seeds sprout + tools

The seedlings came up fast and furious w/in a 2 day period starting Sunday 4/19, except for the peppers. Previously, the peppers took about 2 weeks longer than the tomatoes to sprout. I'm interested to see if the soil temperature will change this.

Also I invested in new gadget that measures pH, light, and moisture levels. This is a HOLD ALL two pronged...thingy that I have no other device to compare it to. Current readings are below:

Moisture: 4 ( 0 = dry, 10 = wet)
Light: 600 ( 0-2000, dark-light)
pH: 7 slightly alkaline

Pudding proof

So the proof is in the pudding or the pictures. These pictures show how well the plants have grown the past couple of weeks in their new containers with the soil amendment (alfalfa meal). The one in the center is a beafy fella. I think his percentage of alfalfa was higher than some of the others.

In response to this wonderful growth I decided to start a new batch of seedlings -- because I can. These guys are starting off in the same soil with better lights, and amendment, in an effort to test the delayed lighting I had in the beginning, one watering error, and the amended soil. A second batch has been started in a small plastic container -- a lettuce container -- with only one set of peat pots and no amendment. This batch will be raised with the same loving care but should test the effectiveness of alfalfa meal on seedlings. I believe there is a time to release/decomposition of alfalfa meal in the soil and I need to look this up. All other conditions will remain the same while testing out these variables.

Plants be gone

So I handed off my tomato seedlings last week after repotting them the week prior. I kept a couple to myself and found that the repotting worked fabulously with a little something called alfalfa meal. I used the same crummy soil that was used to grow the seedlings in the peat pots but added about 1 Quart of alfalfa to a 5 gallon mix of soil, while this was probably too much it did the job. The seedlings I kept seem to have responded very well in the last week. Oh I would be skeptical too if I hadn't also tested 2 transplants with the non-alfalfa soil. These malnurished seedlings are still small and weak looking like a little girlie man, to quote our govenator. So using Arnold and my seedlings as proof I can only concluded that suppliments work....natural ones of course.

Succulents

Succulents have grown on me over the past couple of years. I never really got into them until I moved to this house which had some well established aloe vera plants that bloomed. Sue my gardening friend had never seen aloe vera bloom, hence the pictures. So Sue if you see this picture you can see the bloom and that the donkey tail you gave me is not doing so well -- this is partially due to two curious midgets that love to pick at things. Only time will tell if this plant will survive. I have a feeling the only way to give this plant a fighting chance is to teach the kids not to pick at Daddies plants -- or else! :-)