Valentine's Day is for Love... of Tomatoes!

It has become a tradition now that I start my extra-early tomato varieties on Valentine's Day. After all, tomatoes used to be called "Love Apples" because of the belief that they were a powerful aphrodisiac.

Of course that's not the real reason I start my early tomato seeds on Valentines Day. As I described last year, it is easy for me to remember planting dates based on holidays. One of my major goals each year is to have ripe tomatoes about two months before my neighbors. The normal time around here to pick ripe tomatoes is late July or early August. Last year I harvested my first tomato on June 5th. It took quite a bit of effort to get that to happen. You can read about the entire season's efforts in the early tomato department here.

The goal for the first tomato harvest this year is... May 25th - Memorial Day!

Is that too ambitious? Is it even possible? I really don't know. This year's process for getting extra early will be about the same except now I have a greenhouse with permanent growing beds inside. If the greenhouse helps like I think it can, then Memorial Day is not out of the question. May 25th is exactly 100 days from now. If I can't hit Memorial Day, May 31st will be my secondary goal. I will outline all of the steps I take again this year as I go along. Today however was just the beginning.

Even though I now love using my soil blocker to start seeds, I still use the cell packs for the early tomatoes. I plant one 6-pack for each early variety and I put two or three seeds in each individual cell. Later I will thin to one plant per cell and when it comes time to transplant, I will pick the best plants available. Eventually I will have 2 of each variety to move outside in the greenhouse.

It makes it easy starting with six of each tomato cultivar because I can label the whole cell pack with tape and a marker.

The varieties I started today were Siletz, Sub-Arctic Plenty (World's Earliest), Orange Blossom, 4th of July, Early Girl, and since my new variety Mountain Princess has not arrived yet, I also planted some New Girl.

After covering the seeds with light soil mix, I added some hot water to the tray and put on the clear lid. It fogged up quickly.

I hope I can keep it warm in there so the seeds will germinate quickly. Usually they do pretty well in the Laundry room where the dryer and the furnace keep things toasty.

I plan to keep better records of each variety's progress this year. Last year 4th of July was the first to ripen. I wonder which one will win this year.

The 2009 tomato season has begun. Let the race begin!

Happy Valentine's Day and happy gardening!

Watch Out for Killer Compost!

That is the title of a report by Cheryl Long and Barbara Pleasant in the new bookazine, Mother Earth News - Guide to Growing Your Own Food.

I just bought this gem a few days ago and I love it. It is filled with great articles about how to garden better. Many great topics like organic pest control, seed starting basics, preserving your harvest and container gardening are covered. I enjoyed them all but this one little half page article jumped out at me most of all.

It documents Dow chemical's marketing of the herbicide Aminopyralid as a control of perennial weeds in horse and cattle pastures. It also spells out how the U.S. EPA has approved it even after a previous Dow chemical herbicide, clopyralied (Confront) was found to be the contaminant in compost that killed garden and nursery plants in Washington, Pennsylvania and New Zealand.

The major problem with Aminopyralied is that Dow's own research showed that Aminopyralid is expected to remain in manure for over a year! Many times there is enough herbicide residue even in the composted manure to kill tomatoes and other vegetable crops. This is a real concern for organic gardeners like me who rely heavily on compost and often acquire manure from elsewhere.

Dow's Aminopyralid was associated with the loss of thousands of home gardens in Great Britain last year! If you are always searching for compost ingredients like me, be careful where you get your manure. The Authors of this piece warn us to ask questions about safety before buying manure or compost that contains manure.

They end the article with these words about this problem: "Alert your friends and local composting facilities - gardeners work too hard to lose their food to corporate greed and government loopholes." I agree! That is why I am doing what they advise by telling all of you - my gardening friends.

Pick up a copy of Mother Earth News - Guide to Growing Your Own Food for more details. The article I'm referencing will make you angry, but the rest of the bookazine will cause you to get excited for the promise of the new season ahead. Just watch out for killer compost!

Thanks Cheryl and Barbara for this warning.