The misconception: I always thought that gardening is really easy. It seemed like in Minnesota while I was growing up we would just plant things and they would grow. It didn't seem like we watered much if at all unless there was a drought. And in the fall we were bombarded by produce. My parents grew hundreds of experimental blueberry plants (from the University of Minnesota) that started out so small they could fit into a paper towel. They also grew hundreds of beautiful evergreens from bareroot. It felt like the bigger challenge was keeping things from growing. We were always weeding the gardens and our blueberry farm and mowing the lawn . . . always. Now, I realize my mom's degree in horticulture, her training and network as a master gardener, and her extensive experience from seedlings to soil types and from pruning to pickling played a hand in gardening ease . . . this, coupled with my dad's hard work and intuition. I'm sure too they were experimenting and doing a lot of the work while I was sleeping in until 9 or 10 in the morning.The background: Last year was my first summer gardening on my own, gardening in Alaska, and gardening in raised bed style. I was pretty successful. So, this spring I tried something new and started seeds in the house. My neighbor is a seasoned gardener. In her small lot, she has 5 giant raised beds and 2 greenhouses and she's only lived here 2 summers. Her tomato and pepper plants are jaw droppers. She told me that to start seeds in the house, I would need a light. She starts her seeds in January so she can start harvesting in June, so I didn't trust this completely. We have a lot of sunlight starting in late February and our living room has extremely large windows. I read on the internet that the low e coating on our windows would not take out any visible light needed for photosynthesis, just ultra-violet and heat. A friend in Minnesota told me she was highly successful in starting tomoto, peppers, melons, etc in her house without a light and my mom too told me to go for it.
The problem: So, I started watering 3 flats of tomato, green pepper, and chili pepper seeds in my house without a light. It was a failure. I had probably a hundred seedlings come up, but they were tiny. Six were sizable. I transplanted those six to my garden and cared for them until one day my neighbor told me "Those are NOT tomatoes or peppers!," right after she identified some wild daisy in an area of my tundra lawn and told me to dig it up and move it somewhere safe. Well, it turns out that my successful seedlings were probably from the worm vericompost dirt that I used to fertilize my soil, not from the seeds I bought and planted. I'm still not sure if they are cucumber or squash or what, but they are from some type of leftover vegetable we had and fed to our worms. Because they were stretching toward the windows, they are leggy and I don't think they'll survive. Next year, I will try a light and use packaged soil.
The other problem: I allowed a friend to help with the planting process and, in her excitement or because she was distracted by my two year old, she planted crooked and too high. I replanted today and now it is much easier to water. She brought to us and planted 2 cucumber plants, 1 tomato (my son had a pair of scissors and cut the tops off of the other 3 tomatoes right in front of her eyes while I ran into the house to get something), and 4 gorgeous pepper plants that my neighbor gave to us.
The good news: All of the pepper plants and the giant grape tomato plant from my neighbor have fruit and will ready in a few weeks. They smell so good. Also, currently, my husband and I are watering 40 White Spruce and Jack Pine trees that we planted bareroot (half are out of hose's reach so we're using these barrels and the orange truck). For sure a few of the Jack Pine are dead, but it looks like most if not all of the White Spruce are doing well so far. The White Spruce are native, and the Jack Pine are not, so this is not a huge surprise. The 3 European Bird Cherry trees and 2 large Birches that we planted last year for our wedding anniversary survived beautifully, even though the cherry branches were pretty badly damaged from moose grazing. Cooperative extension says to prune them this week. Next winter, I'll bag the cherry branches to deter the moose.
It's a learning process. But, with little kids around, it is a great hobby. They like to play with water. And watering is a nice thing to do outside the house for an hour, or two, or three after they go to sleep.
