Welcome Spring

The grow light experiment worked! Hubbard and zucchini squash on the far left are the winners, and will need larger pots soon. The tomatoes on the right have plenty of room to grow for planting this June. Petunia is growing in the rear at a slower rate. Only half of the seeds sprouted. Someone has told me petunia is difficult to grow, so maybe half is good? On the lower rack, there are various herbs, lettuce and spinach growing.

I am surprised at how much water the seedlings have required - daily misting and watering every other day without fail. The heat from the fluorescent lamp is low, but enough to dry out the soil apparently.  Spring is here, but it is far too cold for planting on the Palouse in eastern Washington. We are still in the low 40-50°F degree range during the day and 20-30°F degree range at night. To our south in Lewiston (ID) and Clarkston (WA), spring often comes a month early. Temperatures can be as much as 10 degrees warmer. Vince and I decided to drive there over the weekend to do some shopping.

It takes about 45 minutes to reach the Lewiston grade. It's quite a drop in elevation as you can see below. In the 1970s when my husband and I first moved to the area, we took this windy road described on the sign (it was the only way!). We now drive down a slick four-lane highway at sixty miles an hour. Truckers are more cautious, however, and sand-filled escape lanes are provided in several locations - and for good reason. We have heard stories over the years of trucks losing their brakes and sailing over the cliff on that first road.

View from the top. It is still very much winter here, as you can see. These hills will turn velvety green soon, but not for long. They will be brown over most of the hot summer. Lewiston is below to the right. By the way, Lewiston is named after Lewis Meriwether of the Lewis and Clark expedition. Clarkston to the right of this view is named after William Clark.

We stopped in Lewiston along the Clearwater River to view the old 18th Street Bridge. There we saw a touch of green in the grass, and hills in the distance, but trees elsewhere are still in the bud stage.
 

Some history on the bridge follows . . .

Coming home, those gray clouds turned into 
a raging snow blizzard. 

Ah . . . spring, don't you just love it!

Gardening Challenge: Make the Seeds Grow

 
This may seem like an easy task, 
but hear me out . . .

My goal is to plant vegetables and flowers from seed, to fill my garden and occasionally give as gifts to my neighbors and friends. Last

year's effort produced a set of spindly shoots that mostly died in the ground. These were seeds planted in peat pots, placed in plastic trays with lids and located in a sunny window facing southwest.

It is important to know that I live in wheat-growing country, in the Palouse on the Washington/Idaho border. Tomatoes seldom can go in the ground before June here. And . . . I generally keep my house at 71 degrees during the day, which is not ideal greenhouse temperature.

I asked a garden expert, a friend at church who has been growing plots of vegetables in the country for years. "Start your seeds early indoors at the end of February," she advised. She also pointed out she has been doing this for twenty years . . . and uses three fluorescent grow lights.

Aha! The secret, I thought to myself. And here's the key, she added. "Don't place them in a window at first. The seedlings will get too leggy."

Well . . . of course :)

So I did some grow light research online and learned about red and blue light spectrum . . . and frankly, more than I cared to learn. But in a nutshell, here's what I now know: red light is needed to produce fruit and flowers and blue light is needed for germination. HID and LED grow lights are full spectrum lights (red and blue) and manufacturers make some extraordinary claims for being the better way to go.

However, here is what I didn't like about HID and LED lighting. HID and its variants (there are several) put out a lot of heat and require a fan (conclusion: not energy efficient). For someone with an indoor green house, the heat may actually be a good thing. LED lights are still being tested by NASA for growing plants in outer space, which is pretty cool, but they appear to be in the experimental stage and also are very expensive.

The winner was my friend's suggestion: fluorescent grow lights. I was pleased to discover both full spectrum and energy efficient fluorescent lights are available. Just buy T-5 fluorescent bulbs (or larger) and you will have bright, full-spectrum lighting at a savings in electricity. I purchased two grow light kits at a local store, $45 each on sale. Not bad, considering the same kit was $69 online. 

The next challenge was where to place the grow light assembly. We had a portable clothes hanger on rollers we no longer used that my husband converted to a plant stand. He added shelving, and a timer we already had (set to 12 hours of light). I love it!

 

Total cost: $110 plus seeds, soil and tax. Stay tuned for more gardening challenges. I'll let you know how the seeds turn out . . .

Copyright 2013 © Sharon Himsl