Friday, February 12, 2010

Popcorn Popping, planting greens

Today, the Flavor Delight Aprium tree and the Royal Rosa Apricot started blooming. It's a beautiful day, but probably not quite warm enough for honeybees to be really happy yet. Hope some other insects are out.

I plants some "summer turnips" using the Winter Sowing method today. An experiment. I really prefer turnips in the fall. Five 6-oz. deli cups fit in a fried chicken tray from Walmart. Cut some slices out of the bottom edge of the cups and poked some holes in the bottom of the chicken tray. The top is already vented. Used a UV resistant industrial marker (Sharpie) to mark the cups. We're comparing:

White Lady to Tokyo Cross
Hakeuri to Oasis
Just Right (a fall turnip) as control.

I don't think any of these, except maybe Tokyo Cross, are true, 100% turnips. They have sweet, non-hairy leaves which are much milder than regular turnip greens.

I also started some greens and assorted brassicas - 9 deli cups in a pumpkin pie tray from Costco, with plastic wrap snapped into the rim. Poked 2 holes in plastic above each cup, and a few extra holes. The sun is out now, and I don't want any over-heating.