Getting Ready for Fall

I am a bit in denial about this whole midsummer thing. But lately, I've been working in the basement on getting my seed-starting setup ready for fall and winter seed starting.

I have not been able to start seeds for years because I have a cat who eats seedlings, and there has not been a place where she cannot go and where the dog(s) will not romp the poor seedlings to death. But now I can have some seedlings going in the basement, so I can start a lot of plants I would otherwise pay $5 each for at Annie's. A considerable savings, given the theme for next year of "swaths of plants."

This item is at the center of my plans: a shelving unit from Costco, like the others in the basement, fitted up with shoplights ($8 each at Home Depot). I'll also drape it with plastic, so the heat from the lights stays inside, because the basement can get very cold in the winter, and I'm way too cheap to spring for enough heating mats to cover this thing.

A bunch of nursery flats and some light bulbs (I'm planning to just use plain fluourescents; the plants will not be staying in the basement permanently), and I'm in business. Then I need to fence off a place in the garden for hardening off. Or get that hoop house built.

Technorati Tags: gardening, plants, propagation

posted by ayse on 08/17/06