March 5, 2012 - Plans Gone Awry

I had big plans to get in another six hour day today. As usual, I headed out to the garden at eleven this morning. Son Scott came over to help me straighten and finish setting the T-posts for the garden fence. Once that was done, he headed home, and I pulled a lawn chair out to the sunshine and started cutting the old welded wire fencing down into 1' high strips. The plan is to use the plastic mesh fencing that I installed last year. I was very happy with it, as it's nearly invisible and doesn't bend or sag. However, Annie has figured out how to push on the bottom and scoot underneath. The 1' high welded wire keeps her from getting through and into the garden beds. Just as I finished cutting all the fencing, the wind picked up and it started sprinkling. So much for finishing the fence today. I had also planned to measure and mark the garden areas onto graph paper, which was also out of the question due to the weather.

So I cleaned out the garden shed. Now the mini greenhouse is ready for the cool weather seedlings that will stay in the cold shed, under lights. That gives me the entire indoor shelving system for warm weather seedlings, like tomatoes and peppers.

Speaking of seedlings, I'd never used Miracle Gro before, simply because of the bad things that I'd read in other blogs. However, when I was ready to start some seedlings there was nothing else available on the shelves, so I grabbed a small bag. I ran out when I was about halfway through seeding the beets, and by this time the stores had stocked their garden shelves, so I bought a large bag of a "professional" type potting mix and finished planting the beets in that. Well the Miracle Gro beets are four times the size of the others. That being said, I don't think I'd ever grow beet seedlings inside again. I think they grow much stockier when direct seeded. I do think I'll turn a deaf ear to the naysayers and buy another bag of Miracle Gro for starting the rest of my seedlings.



After lunch, there was nothing I could do outside, so I spent the afternoon resting. So did Annie and Otto.....silly Mr. Granny, he thought this room was his man cave.




19 comments:

  1. Now those are some happy babies! How could Mr Granny be upset with that? Ha.

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    1. Oh, he's not...he's the one who supplied the stool so they could get up in the big comfortable chair and the blankie to keep them warm :-)

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  2. I've wondered lately about the detriments of it myself. What specifically is bad about it? Heavy metals? Probably not. Loaded with fertilizer compounds that raise the salts in the soil? idk Do tell. - cloud

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    1. Stay @ Home....hate toward the company maybe? Or non-organic fertilizer content? Or both?

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  3. I hate to admit it, buy I use Miracle Gro soil for the bulk of my ourside pots. It's pretty much the only thing available here and I get great results most years.

    I was in a rush and grabbed some of the Burpee coconut fiber pellets for seed starting. The early results are very good as it doesn't stay as soaked as peat. I may try the brick next.

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  4. Personally I don't like the additional amount of water it retains. I also don't like the non organic fetalizer- but I also manage to use non organic things here and there so I'm not completely sold on that part. What I Have noticed is that my poor tomato seedlings should be twice the size they are this year and they are struggling. I would gladly use 1/2 and 1/2 wihtout even blinking. I just wouldn't use only the miracle grow. But again it's more because of the moisture content here in FL we tend to get swamped out without any help!

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    1. Barbie, the four early tomato starts I have (all the same variety) were all planted in the MG. It's hard to make a comparison on the results though. One is huge and blossoming, two are medium (normal) size and budding, and one is small but healthy. We can use the water retention here, it's very dry country.

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  5. Interesting observation about the beets.
    From what I can tell, the knock(s) against MG include the high solubility of the nutrients, salt buildup in the soil, and the environmental impact in the production of the product. High solubility results in very fast results but anything that is not utilized by plants ends up leaching away. However the same could be said for compost tea…. Common discussions say this leaching leads to algae blooms as the fertilizer makes its way into the water supplies, and perhaps it does in larger quantities, (proven by-product from industrial fertilization) but a little MG in your garden isn’t likely to cause the deleterious effects associated with industrial fertilization. However if everybody did it perhaps there could be a cumulative impact(?) Additional concern comes from the salt build up over time in soils where the artificial fertilizer is used, though the same thing can happen with “organic” fertilizer. There is also concern about the high energy requirements to produce industrial fixed nitrogen (urea) and the large quantities of CO2 produced as a by product. To some this alone might be a good reason to use more organic means of providing nutrients, but there are also counter arguments to this.
    All that said, using MG to give plants a head start probably isn’t reason for concern, and if you go organic once they get into the garden beds maybe you get the best of both worlds – a head start and then growing practices that are more gentle to the environment.

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    1. See, I knew somebody would tell us why, LOL! I doubt my 8 qt. bag of MG, used only for seed starting, will add nearly as many salts to the garden as the bags of steer manure many add to their garden plots. It's also been tested and shown that contamination is removed after running through our sandy soils for 20 feet, meaning a water well only has to be situated 20 feet from a septic system. No doubt anyone who is buying nursery grown plants is already putting MG or its equivalent into their soil :-)

      My problem with it is that I'll probably over fertilize anything grown in it, as I also use fish emulsion (half strength) twice a month.

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    2. The other reason a lot of people avoid Miracle Gro is their company policies. Miracle Gro is a product line of Scotts, and Scotts is the official international marketer and distributor of Monsanto's Roundup. Monsanto is (at the very least) considered to be lacking in ethics in regards to the environmental and human health impacts of their business. At most Monsanto is "the root of all agricultural evil" according to some people, and I'm kind of inclined to agree.

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  6. Must be Mother Nature telling you that you deserved a break. I think Annie and Otto have the right idea :)

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    1. Rachel, Mother Nature is being cruel today. I'm determined to at least get the fencing started, so I'll just have to wear coat and gloves and grit my teeth and go for it! It will be in the 40s, rather than the 65F we had on Sunday!

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  7. I'm really happy that David did all that explaining. It saved me a lot of typing :)

    I hope that you had a good rest yesterday. You can't over do it Granny....you ain't no Spring Chicken :) But you sure can out work most of the young chickadees!!

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  8. You can save a lot of money by buying peat moss ($8 for 3 cubic feet), compost ($5/cubic ft.), and vermiculite or perlite ($10/cubic foot) by the cubic foot and mixing them yourself as a seedling mix; rather than paying $8 for an 8 qt. bag of Miracle Gro seedling mix. It says on the ingredients list that it's 80-90% sphagnum peat moss... why pay extra for them to mix it together for you? ;) Then just add your fish emulsion when needed for a boost.

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  9. Mia Culpa. I guess I shouldn't have admitted to buying one lousy 8 qt. bag of MG (Which was $4.99, by the way). Yes, I do know how to make my own seed mix, I do have peat moss (I'll surely get heck from someone for using that, too), vermiculite and compost. But you know what? Sometimes I have pizza delivered, just because I'm too tired to cook dinner, and sometimes I buy ready made seed mix, because I'm too tired to mix my own.

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    1. lol, nothing wrong with that. You got a good deal too, it's more expensive at my store. I bought Jiffy mix this year, it was too darned cold and miserable to go out in the shed and mix up my own. But it's good to know I can if I need to.

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  10. It's amazing how limiting your choice in potting soil can be this time of year. I will often times get stuck buying a bag of miracle grow as well...though my local home depot has started carrying Organic Promix. The organic Miracle Grow is TERRIBLE.

    I started most of my beet seeds indoors last year but am switching to direct sowing seeds that I've presprouted mainly because the ones indoors always end up being misshapen and never as pretty.

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  11. I never planned on using Miracle Grow (I have a big problem with the parent company and their selling bird seed that they knew was contaminated). That said, I asked Mike to pick up some potting soil for me and guess what he came home with? And I really hate to say that I've got the biggest, fastest growing seedlings ever : (

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  12. wow, i just caught up on your blog. I was out today as well ripping out weeds in a p-patch that has been untended for almost 2 years and has roots that are not axe worthy but definately shovel worthy. We've seen the merits of miracle grow and still i have a hard time using it so will stick to my first thing I found that said organic in home depot which is called "Mater Magic" which did well on our "'maters" last year. I used that plus some fish emulsion mixed with water and did a few sprays of that fish emulsion water as foliar feed as well. my other trick was to trim out anything that was choking out air to the plant and was not a big grouping of leaves or productive branch. It worked out well and we had plenty of 'maters , but was a bit of work. NOT like your matts wild cherry though, that took over your house last year lol.
    Got my seeds sorted but not planted yet. I've been so busy and then sick for a few days. Today (thurs) I will be back out digging up roots and prepping for a new garden bed we're putting into the patch that i got donated from the just garden project that they have for low income peeps in seattle. check out the project, it's pretty cool. www.justgardenproject.com.
    here's a linkie for u also: http://naturalfamilytoday.com/lifestyle/the-quickie-seed-viability-test-for-seed-savers-and-traders/ explaining a seed floating test for viability. not sure u don't already know this but i figure any info is helpful.
    Your GIANT roots crack me up. I'm glad to not have encountered THOSE in my garden! yikes! BTW I got fortex bean seeds. Send me your addy and i'll send you some to get started. Not less cheaply but I owe u something for all of your suggestions. :) Take it easy and chew your meat! hugs from Issaquah, Amy (sore and happy to be back out there!)

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