

The way I go about it is that I never toss out the seeds until dinner is over and I’ve had a chance to sample my squash. I mentally rate it and if it is better than the last one I had, I keep the seeds and get rid of the ones from the previous meal. By the time I eat my last serving of squash, I’ll have the seeds from the best tasting one from the garden. The rest of the seeds go to the chickens. I know it seems like a lot of fussing around but hey, it’s what I do.

Gourds are filled with seeds and have very little flesh. These are seeds from a single gourd.

This is a relatively simplistic way to select for a single genetic trait. Professional plant breeders select for other things such as disease resistance, high yields, ease of storage and other traits. In the home garden, flavor is a good one to select for.

Bob

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October 19, 2018

Saving an heirloom zinnia

Filed under: Flowers,Seeds — Tags: heirloom flower seeds, saving flower seeds, saving seeds, saving zinnia, saving zinnia seeds, zinnia heirloom, zinnia heirloom variety — bob @ 8:53 am

This gardening season, I adopted another unique heirloom seed to try to save from extinction. Currently, I’m saving four dry bean varieties that are not available commercially plus my own heirloom variety of tomato.

Now I’m adding the first flower to my growing collection of heirlooms, a variety of zinnia. It was given to me by a gardener who I lost contact with. She never said what the variety name was; only that she had been saving them for many years. I believe she is no longer able to garden so it’s now up to me to keep the strain going.

This variety has all pink flowers and is not a mix of colors. It probably started out that way a long time ago.

The blossoms were about 4 inches across.

I like to wait until the flowers are well dried before harvesting the seeds.

The plants eventually grew to nearly four feet tall despite the fact that I sowed the seeds very thickly. I didn’t know what the germination rate would be but as it turned out, just about every seed germinated. I transplanted a lot of them into new rows. I eventually gave up on trying spacing them out since there were so many plants that I ran out of room. The remaining ones grew up to form a dense stand, almost like a hedge.

Seeds are produced at both ray flowers (edge) and disk flowers (center)

Once dried, the seeds easily separate from the petals.

Like other zinnias, they responded well to cutting, the more I cut, the more flowers grew to take their place.

I plan to keep the strain going and eventually give away seeds to other gardeners.

Bob

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