Saving - Keeping your seeds

As some of you know I'm a Heirloom seed gardener. I don't plant hybrid seeds but only open-pollinated seeds, seeds that come true to type and can be saved. Over the years I have been saving more and more seeds of my plants. At first it was just the easy ones like lettuce and tomatoes, peppers anything that won't cross pollinate as bad and didn't need any special pollination care like isolation boxes or are a lot of work to process since I really didn't have any real seed screens instead using my kitchen sieves.
Now I save so many seeds every year, of so many varieties I really need to keep good track of what seed is in which seed bag.....I was getting to many little plastic baggies with 'unknown' variety or '???' written on them, because either the writing with the permanent marker had rubbed off or I forgot to label them right away, thinking I would remember which variety it was and then didn't.
So last year I sat down with my Print-Shop software and designed a seed pack that would fit into a 3" x 5" plastic bag.

 I added the name of the plant variety and very basic grow info on the design and added a picture of the vegetable plant. They were some nice seed packs but it took too much time to cut and glue them together every time I needed some. It ended up being a way bigger job then I wanted it to be.

I ended up just using the front side, cutting away the rest, since I was storing the seed envelopes in plastic bags anyway, I really didn't need all the paper. So this spring I decided to redesign the whole thing and came up with paper card inserts that perfectly fit into the plastic baggies and since a bit larger also were able to hold much more growing info.

I can also add many more inserts on one sheet of paper.......saving paper and trees. Also just having all the important growing info right in front of me when I need it,  is just so nice, plus instead of cutting paper and gluing I get to have more fun planting and playing in my garden.

In Love with new garden tool

When I first started gardening, way back then in late 1980's it didn't take long before I came across my good old Newspaper Pot Maker. I never liked the Jiffy Pots, I think they kill more vegetables then they grow for you and plastic pots, back then, weren't recycled, also I didn't want to waste our money on buying plastic pots to grow vegetables. So when I came across the Paper Pot Maker it was Love at first site.
What couldn't you love on that thing? It forced you to recycle the newspaper! Back then they didn't even recycle Newspaper where we lived, nope there was no recycle pick up at our town. You could get the best soil mix you could get your hand on, or make your own instead having to rely on whatever they put into those Jiffy pots. Okay, you could do that with plastic pots also, but........no more messed up roots when you transplant, since you plant the whole pot and all. What is not to love!
For a few years I lost my way, I admit, I got lazy, I got plastic pots and filled them with dirt. I tried all the newest growing pots, growing systems trying to find the one that just might be the best growing system ever invented.
I never found it, I think it doesn't exist or maybe I just had it all along. Paper pot!
Nevertheless I think I have to retire my good old paper pot maker.
No, not what you think...no, I didn't fall of the wagon.

It is just simple, I found the best new Tool for growing my vegetables..........A better Paper-pot Maker!

It is much simpler to use then the older model and makes pots about 7.5 x 7cm wide instead 5.5 x 5.5 cm as the old one that are also much more solidly built. I tweaked the instruction a bit because it was easier with less cutting involved and made for even sturdier pots.

start out with a half page of newspaper

                                                  Fold about 2/3 over lengthwise

fold a edge over about 3/4 to 1 inch on the folded edge, with the last third cut in so it is not folded over

 roll the paper pot along the edge, but keep
 the open edge loose

like you see in this picture

This is probably the most tricky part. You grasp the paper at the bottom
and twist it together and push it into the hole at the bottom of the pot

Like that. Now push the paper pot, with the pot maker in it
down on a surface, to seal and flatten the bottom nicely

                                                                                Almost done!

Twist the wooden pot maker out of the paper
and fold the edge that sticks out on top to the inside, that is
what makes the pot sturdier and holding together better then the old.

                         Voila! You just made yourself a paper pot

You can get the Paper pot maker here, it comes in two sizes
http://www.seedandgarden.com/shop/products/NViroPotter-Paper-Pot-Making-Tool.html

Companion planting charts

I have been busy reading over the winter and finding more information about Companion plantings, Inter-planting of vegetables and flowers, and rotations in the vegetable plants.
Companion planting is based on the idea that certain plants can benefit others when planted close to each other so that some cultural benefit like pest control, disease prevention, nutrient support and higher yields, can be utilized by the plants growing together. Knowing what plants can be planted together helps to utilize your beds better, because you can plant denser, the technique comes from the Bio-intensive garden philosophy. It also helps with the succession planting, because you use the space around larger or later plants, planting quick maturing and smaller plants between them. Granted it takes much more planning to do it successfully and to make the planning easier, I came up with the idea of making a chart. Which I will tape into the lid of my seed box to have it always available when planting outside.

There is a lot of information out there in books and the internet but I found many of the charts lacking for my use. Most of them gave you some but not enough information. Some of the information I didn't need. I just don't need to know when I am outside planting, why I plant them together, just give me what I can plant together and what I need to know for the task. Many of the online charts usually just cover the basic vegetables. Many didn't even give you all the kinds of vegetables one could grow together, keeping their information very basic.

For a gardener that goes for the unique and unknown vegetables to add to the common available ones basic just doesn't cut it. I am such an information hog, I just needed more!
So I decided I would learn as much as I could about companion planting and then put what I have learned into a chart, utilizing all the information I found.

 Some of the best information I found in the book I got last year
The Kitchen Garden Grower's Guide by Stephen Albert

This book is so full of the basic information to help you grow your garden and covers many more vegetables then most garden books I have come across and the best is it is all in a simple Encyclopedic format.

So here are the charts I made. They are large and I had to break it into 2 files. If you click on the picture it should pop up into a larger file. I probably will keep adding more information to the charts as I learn more about companion plantings of some of the newer vegetables I am getting. I also added some basic fertilizing and bed preparation information but didn't add the herbs and perennial vegetables into the chart, because I have my herbs in a separate herb garden area close to the vegetable garden and the perennial vegetables aren't planted in the raised garden beds in my garden.

Chart number one from Arugula to Eggplant

Chart number two from Endive to Turnips

                                                                      Enjoy!

Strawberry towers

This is just a funny garden year. There it is was mid June and still rainy outside. I looked at my weather report every day, hoping for this 5 day forecast of sun, just to be cheated over and over again.
I found myself planning my schedules by the dry and sunny days. Going shopping only happens on the rainiest days, forget going to town if it is sunny outside. I needed that day to catch up in my yard. 
But finally we got some nice Summer-like weather, I just hope it will last.
The weeds really seemed to like this wet weather, they are growing just like weeds. Or maybe it is just that I couldn't weed all the time and so there will be now weeds all summer. Since our summer arrived I have been outside almost all day, trying to catch up. This i one of the reasons I have been neglecting my blog for a while. I am just so busy outside I hardly have time to do anything else.
So I was really behind planting my Peppers and Eggplants, which I just managed to plant two weeks ago. But even they had been in the small pots for a long time, they are growing so nicely and are already setting peppers. I think using the home-made warming tray has really helped growing healthy and strong plants. Usually I was lucky to get a few peppers late season.
They do say that if you stunt the growth of the heat loving plants like Peppers, Eggplants and Tomatoes they sometimes never catch up anymore and greatly reduce production. My sun-room is just too cold in February to grow anything, having the warming tray is making a big difference.

My first Strawberries, even they were slowly getting ripe, were getting all mushed out by the rain. It wasn't too big of a loss since they didn't really taste all that good anyway. The rain washed all the sweet, strawberry flavor out of them.
But now the weather is perfect strawberry weather and I am picking a large bowl of Strawberries every other day and they are sweet and juicy. Since I am so busy weeding and catching up in my yard I mainly made some of my quick Strawberry Tart and some Ice cream with them. Luckily I only grow Ever-bearing Strawberries so I will have a long harvest and hopefully will be able to make some strawberry jam later in the season.

Strawberries use a lot of yard, especially if you grow enough to make jam and freeze. The area my strawberries are growing in right now will be my new flower and shrub garden, it is our second lot and eventually we'll built a smaller house there. Lucky me, I get to start some of my new garden before there is a house.

This way at least some of it will be established and I get to move my favorite plants from my old garden to the new. I already got started on some of the new garden, but the strawberries are in the way and need to get moved.

 I wanted to move them to my Kitchen-garden, which is fenced in. Already I grow all my other berries in the lower part of this garden, but there just isn't enough room for that many strawberries. To have strawberries down there I needed to go vertical.

For two years I have been looking at the strawberry towers at the Raintree Nurseries website, thinking I like to make my own, but I have been trying to find bigger diameter tubes then the ones they usually have at the Home depot, but never found anything larger then 4" or 8" which I think is not wide enough to grow them successfully. I know from searching online many people make them with the smaller sized tubes, but I just felt there wasn't enough room for the roots and enough dirt to sustain the roots in there.
I also think plastic just gets too hot for the berries and thinking of all the chemicals in the plastic I am not sure I even wanted plastic tubes for growing strawberries.

So one day I saw these strawberry towers in the  Stark Brothers Catalog, which consisted of a small wire cage and coconut fiber mats you can fill with dirt and then plant with your berries. It was a bit small but I liked the idea that the plants had more dirt around their roots and no plastic involved.
So I got the idea of making something similar out of sturdy fencing, some fence posts and coconut fiber mats.

I just cut the fencing into 6 feet high x 35 inch wide sections, rolled them into a tube 33 inch diameter, wiring the length sides together, overlapping just 2 inches to make it sturdier. Then I cut the coconut fiber mat into the same size, rolled it into a tube and inserting it in the wire tower. Now all I had to do fill it up with some good soil mix, watering it well and plant the strawberries. Since my new mail-ordered strawberries were already waiting for me, I had to plant them right away. To plant I just cut some holes into the coconut fiber mat, poked a hole into the dirt and carefully inserted the strawberries. It is a bit tricky to do without hurting the plants. Then I watered it again, to wash the dirt well around the roots. One thing I would do different next time is to let the dirt filled tower sit for a few days before planting the strawberries in it. After a week the dirt had settled a bit and pulled some of the berries down into the wire a bit. I pulled them back up, but my suggestion is wait a week, water it daily and let it settle before planting.

I added a mini bubbler-dripper on top of each tower and connected it to my timed irrigation, the towers will dry out a bit quicker then on flat ground and the berries need a good amount of water to produce berries.
They are growing for about a month in there now and even I lost a few plants, the remaining plants are growing nicely and starting to set some fruit. As the berries produce some runners I will be pinning the new plants into new holes and by next year maybe have all of the tower filled with plants.

Growing them vertical will be not just a space saver I think it will keep them cleaner and more disease free.
And I get to use their old space for my new flower garden.

disclaimer: Not to be shared with the Dervaes Family of Path to Freedom Website. Thank You 

Growing seeds-Built a light stand

The house I am living in is typical for the US that it is not situated on the lot for using the movement of the sun in consideration for optimal light in the house or solar gains. Typically they seem to plot the houses on the land just to be able to have the front door facing the street. At least it seems like that to me.
In Germany, no matter where I lived we always had large windows with deep windowsills, facing south or southwest, just the perfect place for your house plants or starting your seeds.
I never had a place in the US where I had a window with the proper lighting for house plants or window sills which actually can fit a planter. It is hard to grow your vegetables in such conditions.
In North Carolina we had a laundry room/mud room which had a long wall. To grow my seeds we put wire shelving on the walls, attached shop lights above which worked pretty good and it kept the dirt out of the house.

This house I have now has no room inside the house to grow my plants and no window which lets the proper lighting in. But I have a sun room that even it faces the wrong way, (only the small side faces partly to the south) at least it has room for my plantings. Unfortunately it also has old single pane windows, which let all the cold air in, so during the winter it does not warm up very much, only in the afternoon it starts warming up a bit, but then later in the day the sun is again on the wrong side of the house. The first year I moved in here I got all excited about finally having a sun room that I bought a bunch of  house plants just to have them all die on me when the winter came, when it went below freezing outside, it can get very cold in there.
It is not a good place to start seedlings, with no warmth and not proper lighting.
Sometimes you wonder why people bother to built a sun room if you can't keep hardly any plants in it and it is too cold or too hot most of the year, even for people, to sit in there.

I needed more light in there but light tables, the ones you can start seedlings on are a bit expensive.

Years ago I saw in a magazine a table built with PVC pipes, so this is what I decided to make. It was easy to built, most of the material I already had and I could make it myself, and because it is made with cut pipes I could make it any size which fit my space and needs.

I made the lower part double wide, to be able to fit more trays on one level. This way I can move the plants better around as they are growing. The trays sit on Plexiglas shelves which just are laying across the pipes. They could be screwed in to be more solid in place, but I never bothered with that. It works fine as it is it is easier to change my setup. The upper part I made extra high, to be able to keep the plants longer under the lights as they get taller. And the bottom shelve, even it is double wide I am using only single wide Plexiglas sheets. This way I can put big pots on the floor, which would be to heavy for the Plexiglas sheets.
You can glue the pipes together, but I never did myself and it is holding up fine. Even if you decide to glue the pipes I recommend not to glue the upright longer pipes in, this way you can always take the table apart for storage, or if you decide to make a section higher you can switch out pipes. 
The beauty of working with the PVC pipes is that you can make it as big or small as you want it too be and as long you don't glue together it is always changeable.

My table is about 4 feet wide x 18 inch deep and 6 feet 5 inch high and to make my table this is what you need:
You will be using 3/4" PVC plumbing pipe
Material list. 6 End caps, 48 T connectors, 19 4-way connectors,
8 Elbow connectors
Pipe lengths of upright pipe sections:
You'll need 27  3-1/2" length pipe sections, 9  12" length pipe sections,
9  19" length pipe sections,
6  30" length tube sections
Pipe lengths for the depth of the table:
14  3-1/2" length pipe sections, 12  7" length pipe sections
Pipe lengths for the width of the table:
28  2 feet length pipe sections

Then you also need either a hack saw or a PVC pipe cutter, PVC glue (optional), 4 Plexiglas shelves 24" x 20" deep, 2 Plexiglas shelves 24" x 10" deep, 4 shop lights with the light bulbs and chains with S-hooks you use to hang the lights up with.

Now all you have to do, cut and assemble your growing table, start with the bottom and work your way up to the top.

                       Here you can see how the light tables leg part is assembled.
                      See how the plexiglas shelve is sitting only on the back side
                      of  the table.
                      This way I can put larger pots on the floor in front.

Notice how the PVC tubes the shop light is hanging from are set in a bit from the front and back.This gives the table more stability and also positions lights just right above your plants

                              Another view for the lower part of the table

Here you can see a bit how the next level of the light table is put together. If you wanted to, you easily could add another light to the front of this table or even make bigger plexiglas shelving for the bottom shelf.

Here the plexisglas sheets are sitting across the whole depth of the table at the middle level.
Again notice how the pipes the lights are hanging from are set in from the front and back a bit.
The chains to lower or shorten are just simply wrapped around the pipes.

Here you can see the lamps suspended from the pipes.The plexiglas sheets are laying again across the full depth of the light table

The upper part of the table. Here I use only one light. If you wanted to, you
could make it as deep as the lower part of the table. I have two pipes
connected together for the height of the upper part, because after I wanted
to keep my perennial chili peppers overwinter on this table I found I
needed the light to keep them happy, but I did not have the height.
So I just added some more pipe to it.

A view of the middle part with the 4 way connectors.These are the pipes the lights are suspended from.
These pipes make a great storage area above the lights for the unused planting trays.

                       View of the left side of table.
                      Light suspension pipe and shelf supporting pipes

                               Another closeup of the middle section

                             So here is the whole table again.

It really is quite easy to built and so easy to customize to your liking. It is just like building with the kid toy 'Lego'. Make it bigger or smaller.
The whole table without the shop lights which I still had from my previous light table probably cost me about $30 to $40, quite inexpensive compared to the light tables you can buy.

Maybe I should have washed the dirt off my table before I took the pictures, as I looked at the pictures I could see quite some dirt on there. But hey, it is a planting table it will get dirty. Right?

disclaimer: Not to be shared with the Dervaes Family of Path to Freedom Website. Thank You 

Taking care of your worm bin

 The only worms you should use for the worm bin are the 'Red Wiggler' worms or also called 'Eisenia fetida' which are native European worms, all the other worms will not eat your garbage.
Red Wigglers thrive in organic waste and because they live close to the surface in their natural environment they can't really take colder then 40° F and not hotter weather then 90° F.
You still probably should try to avoid adding the Red Wigglers to the outdoor environment or compost pile, even the possibility of them surviving outside is rather rare but in mild winter areas there is a slight possibility they could survive in compost bins.
The worms are actually a bit sensitive to the cold or heat and you should take them into the house or garage if the outdoor temperature drops below 40° F or you might loose them. They also will stop feeding if they are too cold or hot, so keep them in the shade during the summer.

There are many places you can get Red Wiggler worms, you probably can even find a local person raising worms near where you live, the best time to get your worms are supposed to be spring or fall, but where I live we have cooler summers and I got mine in early summer and had no problems.

Before you put your worms in your newly built bin, you need to prepare your bedding. You need enough bedding to fill your bin 3/4 full with bedding, leaving the 1" louvered vents exposed.
Worms need damp but not wet bedding, a good and cheap worm bedding is a mixture of shredded newspaper and wood shavings. You will get less of crawling/flying critters that way. Stay away from Cedar bedding, which is toxic to many animals and it is advisable not to use colored print paper or office paper, because those inks are often toxic. Newspaper nowadays is printed with soybean based ink which shouldn't cause problems. I even would stay away from bleached paper I just don't think that will be good for the worms. Other bedding possibilities are sawdust, cardboard, straw (chopped into small pieces), shredded fall leaves, compost or aged manure or a combination of those. A variety of bedding material will give the worms more different nutrients, but they will be fine just with newspaper shreds and wood chips.

You have to soak the wood chips overnight in a bucket of water to make sure they can take up the water. Shred the paper into 1/2"-1" strips, put it into a 5 gallon bucket or garden tub and carefully wet the paper, turning it frequently until it is moist but not dripping wet. Then mix the drained wood chips with the paper and fill your bin #2 (the one with the drainage holes), to below the vents with the mixture making sure not to cover the vents. The worms need the air in the bin. Don't pack the bedding in, fill it loosely to add air spaces for the worms it also helps control the odor.
If you think your bedding got a bit to wet, you might want to let it drain for a few hours before you add your worms to it.
It is beneficial for the worms digestive system to add a hand-full of garden dirt or sand. Now you are ready to add your worms. Just spread them with the dirt they came in over your bedding, they will crawl in on their own.
So now your worms are in the bin you need to feed them, but you do not want to feed them too much or you will get a huge smelly mess and the worms might die.
The formula to figure out the pounds of food per week you size bin can handle is:

Width of bin x length of bin (sqft) is equal to pounds of food per week.

So if you have a bin that measures 1' wide by 1 1/2' long it can handle about   1 1/2 lbs of food per week.
When you add the food try to create a pattern by burying the food in a new place every 4-6 times. Avoid disturbing the bedding when you bury it, because it might make it heat up like compost in your compost bin and the worms will have no place to escape the heat.

What can you feed the worms? If it is vegetative matter you pretty much can add it all. Potato peels, vegetable scraps, fruit scraps and peels (including from citrus peels in small amounts), coffee grounds (paper filter included) or tea leaves/bags, and pulverized egg shells. You should not add meats, dairy, fatty food. Some say no grain, because of problem with flies or rodents, but I don't think a bit of old bread, Corn meal or oat meal here and there causes much problem, just don't add too much.

Drain the compost tea liquid often, check it daily after you add new bedding, less frequent later. You can pick up both bins and shake them back and forth, if you hear a sloshing sound you should drain some of the liquid. I use mine mixed half with water to water my house plant, but you could also use it full strength to give it to your vegetable plants outside. If the liquid smells foul, like very rotten food don't use it and flush it down the toilet.

As the materials in the bin break down into compost, you need to add more fresh bedding on top. You need to be able to bury your food under the bedding, so it is important to keep adding as it decomposes.

You can harvest your compost when the bin material looks brown and crumbly, similar to coffee grounds. It should smell like nice forest floor. It probably will take about six months from the time of bin set-up until you can harvest the worm castings
To harvest you can empty the contents of the bin on a plastic sheet or tarp (you need to drain all the compost liquid first) remove all visible food scraps which you set aside to add later to the new bedding. Worms avoid light so they always will burrow down into the compost. To separate them  from the bedding you just have to wait a short time, then remove the 3"  top layer of the compost without the worms. Wait again until they burrow down and repeat the same every 5 - 10 minutes. In the end you have very little compost with a pile of worms. Re-bed Bin #2, add worms with the little compost to the bin, reassemble the bin setup and bury the leftover food scraps inside the new bedding.

You also can gently move the worm compost to one side of the bin, fill the other half with the fresh bedding and wait a day or two until the worms have moved to the new bedding, then remove the worm compost and fill the bin up with more of the new bedding. This does work much better if you have a larger bin, but it still is worth a try for the much easier and less messier technique.

Now you can use the harvested compost in your vegetable garden, or add it to your house plants as fertilizer.

If you have a problem with little flies inside your bin, which might be fruit flies, this can be prevented by laying a piece of cardboard over the bedding, inside the bin. Fruit flies don't like to lay their eggs on the smooth surface of the cardboard so this breaks their life cycle.
You might have Fungus gnats which are attracted to moist organic matter, like found in worm bins. They don't respond to the same technique as with fruit flies but can be trapped with a sticky trap made for gnats inside the bin. Sometimes if you get gnats in your house plants putting sand on top of the soil is supposed to prevent them laying their eggs, the same might work in the worm bin.

What could cause your worms death?
1)Bedding too dry, which leaves no moisture for the worms can cause them to die. Bedding needs to be moist like a wrung out sponge.
2)Too much water, causes them to drown. Use the spigot to drain the liquid more often. A layer of coco peat fiber at the bottom of the bin can absorb excess moisture.
3) Not enough air, will suffocate the worms. Keep the bedding fluffy and keep vents clear of bedding.
4)Too much acid is toxic and can burn the delicate skin of worms. Avoid adding too much citrus scraps.
5) Digging to much around in the bin will cause the food and bedding to heat up like a compost pile, heat will kill the worms.
6) Sun will heat up the box and kill the worms. Keep the box out of the sun. In hot climates it is advised to keep them out of over 90° F temperature.
7) Too cold. Worms start dying off in temperatures under 40° F.
8) Harvest compost when ready, the worm's castings are toxic to the worms.

So, this is all the information you need to keep your worm bin going and your worms happy.
I promised it won't be hard.

Part one: How to build your worm bin

Composting with worms-building a worm bin

I wanted to get a worm bin for a long time, so last year I finally built one after I came across a nice bin design which was using Rubbermaid bins you can easily get at any Target or Hardware store. Making your own is just the right thing for the person who wants to try worm composting without making a big financial commitment.

 

What are the benefits of worm composting?

For one the worms can recycle your kitchen-waste into one of the best soil amendments nature gives us, which are the worm castings, during the winter when your compost pile outside slows down or stops composting. Worm castings are supposed to have 7 times the nutrients than your outdoor produced compost. There is no turning and no watering, although you are supposed to keep it at a certain moisture level, not too wet and not to dry. You also will get some nice compost tea, which you can drain to water your house plants with.

I am diluting the compost tea half with water and water my house plants with that, since it seems to be so rich and my houseplants are responding nicely to it.

Another benefit is, you can do it indoors or outdoors, as long the temperature is between 40° and 80° F, which allows even apartment dwellers a way to compost their kitchen waste.

And if you like to go fishing, you will have always a nice supply of worms for that, because if the worms are happy, they will happily reproduce but there is only so much room in the bins for worms. And you also need to periodically separate the worms from the finished compost or they could die off. You can  pass on the left over worms you don't need to other people interested in trying worm composting or your fishermen friends, or add them to your compost pile. Or you could just make a second bin if you have the room.

Some people advise to get your Red Wigglers from outdoors, but the worms you will get outside are certain to be Night Crawlers and they thrive only in unimproved soils they’re NOT adaptable to worm bins and will die in them. They are the typical bait worm and are an invasive species introduced to the Americas. The Red Wigglers or Eisenia fetida for compost bins is also an European import but will not survive outside temperatures below 40 degrees or higher then 90, so are no thread to the environment. 

Let me show you how my bin is made.

Here are the parts you need, you should be able to get them all at your hardware/garden store:

  -2 solid color Rubbermaid bins, which need to be at least 14" deep. They need to nest into each other and still leave some room on the bottom for the compost tea to drain into.

  -2 - 2" screened louvered vents

  -10 - 1" screened louvered vents (we couldn't find 1" vents, so we used 6 - 2" sized, half the amount recommended)

  -O-ring hose washer

  -1 Male hose adapter, 3/4" x 1/2"

  -1 Metal hose shut-off valve, spigot

-Teflon plumbers tape

tools:

  -Motor drill

  -1/4" drill bit (regular)

  -1" drill bit (blade type)

  -2" drill bit (cup type)

  -measuring tape

Assembly of the worm bin:

Bin#2: Installing the screened louvered vents and drainage holes

 *Before you drill the holes, you should make an indentation with the 1" drill bit point to help guide the drill. You will have less slippage that way.

 *Turn the bin upside down and drill about 20 - 1/4" holes in the bottom of that bin, which will be for drainage.

Make sure to remove all bits of plastic residue from the holes, so they are clean and free of plastic curls. The plastic chips could make your worms sick.

 *Turn the bin on it's side and drill 5 - 1" holes if you have the 1" vents, or 3 -2" holes if you use the larger vents, along the upper edge, use the 2" cup type drill bit for the larger size. Locate the holes 1 3/4" from the top edge, spacing each hole about 3" apart.

 *do the same on the other side of bin

 *Now you need to insert the louvered vents into the holes from the outside of the bin

 *Make sure the vents are flush with the outside wall

Bin #1 Install the shut off valve spigot

 * Drill a 1" hole right at the center, end wall (the smaller side of bin) one half inch from the bottom of that bin

 *Stretch and push the O-ring onto the threaded end of the male hose adapter

 *You need to make sure the O-ring is in the groove all the way to the end of the male hose adapter

 *Wrap the threaded end of the male hose adapter with Teflon plumber's tape, which will make it fit tight and prevent leakage

 *From the outside of the bin, screw the shut off valve/spigot on to the male hose adapter tightly

 *The valve/spigot control know should be on the topside of the spigot so you can use it easily. Keep the spigot always in the closed position so you won't have the compost tea leak out.

 Lid # 2: Installing the screened louvered vents

 *Take the lid of the bin #2 and place on top of the #2 bin.

 *Mark two locations of the lid for the 2" louvered vents. A good place to put them is in the middle of the bin which is a bit indented. You do not want to put the holes across the border area from the indentation to the smooth area. The vents would not fit properly then.

 *Drill the 2" holes carefully into the lid using the cup drill bit.

 *Again clean off any plastic residue or plastic curls

 *Insert the 2" louvered vents from the outside of the bin, just as you did the side vents

 *Assemble the bin according to the picture of the finished bin at the beginning of this article. Stacking Bin #2 inside the Bin #1. Put the lid with the vents on the top bin.

Don't snap it closed, just lay it loosely on top of bin.

Use the other lid #1 as a drip tray underneath the whole set up. It helps to put two or three bricks underneath the bins to raise them up higher, it makes the job of draining the compost tea into your water can or container you are using easier.

So now you have your very own, home built worm bin and you are ready to get some Red wigglers and start composting. In my next post I will share how you prepare your bins for the resident worms and how to care for them. I promise it will be easy

part two: Taking care of your worm bin

Planting with home made Seed Tape

Sometimes I have a hard time planting the tiny seeds without wasting to many seeds. It is really hard to spread the small seeds at a proper distance, often you can't even see where you put them. I hate to waste so many seeds, but even more annoying is the extra work I have, having to pull the excess seedlings to make room for the ever growing plants.

When I still lived in Germany, 25 years ago, they sold many varieties of vegetables in Seed tape. It was a fleece type paper, similar to tissue paper which easily dissolved once planted.
It was so easy to plant. You just tore the right amount off and laid it in proper distance on the bed, spread some soil on top. Done!

In my early gardening days in the US, I often looked for Seed Tape in the plant catalogs, never found it until a few years ago.
Some things just take a long time to make their entrance to the US.
We are such a progressive country, for some reason we are often behind the rest of the world in new things.
For just a few years you finally can find Seed Tapes in a few catalogs, very few catalogs that is. But they have such a small amount of seed varieties offered that it is hardly worth bothering with it. Especially for gardeners which like Heirloom Vegetables.

Luckily they are easy to make yourself. All you need is some tissue like paper. Toilet paper works well, I like to use commercial type paper towels, like they often have in restaurants bathrooms.
Then you need some glue, like Elmer's Glue or you can do what I do, just boil some Cornstarch in water until it is thick like glue, it works just as well and there are no chemicals involved.
I don't have exact measurements for it because I just mix a little Cornstarch in water, cook it and if not thick to my liking I add some more Cornstarch and repeat. Just remember not to get it too thick, because it has to be able to come out of a squeeze bottle. After it cools down a bit transfer to an old glue bottle and you are set.
To make the Seed tape, I put little dabs of the glue mix in the right distance for the seeds to grow. I seed mine a bit closer, just to make sure I have enough sprouting. Rarely all the seeds will sprout, and the few extra seedlings I just pull when needed.


Then I put the seeds on the little daps of glue and cover the sheet with another paper towel, labeled with the varieties name, so I don't confuse the plants.
Now all you have to do let them dry, fold them up and next time you get out to the garden, lay them on the prepared garden bed, cover with a bit of soil and you are done planting.

The nice thing about it is, that when the weather is too rainy to go outside to plant, you can prepare the seed tape inside, knowing once the rain has stopped, you quickly can plant your seeds.

So after I made these seed tapes, I found this product on the web.
Make your own seed tape http://seed-tape.com/index.html, just like the Seed tape I knew in Germany. You just add your own seeds. I think I will order some of that.
Go figure, I have been looking for that for such a long time and right after I make my own, there it is.

Seedling potting mixes, home made

I have been looking in my garden books for some seed and potting soil mixes and like to share some.

Many of the older recipes call for peat moss, peat moss is not a sustainable material so I like to substitute coco fiber for it. This used be hard to find but now you can buy coco fiber in many home and garden stores. The other common ingredients in these mixes are vermiculite, perlite, sand, coarse sand, milled sphagnum peat moss, leaf mold, compost, good garden soil.
Then some nutrient ingredients you might need for potting soil, which are cotton seed, rock phospate, green sand, blood meal, bone meal, lime, wood ash.

Here are the recipe and the source they are from.

Seedling mixes

1. from the Lane County Master Gardener Association, Eugene, Oregon
'Garden Rhytm-A year round guide and journal for the maritime Northwest

Seedling mix

1 part garden soil or finished Compost
1 part equal amounts of sand, vermiculite, and perlite
1 part coconut fiber

mix all ingredients together. To sterilize, bake the soil in an uncovered pan at 180°F for 30 to 60 minutes.

2. from the old garden book stable Rodale,
'All new encyclopedia of Organic Gardening-the indispensable Resource for every Gardener'
page 529

they suggest for a soil less mix using the ingredient alone or mix two or more together. No proportions are given, so you have to experiment
Ingredients given are
vermiculite, milled sphagnum peat moss (you can substitute coconut fiber), perlite, and compost. Use it to grow until the seedlings have their first true leaves and then transplant them in a richer potting mix.

3. from the same Rodale book. If you like to start the seedlings in a richer mix so you don't have to transplant them.
combine equal amounts of compost and vermiculite

4. From the book 'Growing Vegetables west of the Cascades' by Steve Solomon

Seedling mix

1 part by volume garden soil
1/2 part by volume finely screened compost
1/2 part by volume sifted and premoisted sphagnum moss
Blend into each cubic foot (5 gallons) of mix:
2 cups complete organic fertilizer (see below)
1/2 cup agricultural lime (in addition to what is the complete organic fertilizer)

He suggests if you have sandy garden soil to add vermiculite instead of sphagnum moss

Solomon's Fertilizer mix

4 parts seed meal (cotton seed or canola meal are available in our region, also can use linseed meal and soybean meal, all oil seed is generally similar in fertility (6% Nitrogen - 4% Phosporos - 2 % pottasium)
½ part lime (best is an equal mix of agricultural lime and dolomite)
½ part phosphate rock or bone meal (steamed or raw)
½ part kelp meal (any kind of pure seaweed meal from anywhere)

5. from the book 'Great Garden Formulas' from the Rodale company
page 71

Seedling mix

1 part vermiculite
1 part compost (sifted)
Milled sphagnum peat moss, or clean fine sand

Blend vermiculite into compost and fill flats or small (4") pots with the mix.
sow your seeds as directed
Sprinkle a fine dusting of moss or sand on the surface of the mix to discourage the fatal disease called 'damping off' that can infect seedlings at ground level in moist conditions.

6. same book, page 74
This is a High fertility seed starting mix from the Zephyr Farm in Stoughton, Wisconsin

¼ cup ground limestone
1 ½ cups Fertility mix (see recipe below)
3-gallon Bucket (for measuring)
2 buckets sphagnum peat moss (substitute coco fiber)
1 ½ buckets vermiculite
1 ½ buckets compost, shredded and sifted (first spread compost on tarp to dry and shred (if possible), then sift it through ¼-inch hardware cloth)

Sprinkle the ground limestone and Fertility mix over the peat and mix thoroughly
Add the vermiculite and compost and mix well
Yield: 15 gallons of seed starting mix
note: to fill seedling containers, moisten the mix so that you can feel a little moisture when you touch it.
You don't need any extra fertilizer as long you don't overwater, which leaches out the nutrients.

The Zephyr Farm Organic fertility mix

2 cups rock phospate
2 cups green sand
2 cups blood meal
½ cup bone meal
¼ cup kelp (seaweed) meal
yield: 6-3/4 cups

mix all ingredients together
sprinkle the Fertility mix over 15 gallons of commercial potting soil, or stir into the seed starting formula above