The arugula is up first and ready to go! You can direct sow arugula quite successfully, but the weed pressure here is so extreme, we prefer to transplant and use heavy mulch. We do this for many greens that can be planted directly in the garden, like kales, mustards, and lettuce. There is more labor involved up front, but the mulch is so effective at keeping weeds down, moisture in, and building up the soil that we feel in the end the benefits far outweigh the extra "cost".
The Rainbow Lacinato is also starting to unfurl its cotyledons. We're really excited about this variety. None of our fall planting made it to the market or the baskets because the bug pressure was so intense. We're going to try regular sprayings with
Basic H and using coarse salt to kill the caterpillars this season. Hand picking the cabbage moth caterpillars was miserable (and ineffective), much as the chickens loved the windfall.
These are little kale cotyledons (seed leaves), but everything from tomatoes and peppers to cabbage, beets, and turnips all look very similar. Some plants have more slender cotelydons, and some plants, like squash, have comparatively enormous cotyledons. But they are all astonishingly diminutive compared to the mature plants they morph into. It's inexpressibly humbling to be allowed to usher the plants through their growth process.
The arugula is up first and ready to go! You can direct sow arugula quite successfully, but the weed pressure here is so extreme, we prefer to transplant and use heavy mulch. We do this for many greens that can be planted directly in the garden, like kales, mustards, and lettuce. There is more labor involved up front, but the mulch is so effective at keeping weeds down, moisture in, and building up the soil that we feel in the end the benefits far outweigh the extra "cost".
The Rainbow Lacinato is also starting to unfurl its cotyledons. We're really excited about this variety. None of our fall planting made it to the market or the baskets because the bug pressure was so intense. We're going to try regular sprayings with Basic H and using coarse salt to kill the caterpillars this season. Hand picking the cabbage moth caterpillars was miserable (and ineffective), much as the chickens loved the windfall.
These are little kale cotyledons (seed leaves), but everything from tomatoes and peppers to cabbage, beets, and turnips all look very similar. Some plants have more slender cotelydons, and some plants, like squash, have comparatively enormous cotyledons. But they are all astonishingly diminutive compared to the mature plants they morph into. It's inexpressibly humbling to be allowed to usher the plants through their growth process.
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