Gardens in 2017

Already ordered my seeds. It will be trials here, starting from scratch in a new location. Very excited! Now just hoping that I'll have time to tend to the garden as much as I want, work has been busier than I intended.

My goal is to learn more and more while experimenting. I'm also looking forward to trying different crops such as "watermelon radishes!"

Very nice, look forward to hearing how it goes.. new land is a lot of fun.. and I know you have a good set up as well.

My just for giggles this year is growing my own upland (dryland) Russian rice that will if it works allow me to grow my own on the farm..

Otherwise, its a put it up year.. less for fun.. more for canning and cellar, less trail, more proven but of course still working on my landrace projects, my heritage seed projects and my pushing the zone plantings.. as well as expanding a number of my soft fruiting garden

We started our 'new' garden last year with two 4x10' boxes and a few squash hills. I'm hoping to add at least one more box this year, and make more and larger hills. I'm also planning a 10x10 corn patch, and to finally start my own seeds instead of going to the garden centre. I had to resist the urge to buy every seed I saw and limit myself to what I'm actually going to use and can! I'll be trying some little pickling cucumbers for the first time, tomatoes, squash, carrots, beans, cabbage, beets, onions, sunflower, and lettuce.

My True Potato Seed arrived in the mail, I have been trying to get my regular potato's to produce seed for the past couple years but I have not had any luck, these seeds come from a mix of colors and potato types but they are also proven to produce seed.. so I ordered in 200 of a mixed seed, there is to be a mix of white, yellow, pink, red and purple in these seeds.

I plan on starting 50 seeds this year as a learning curve, holding back the others which in good storage should give me a base start for the next three years.. I hope that these plants will produce seed as well that can be mixed to work to create a landrace of actively seed producing potato tailored to my land and zone..

Anyone else got True Seed Potato seed in their seed box's this year, anyone else working on this project?

Haven't ordered any seeds yet, but will probably be ordering my potatoes soon. Also have potato sprouting from last year, so will use those too. Have to go through all the seed I have stored and will be probably using those seeds this year. Probably not going to try anything new unless it might be a different type of tomato, but haven't quite decided yet.

Not working on true potato seed this year. The potato plants last year had some, tried to save some, but it didn't work out.

My brain is just getting into gear. I'll start my Brandywine tomatoes at the end of next month. I've already got butternut squash seeds from last year's crop (I grow A LOT of squash). Probably nothing new this year.

I have a Tromboncino squash that has made two plus years in storage now, and I am debating if I want to try and hold it for three years to see if it can be done or If I want to process it in the next while, split the seeds and grow half of them out this year and get those amazing storage genes into the next generation..

You have to like a squash that can hold for two years..

I've finally settled on what I'll be growing this year, and started gathering Lowe's gift cards so that when the stores start putting out the big bags of soil, I can buy big bags of Miracle Grow soil. The gift cards are being purchased now so that I can redirect funds into preps in the spring. I'll be growing tomatoes this year with the emphasis on canning them. Also putting in kale again since last year it grew so well, carrots, spinach, lettuce again, celery, collards, zucchini, peas, sunflowers, marigolds for pest control, peppers, dill, parsley and basil.

I'm going to try the vertical/small space gardening in my backyard this year.

Well, its that time of the year now.. can you believe its going to be Feb in a few days

So who is starting onion seeds or very hot pepper plants in the next two weeks?

Who is going to be spending the next few weeks prepping and getting their winter sowing projects out and on the move?

What are you winter sowings this year?

Have plans to get some seeds started this week. At least the peppers. Usually just pick up onion sets when its time for planting.

Got my seeds in the mail a few days ago, but won't be starting anything until the end of the month. Although I did bring the bag of soil indoors, since I left it out and it's a frozen brick.

Any recommendations as to when I should start my seeds indoor? I have looked at a few websites, but I'm confused since some of my crops (tomato, pepper, cucumber) will go into the greenhouse. Other crops (cauliflower, broccoli and some other cucumbers) will go in the garden. I'm in the Edmonton area. Some sites offer recommendations, but differences are not made whether the crop will be grown in a greenhouse or in a garden.

Any suggestions?

Unfortunately, I did not grow all my greens in the greenhouse for my winter garden. I was simply too busy and had a lot of unlucky family incidents that occurred in 2016. I'm glad to see a new year and hope this year has some more positive things on the home front! I'm excited about the new possibilities for our 2017 garden. We have improved the garden by adding double the space and boxes. Last years garden was awesome mid summer but the group was hit hard by hail. I have decided to change up my potatoes as I found last years experiment was not as good as 2014/2015. These last potatoes produced about 20% less and did not store as well as ones produced in prior years. Our group decided for 2016 that we would order four types of potatoes we had not tried before and we all grew them with different techniques. All of us were only so-so about the results. As far as the rest of the garden-I'm going to trying a variety of squash to see which will do best in this area. The rest of my boxes will contain my usual. All my other seeds are on order and should be here within a week. I order all my seeds from Salt Springs Seeds and have for years! Eagerly waiting for April!!!