“just a dude. growing food”. That’s the tagline plastered atop the home page of this blog. If this were another plot renovation update, I’d more or less be forced to update my tagline to “just a dude. building wood containers.” which A) isn’t a hobby that inspires the imagination and B) doesn’t rhyme. Luckily this post is getting back to what we came here for, and that’s … growing food!
We’re getting oh-so-close to transplanting the original starts that started it all; the onions and shallots. Let’s get a quick look.
The stalks are thickening up nicely. Seeing as these are my first ever starts that I’ve attempted, I’m very happy with how they’ve turned out. Everything from the seed starting mix I made from scratch, to the grow lights, watering and ‘haircuts’, I couldn’t have asked for much more in this stage of their development. Also, the base of the onion stalks are now developed enough to indicate their varieties.
From my research, I’ve gathered multiple last frost dates from various sources and averaged them together for our location. The average of these dates for less than 50% chance of a late frost is April 12th. So, if all goes according to plan, and the 10 day forecast on April 12th doesn’t indicate any forthcoming frost, then the plan is to harden off these starts (along with the shallots) and get them out into the wild within 2 weeks. This will open up some beloved grow light real estate for my seedlings in earlier stages of development, which we’ll check out now!
In the left corner….introducing the pleasantly palatable purple people feeder; 💪🏼 Amarant Cabbage 💪🏼. This variety seems to do well under the stress of summer heat and produces tight, compact heads. It’s an open pollinated variety maintained by a seed intiative in Germany called Kultursaat e.V. (‘culture seeds’). It matures in 75-90 days.
In the right corner… introducing the gregarious, gallant greeeeen machiiiine; 💪🏼 Primax Cabbage 💪🏼. Another summer cabbage, this one matures in only 60 days and reaches 2-4 lbs in maturity on average. The heads are pale green. Apparently this variety has become harder to find recently due to the seed industry’s transition towards hybrids.
I’m only going to attempt 2 heads this spring to not go overboard and ration my valuable bed space, but if they perform really well then I will probably plant more as a fall crop.
I plan to plant these cabbages alongside my potatoes since they have a shallower root system that won’t compete, and they’re from different families to avoid attracting similar pests.
Next up, we have the main event and the title of this post. I want you to say this three times fast. You ready? Charentais Superprécoce Du Roc ….. melons! a.k.a a French cantaloupe.
I’m super excited for this guy. The final products are small softball-sized striped melons that are known for having “honeyed, floral and fruity flavor” and are grown mainly in France. I picked this variety because melons traditionally have a slow growing season that pushes growers towards a late-season harvest, but this variety is quick to ripen in just 70-80 days. Below is a picture of what they will look like if they actually produce.
“Charentais” is the main name of the variety and “Superprécoce Du Roc” translates to “Super-early From The Rock”. I’m not sure what ‘from the rock’ means, but if you haven’t noticed the theme of these new cabbage and cantaloupe seedlings, it’s that they’re all early varieties. Or dare I say SUPER early varieties.
As a new gardener my belief is to fail fast, which is a belief I hold in my work as well. Therefore, I spent a decent amount of time search for these kinds of early varieties so that if they don’t produce then I will know sooner and can replace them in my beds with something else, salvaging a good remainder of the growing season. If they DO produce, then I get that much sweet goodness that much sooner. I’m not skilled enough to risk a lot of bed space for late varieties that can take 4-5 months to mature quite yet.
As with my other posts, I’ll leave you with a lil teaser. April means the season is starting to heat up, which means more seeds are being planted and things are getting hectic. Below is a quick pic of the next wave 👀
We’ve got code names L, M, AH, AG and AR. A little hint to send you off with…
Arrivederci !
AA
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