How I Plan My Garden Part 3: When do I start my seeds?

In Part 2 I decided what I wanted to plant, based on my big picture goals.  In Part 1 I took a good look at last year's garden to decide what I want to repeat this year, and what I want to change.  I'm ready to buy seeds.  I know what in planting and how many, but when do I plant?

Good news!  Starting seeds happens progressively through winter and spring, depending on the type of seed, not all at once.

Most seed packets include basic instructions around planting time, and many of these instructions reference your "last frost day" or planting before or after "all danger of frost."  Thankfully, that's an easy to find date.  It's the day in spring when you're likely to have one last frost before temperatures stay above freezing for good. Type your zipcode into a calculator like the one here at Dave's Garden and then take note of the date around the 30% chance, to be safe.  Once that day comes, you'll need to look at your weather forecast to see if it's really the last chance of frost, but for now it's a date to count back from so you'll have plant-able seedlings when the time comes.

I mark this day on a wall calendar, and mark every week before it, going all the way back to midwinter.  This way when I read, "start 6 weeks before last frost" I can easily flip to the week marked six and make note of which seeds need to be started then.

Last year I bought a nifty "perpetual calendar" from Fruition Seeds that gives space for three columns after each date.  Each column is a year, so I can easily move information over from one year to the next.  You can see entries here for two years, last year and this.

I sort through all the seed packs, find the information on when to start, and then write it down on that week.  This way, I only have to figure this stuff out once and then look it up each week, instead of counting on my memory (dangerous) or re-sorting through seed packs every week wondering, "do I need to start any of these today?" which would certainly take a lot of the fun out of this hobby.

Once they're all noted on the calendar, I physically lay the packets out in order of planting week.  Once they're in order, I put them back into storage in order, behind little cards noting the date.  Every week I check the calendar "what do I get to start this week?" and then go into the seed box to pull out a preset collection of seed packs.  I also write planting dates on the calendar, and hardening off dates 2 weeks before each planting date.

So what about seeds whose planting date references something other than last frost?  Like tomatoes, which are to be planted, "once the soil has warmed to 50*F" or "once the nighttime lows are reliably over 50*F."?  Sure, when the time comes I can read a forecast and a soil thermometer with the best of them, but without a time machine I can't then go back 8 weeks and tell myself, "time to start the tomatoe seeds."  This is where it's great to find other local gardeners.  Ask in local online gardening forums and in local garden shops,* "When is it safe here to plant tomatoes, beans, peppers, etc?"  

If you are starting with seedlings, not seeds, it's still good to organize your purchasing and planting around a calendar.  peas and greens can take some frost or even snow, especially if you're directly planting the seeds into your garden, but tomatoes and peppers need to wait until much later.  There's never just one day to put in the full garden if you're growing more than one kind of vegetable.  I find it's well worth it to spend a few hours on a winter holiday break to set up the calendar just once, and then follow the plan from there forward.

A few words about aquiring seeds:  Seeds last for years.  Don't feel you have to use up the whole packet the same year you buy it.  Store what you don't use this year for the future.  The most important thing about seed storage is keeping them dry.  Save silica packets (those little rectangles that say "do not eat") from shoes, vitamins, etc and put them into the same well sealed container as your seeds.  For really long lasting seeds, store the sealed container in the freezer.  How long seeds last depends on the type.  There are lots of handy charts for that, including this one from The Spruce.

If you are purchasing seeds, buy them from a reputable seed company or that local garden shop.  I've heard a lot of stories of people getting screwed buying seeds from amazon or ebay.  Personally, I wouldn't.

There are lots of free seeds in the world!  Starting with that packet you saved from last year.  Save the seeds you grow.  It's a huge topic, and the process can be very different from one plant to another, but tomato, pepper, and dried bean seeds are among the easiest to save and a great place to start.  You may also have a local seed library.  Ask around, do an internet search.  The added benefit of getting seeds that your neighbors have grown out and donated to a seed library is that you know for sure that someone has grown them successfully in your area.  I start the calendar process with the seeds I already own, as that helps me figure out what's missing that I'll need to find or purchase.

One last word about seeds:  you cannot accidentally buy GMO seeds.  Lots of seed companies state that they aren't selling GMO seeds, with wording that implies that maybe somebody else is, but in reality, GMO seeds are proprietary, and you need to pretty much be a farmer, and definitely sign a contract to buy them.  Please don't just take my word for it, after all I'm some lady on the internet you've never actually met.  Instead, here's an article from the garden professors, and one from gardening know how.  There's lots more out there if you're interested in searching for them.

I hope that this short series has helped you get on top of garden planning.  It can be overwhelming to narrow down what you want and where to start, but once you have a routine down it's very easy to adjust and repeat.  I'm especially hoping this is helpful to all the new gardeners of the last few years, and helps you enjoy more and worry less!

*Local garden shops, not the garden section of big box stores.  Why?  Because the employees there have to be ready to work in any department, and just because someone is working in the garden section that day, doesn't mean it's their area of expertise.  My career is in building costumes for theater, dance, and opera.  I'm an excellent tailor and seamstress, and right out of college I worked in a large corporate fabrics and crafts store.  I could have been a great source of advice for anyone who had questions about sewing clothing.  In two years, I maybe got that question once.  Instead, thanks to that guy Murphy, I got asked about glue, and embroidery, and scrapbooking, which I know nothing about.  My co-workers who could have answered the glue question got the clothing question on my day off.  So if you have a question in a big box store about gardening and the employee doesn't know, don't hold it against them.  You're probably talking to someone who is an expert in plumbing or paint.  Better to build a relationship with the employees in a local garden shop, who focus exclusively on gardening, and garden in the same region as you do.

Stuff That Lasts

No, I’m not writing about love, faith, friendship, or any of that great stuff.  I really do mean STUFF that lasts.  Yes, it’s shallow and soul killing to be materialistic, but there’s lots of stuff that’s necessary to life and not materialistic at all, like tools, warm clothing, food, and shelter.  That kind of stuff.

It all started with a new pair of shoes.  Truthfully, it started before that, with a worn out pair of shoes.  I despise malls (a post for another day, I’m sure) so I began looking for a new pair where I always do, online.  The shoes I wear the most, especially for work, are Doc Martens.  I stand for most of my 8-12 hour day, and Docs have been the very best shoe for me to do that in.  Add to that the practicality of being long lasting (5-12 years for most of mine) and the fact that the boots make me look cooler than I am, and it’s a win.  While searching, I read some of the comments. (I know, never read the comments.)  Several said something like, “they’re OK, but not as good as my old Docs that were made in England.”  It could be the rosy glow of nostalgia, could be imagined after seeing that they were made in the third world, or could be true, either because they’re made in the third world, or because the whole product line is being made differently than it once was, regardless of where the factory is.

I decided to investigate.  I went to the Dr Martens site and found some interesting information.  Most of their shoes are made in Thailand.  They have a great statement explaining their take on social responsibility and how they work with their Thai factories.  More interestingly, they carry a line of Made in England footwear.  Each item is a little more expensive, but that would be worth it if the commenters are right about the better quality.  Then I found a glorious thing, a section of the website titled For Life.  Isn’t this what I really want?  I mean, I’ve known for years that Dr. Marten and I have made a lifetime commitment, but up until now it was only common law.  Here was the chance to make it official.  Yes, you can buy a pair of Docs that are guaranteed for life, and will be repaired or replaced for free (plus a handling fee to mail them to England).  But here’s the thing, they’re not made in England, they’re made in Thailand.

So begins the soul searching.  Why do I think I prefer products made in the first world to those made in the third?  I certainly made this choice when I bought a car.  I try to do it other times too.  This isn’t about American labor, which I’m part of, since the options are England or Thailand.  There’s nothing inherently wrong about employing Thais.  I’m sure they’re good people.  They have to be to make, eat, and appreciate such good food.  They need jobs just like the rest of us.  For me it boils down to 3 things.  First world countries generally have the highest safety standards for their workers, I abhor supporting companies that move their manufacturing to the third world in order to save money by no longer complying with those safety standards, and I tend to believe that the quality is better from a first world factory.  But let’s examine that last one.  Here’s a company that has gone out on a limb to guarantee a product for life, including free repair or replacement if/when it fails.  That’s a big promise, and one that could cost them money.  It’s to their advantage to make these their very best made shoes.  In fact, they go into some length about what they’ve done to make these a top quality shoe.

Assuming that Dr. Martens is following their own policy about factory conditions, there’s no inherent virtue in employing the English over employing the Thai, and in the long run, I’m most interested in getting a shoe that will last for more than 10 years before it needs to be replaced.  My first replacement pair will put me ahead of the game financially (i.e. For Life costs more than a standard shoe, but less than twice as much) and more importantly, the longer my shoes last, the fewer of them I’ll have to send to the landfill over the course of my life.  For me this is the best part of a lifetime guarantee.

I became environmentally aware? conscious? nut job? somewhere in the range of 10-12 years old.  It was the mid-eighties and the biggest environmental issues were energy use, land use, and landfill space.  I was really engaged by the last two.  Our planet is only so big, and frankly has too many humans using and disposing of too much stuff.  Land use issues are the main motivation for my vegetarianism, recycling, composting, and a part of why I have chosen not to breed.  It’s also why I’ve replaced many of the disposable items in my life (paper towels, tissues, cotton balls, “feminine products”) with washable, re-usable items.  At the age of 12 I would have happily informed you that disposable diapers take up the most landfill space, with “feminine products” in second place.  Now everyone is on about carbon footprints, but that’s only part of the issue.  Someone did a study claiming that disposable diapers and cloth diapers had the same carbon foot print, so it was ok to use disposable.  I’m sorry; did we suddenly double the size of the planet?  Where do they think we have room for another big pile of disposable diapers?

As you can see, I’m passionate about making as little garbage as I can, so I went with the lifetime guarantee.  And I can tell you, I’m not sorry.  In addition to being made of long lasting materials, and built to be repaired (many cheap shoes are not) they come with Dr. Martens Wonder Balsam and an extra set of laces.  Both pairs of laces have metal aglets!  I’ve never seen shoe laces with metal aglets before!  Talk about built to last.

After reading the little booklet about taking care of my new purchase, I got excited and cleaned and polished all of my Docs. 

 

Aren’t they pretty?

The Wonder Balsam is aptly named.  I can’t believe the difference it made for my shoes.  They all look like new again, even the sandals and the short black boots, which are both about 10 years old now.

As much as possible, I try to choose the longest lasting option when buying stuff.  I’m willing to pay more if it means I’m buying the thing once instead of once every few years.  So I own a Rainbow vacuum cleaner that I expect to outlive me, and a Mini Cooper I hope to drive for 20 years…you get the picture.  And I’ve been taking care of the stuff I already own—making it last, just like the shoes.  I’ve been fixing stuff around the house that got mysteriously chewed.  I “re-soled” my felted slippers.  I’ve made arrangements to have my vintage mechanical watch fixed.  Oh, and speaking of lifetime repair or replacement guarantees, I may have just bought rather a lot of Tupperware.

A Community's responsibility to Its Pets

The Buffalo News has printed the article I submitted to it's "My View" column. We're now up to 2 large animal shelters in the area who are in trouble for their practices. Since I've been volunteering at a really great shelter for the last 3 years, I wanted to use what I've observed there to shift the conversation back to the community's responsibility for it's unwanted pets. I see so many animals surrendered for the most specious reasons.

The article can be found here.

And thanks so much to everyone who has been posting it on facebook, too.

Magic Hat has won me for life!

As you may have noticed, I like beer. I like beer so much that later today I plan to bottle 5 gallons of it. Next weekend I will brew 5 more gallons, which should be ready to drink just in time for Christmas. For the last few years now, I have been using my bonus day off to celebrate "beer Friday" while the rest of America makes me ashamed with their behavior on "black Friday." But I digress.

Even though most of the time the amount of home brew I have on hand can be measured in gallons, I do still buy the occasional beer. I definitely have favorite breweries, and seasonal beers that I look forward to each year. Every year I buy at least 4 12-packs of Magic Hat, each of their 4 seasonal mixes, in order to try all of their "Odd Notion" series. I really like their brewing style, and they use the Odd Notion series to showcase some pretty interesting brews that they've been playing around with. They take risks with this series. Last winter's notion was a pleasingly sour Belgian ale, and if memory serves they've also done a barley ale, some interesting wheats, and various beers with unexpected ingredients. This is a company that regularly brews their summer ale with beet juice, so you know you're in for an interesting and bold treat when they share their experiments! Best of all, after I've tried each new Notion, I can go to the website to find out what it is, give my feedback, and read through the other feedback.

As you can see I look forward to these, so imagine my sadness when I tried the Fall Odd Notion and it was BAD. I don't mean, "not to my taste," or they used an ill-advised ingredient. I mean it had gone off. Now in the long run, this was super instructional, because as a brewer I've read through the various descriptions of what can go wrong with a batch of beer and what each problem tastes like, but it's difficult to truly describe a flavor in words. Now I know one of them!

I contacted Magic Hat because, given their quirky emails (yes, I'm on the mailing list), their willingness to share their experiments, and their desire for customer feed back, I figured they would genuinely like to know that something had gone wrong with a batch.

They responded right away, shared with me what had gone wrong (again, great information for my own brewing) and then offered to comfort me with swag.

Within a week or two, I got a lovely package of cool beer stuff. Behold:

Not only am I comforted, but I will be their customer for life!

Most of the time, when a company has truly done me wrong with piss-poor service or shoddy merchandise, I can't even get a decent apology, much less a replacement and a coupon or two for my trouble. I've almost given up complaining. Almost.

With Magic Hat I hadn't even complained. I really was just informing them that something had gotten past them, because if it was one of my brews, I'd want to know, especially if my later batches would also be at risk. Even so, they immediately explained and offered what they called a "care package." How great is that?

So hooray for small businesses, and people who are able to do a job they love, who hang onto their passion for it, and truly give a damn about the people who ultimately use and enjoy their product!

So if you like beer, go pick up some Magic Hat and think of me. The winter Odd Notion is great! I'll be raising a #9 every year on my birthday, 09-09.

Thanks Magic Hat!

Messing Up At Work

I am so glad that when I make a mistake at work it does not make the news. Here in Buffalo we’ve had 2 recent, very prominent work mistakes.

The first mistake was in one of the first Buffalo Bills football games of the season. I won’t even try to explain in detail, as my attempt to describe football plays is equivalent to the folks who see me spinning on my wheel at events and say to their children, “Look what she’s weaving,” or the people who explain the Devil’s Hole with, “gravity sticks you to the wall.” Instead, I will just say that it was the end of the game, the Bills were in the lead, and this player made a choice that allowed the opposing team to win. Most of the people I’ve heard talking about it believe that the choice he made was not what he was coached to do. Two local teenagers decided to express their dissatisfaction with his final play by vandalizing his lawn with a word that cannot be said on the radio.

This week, a prisoner briefly escaped from the holding center. Apparently he got out through a roof access hatch that was supposed to be locked. The guard who was responsible for locking it and checking it has been suspended.

Both incidents made the news for multiple days.

It seems to me that the football screw up was pretty minor—an error in judgement at the worst possible point in the game. No one was hurt, and he has been kind enough not to press charges against the lawn vandals. The jail screw up had huge repercussions, including a (thankfully) successful manhunt for an escaped prisoner who was deemed dangerous. Of course this one was a serious mistake, but honestly, I can’t count how many times I’ve left the iron on when leaving a costume shop at night, and I know I forgot to lock the door at least once. I wouldn’t even think of those things when trying to list ways that I’ve screwed up at my job. Thank goodness I’m not a prison guard.

My biggest mistakes in my job, as far as I can remember:

1. I accidentally shattered all the buttons down the front of a jacket with a hammer. Really, this was an accident, I was using a hammer and die on another kind of closure behind the buttons and didn’t notice until each and every one was in pieces.

2. I scraped an opera singer’s leg with a safety pin, drawing some blood. She was really gracious about it.

3. I cut the short wide man’s vest out of the fabric meant for the tall thin man’s vest. This one really sucked, because they were both intricately patterned fabrics, and not only had I taken the time to match the center fronts, facings, and pocket flaps when I cut the wrong one, but I had to figure out how to do it again with the scraps to cut the correct vest. I managed to fix it without having to declare what I had done wrong, or ask for more of the expensive fabric, but when I admitted to this months later, my co-workers told me that I had acted really squirrelly that day but they couldn’t figure out why.

4. I made my stitcher Larisa spend a full day beautifully pin-tucking the yoke of a Victorian nightgown, only to be reminded in the fitting by the designer that it was supposed to be made out of a piece of ready made lace fabric, no pin-tucking required.

5. In my very first costume shop internship, after declaring my great math skills, I miscalculated the length of fabric I needed to pleat and had to go back to the first hand and tell her it was too short. I thought it was the end of the world; she told me to figure out how much more was needed and make sure the seam was hidden behind a pleat.

6. I can’t even count how many times I have accidentally snipped a hole in a garment or myself.

7. My hands are covered in tiny scares, either from the aforementioned snips or from iron burns.

8. Neither can I count how many times I have bled on a costume.

9. In my first job, as a wardrobe mistress, I almost never got all the girls completely closed into their dresses during their quick change. In my defense, I was 17 and completely untrained. However, I am still complete crap at wardrobe.

10. Also in that first job, I put a rosary through the wash. If I was Catholic this would be a much bigger worry for me.

11. I flooded my shop and the downstairs hallway of the building it is in 3 times, thanks to a faulty washing machine. The first time was after 7pm on a Friday, and I had to call the after hours maintenance guys to come clean up after my mistake. It’s super embarrassing for your students to see you shop-vac-ing up a giant puddle you created. It’s also a lot harder to remain scary and intimidating to them after that.

12. I altered a suit coat in a crappy manner, and made it too tight.

13. I distracted and interrupted Wendy Wasserstein during the dress rehearsal of the first and only opera for which she wrote the libretto. When she turned towards me, and I realized my mistake, I blurted out "I'm sorry, I thought you were someone else," and scampered off into the dark again.

None of these made the news. None of them caused a death or an emergency, and only one resulted in injury. Many of them have led to really great learning experiences. I don’t think anyone I’ve worked with would disagree that I’m really good at reweaving holes in fabric. Most were made by moths or cigarettes, but a few were made by me.

I’m thankful every day that my mistakes at work are private, and most can be fixed with a seam ripper, new buttons, or a needle and thread. I can’t imagine what it’s like for surgeons, whose mistakes could end in a loss of life.

I’m also glad that my work mistakes aren’t open to the criticism of every arm chair quarterback in Buffalo. The last thing I need is a bunch of guys who can’t thread a needle discussion at length how I should have chosen a double dart instead of a single, or how the sleeve isn’t hung quite right.

Sometimes I find human beings incredibly disappointing

Before I begin today's rant, please read this press release: SPCA Rescues 100+ Animals From Buffalo Apartment. Go ahead and read the whole thing, take some time looking at the pictures. I'll wait right here until you're ready.

Read it? OK good. Here goes: I adopted my rabbits from that SPCA. As far as I can tell, they were part of this rescue in July. Make sure that you look at the pictures. After adopting, I began volunteering at the SPCA to do as much as I could for the rabbits waiting for adoption and for the families who might wish to adopt them. There is space at that particular location for about 8 rabbits, and although a few get adopted each week, and most wait only a month or less to be adopted, there is never an empty cage. As soon as rabbits get adopted out there are more to take their place. Many of the rabbits that come in in such big groups are fostered in volunteer's homes until there is room for them at one of the shelters. There is no lack of really nice bunnies who need good homes.

Neither of the cases I've linked to seem to be issues of active abuse, they both seem to be cases of extreme neglect. How on earth could anyone live with animals every day who were this sick because they weren't being fed, because they were packed in too close and fought each other tooth and nail, and/or because they needed vet treatment they weren't getting? How can a human being allow animals to suffer like this, right in front of them? I have seen rescued rabbits with their ears chewed off because they were stuffed into a cage with lots of other rabbits, none of them neutered, and little or no food. At that point, it's a fight to the death. In some of the cases I've read about nationally, rescuers came on the scene to discover a number of dead animals in amongst the living, or they rescued animals who were so sick and so close to death it was deemed most humane to euthanize them as soon as they were rescued.

Again, what human being can do this? What part of them is so fundamentally broken that they can blind themselve to thier animals' suffering? The couple being charged in the first story I linked to have been quoted in the news as saying that they hadn't done anything wrong. Did you look at the pictures?! WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH THESE ASSHOLES?!?!?!?!?!?! I'm sorry Mom, but I can't express my feelings on this without the cursing. And now these poor animals have a long road to recovery as they get medical treatment and wait to be given the chance to be adopted into new homes. I'm still spending time each Thursday night with rabbits who came in as part of that rescue in July. I'm also seeing rabbits who were born in the shelter because their pregnant mothers were rescued in July. And now we have more rescued bunnies who did nothing to deserve their crappy circumstances.

I love volunteering for the SPCA. I have a great time playing with the rabbits every week, getting to know their personalities, and getting them to open up to human contact. My visits with them are also intended to help them combat the stress of being in the shelter, which is not the easiest situation for a rabbit. I've only been able to get one rabbit adopted out since I started, but I could tell that he went to a great home. The mother and son who adopted him came back to buy him more food and hay and said "hi" to me, and told me what a good time they were having with him. I'm so glad I could be a little part in making an improvement, but it feels overwhelming when I compare getting one bunny adopted over the course of 3 months with an influx of dozens of miserable abused rabbits who all need decent homes.

I will not give up. I really enjoy the rabbits at the shelter, and it's amazing how sweet a rabbit can be, even after horrendous treatment. So I will continue to volunteer. Although I got Rusty, the best bunny in the world, from a breeder, I can't imagine ever getting a rabbit from a breeder again so long as there are so many rabbits in the shelter who need homes, and so many more waiting to take their places. I will continue to donate to both the National House Rabbit Society and the New York State House Rabbit society. I will continue to buy my rabbits' food and supplies from the Eerie County SPCA, to donate my time, and to donate money whenever I can. I will continue to introduce friends and family to our rabbits, and to work toward educating responsible pet owners about the joys of rabbit ownership. Rusty was so awesome that our vet used to introduce him to anyone who came in and thought that they didn't like rabbits, or weren't interested in them. She called him "The Bunny Ambassador" and would let them offer him a treat so that he would run right up to them and let them pet him. He just loved it at the vet's, which was great considering how much he was there!

If you're looking for a pet, please check your local shelter, there are lots of wonderful animals looking for homes. If you're looking for a rabbit, check your shelter and your local chapter of the House Rabbit Society, and if you have the means, please make a donation to any of the organizations I've linked to, and buy a rabbit a little time.