March is a great time to start your vegetable and flower seeds indoors. You can use any container. Here is how I am doing mine.
I took the plastic lids off my storage boxes and filled it with seed starting soil. I moistened the soil and laid the seeds on top of the soil. I am getting a bumper crop. Keep them moist and in the sun. On warm days, they go on the porch. Tomatoes grow quickly. In May, they all go outside.
I am a do it myself person and made this method up. It works.
By bali from Summerhill, PA
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I was sitting here reading some of my gardening notes from 2015. I made a lot of mistakes last year. Hopefully, the notes will help make this year's gardening more fruitful and with less work. One thing I like to try is planting seed from hybrid fruit and veggies.
After my garden is tilled, quite a few rocks get dug up. If they are about the size of a fist, I put one at each end of each row of seeds planted or in the middle of a hill of squash to mark the spot.
When I cut the root end off of scallions, I plant them in a pot on my porch and within a week or two, the tops have grown enough to use them. I do the same with any root vegetable and soon I have a free, healthy alternative to buying greens for salad, etc.
I do this each and every year for my tomatoes and peppers. When I am cutting/slicing my tomatoes and bell peppers, hot peppers, banana peppers, I slice them on a paper towel.
When you shop greenhouses in the spring, you may have noticed that some types of vegetables are rarely available as transplants; e.g. beets, peas, and carrots. That is because these types of vegetables grow best when sown directly into garden soil.
When planting your seed rows, plant a few onions on each end of the row so you can tell where the rows of slow germinating seeds are. By the time the onions are ready to pull, the seeds will have sprouted.
Grow vegetable seeds in smaller pots or a small garden plot. The seeds will grow better than being just scattered around a big plot. When you throw seeds in a wide space, there is little chance that you see the tiny plant growing.
I use my flower pots from last year that already have soil in them. When I transplant, I then use the pot for my summer flowers. Works great!
Here are the questions asked by community members. Read on to see the answers provided by the ThriftyFun community.
I am a beginning gardener and I would like to grow veggies with my kids. I was wondering what seeds are easiest. Also, can I use seeds I already have in the house like a peach seed or apple seeds? Can I plant seeds I cut from cucumbers? Do I need to dry out the seeds first? I'm just curious what will grow and what won't?
Hardiness Zone: 9a
By michelle from Phoenix, AZ
Tomatos seeds are great, right from the tomato and into a hole in the ground.
You can cut up a potato that has started to root and plant that. It will grow into beautiful green leaves and after the season there will be baby potatoes under them.
Also, a great thing to do is to buy a bag of pinto beans and plant them all out in the garden. They grow bushels and bushels of green beans and you can eat them off the vine, they are so good.
I am sure that sweet potatoes are the same, they have such beautiful vines, they are related to the morning glory vine. Sweet potatoes are great detoxifiers for the body.
I dont have much luck with carrots for some reason.
Most seasons, I save seeds from when I eat tomatoes and throw them out in the garden. Whichever ones come up, when I see them and they are about two or three inces high I transplant them where I want them to be. I throw seeds of tomaotos to test the soil to...if they come up the soil is good, if they dont, it needs a little organic matter dug into it. I don't really mess with all that very much. I am partial tot he green beans from pinto beans and the tomatoes!
Blessings,
Robyn
Michelle, here in the low desert, you can grow something during every season. I have snow peas bearing right now and lots of lettuce. I have some snow peas where I planted them last year, came up from some dropped. More and more people are growing their own food.
I have a gardening group on Yahoo, PhoenixGardenersExchange. If you would like to join, we have Master Gardeners in the group who are always willing to answer questions. Pat
Michelle, I love to try interesting things and I have planted and grown an unusual plant from a Mango seed. Yep, ate the Mango, cleaned the seed up a bit and stuck in a pot of potting soil. Took about a month and lo and behold up came a sprout. After it's developed its second set of leaves, pinch the entire top off (sorry, I hate to do that too) and soon it will begin to make more leaves and branch into a tree.
You know what great for kids and grows so easy is beans. Kids love to watch them grow and they sprout within a few days. You can even put them in a papertowel with a few seeds and wet the papertowel and stick in into a plastic baggie so the kids can see it happening. After they sprout you can take the papertowel and put them in a pot and watch them produce!
Apple seeds, grapefruit, lemon, & lime (& avocado) have all grown for me. Just take the seeds - put between 2 layers of paper towel (moist) & put in a zip loc baggie. Wait for the sprouting (you'll see it!) then plant. Avocados of course you suspend over water with toothpicks. I'm a zone 6 so can't help much more than that. As missbes99 mentions, beans are a great thing to do. marg s.
Thanks everyone for the input keep the advice coming! We did plant a peach pit in the back yard and some apple seeds I guess I'm still in denial it will work. Time will tell.
I am curious why many people are suggesting to put in a wet paper towel and let spout first is that a better plan or can I just plant outside? We have had a lot of wet weather recently and it is perfect planting time!
Hybrid seeds don't do well. One time, I planted a canteloupe seed from a store bought, and wound up with a little tiny melon. The tiny melon was cute, but nothing more.
We have been growing heirloom tomatoes, and they keep coming back year after year. Bugs get to some of the tomatoes, so I just leave them on the garden ground, and the next year we have more tomato plants. Last season, I guestimated we had 200 to 300 heirloom tomato plants, and not enough room for them all to grow.
Radishes grow in about a month here, but children might not like their taste. I'm zone 5a.
I am a beginner vegetable gardener. Which seeds grow the fastest? Thanks!
By Trudy from in the woods, PA
urbanext.illinois.edu/
Radishes harvest very fast. Many are ready to harvest in less than a month. There are many, many different kinds of radishes, too. Some are all white, some are red in the middle and green on the outside, very pretty. There are even black radishes. They have different flavors. And you can eat the greens. Radish leaves taste pretty much like the radish, and are really good in a salad.
Leaf lettuces grow quickly, and there are hundreds of varieties. You can harvest a beautiful salad in a few weeks.
urbanext.illinois.edu/
Growing your own veggies is very fulfilling, and not as hard as you might think. I hope you are very successful, and that you really enjoy yourself. Good luck!
I agree, radishes and lettuce are great choices. You can plant fast-growing crops every couple of weeks to give you a steady supply during the season. If you choose loose leaf or "cut and come again" varieties of lettuce you can snip off leaves as you want them, leaving the plant to grow more. Another option would be early peas, baby carrots, or some varieties of beetroot. Read the description to see if the variety is suitable to harvest early; packets should tell you the length of time till maturity as well. Potatoes actually grow really well in containers, so you could even try new potatoes!
For vegetables that take longer to start from seed, like tomatoes, you can buy them as plants in your local garden center. Have fun!
Once again this year I purchased my vegetable seed packets to start inside. Other years I started them with special starting soil, placed them in a sunny window and kept them watered. I always end up with spindly plants with weak stems. How do I get stronger plants?
Hardiness Zone: 6a
By MaggieGrace from PA
Is there a chance you're falling victim to "damping off"? It's where otherwise healthy seedlings suddenly become weak and die. It's caused by a fungus that attacks the plants. I've had this happen myself.
Over-damp soil and lack of airflow can lead to the problem. Try not to water the foliage when watering, and keep covers ventilated if you're using them. Making sure your seedlings are properly thinned out can help too. There are home-made sprays that use chamomile tea or hydrogen peroxide to help prevent the fungus, if you wanted to search for them. I've read a sprinking of cinnamon powder on the soil can work too. Good luck with your gardening!
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