Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Alaska Started the garden tonight.

A dozen 6" pots, each with 3 seeds of four varieties of tomato- Sub Arctic 25, Early Tanana, Swedish, and Polar Baby. Another half dozen variatals ( Polar Beauty, Siberia, et. al.) were left waiting in the wings. Extra germinations beyond one per pot will be sub-divided- not all will have room in the greenhouse, but I'll get some production off them anyway... they will all wind up in garbage-bag-lined milk cases as container plants... easy to move around, and warmer soil temps.

I buy my seeds a year ahead of time, because often they are not yet out when I want/need to plant - for tomatoes anyway. Cucs will be started in two weeks.

By mid-May, the living room with its big southern-exposure picture windows will be a jungle- then they get moved to the unheated greenhouse. Can't wait until I get my heated garage with attached heated-slab greenhouse finished. I'll probably die about then....

I'll have ripe tomatoes from mid-June thru October- sometimes well into November as the green ones harvested at freeze-up ripen on newspaper on the kitchen counter ("handy snacks"!). Cucs will last almost thru September.

They taste SO much better than the cardboard store-boughts.... even if they are a PITA.

I'll start some broccoli later to set out in my moose-fenced raised beds, along with lettuce and peas. Sometimes I throw in a few cabbage and cauliflour plants. I'll start a second lettuce crop later- as it goes rank pretty fast..

Las: That is good to hear. I planted spices last week in my windows here in Seward after calculating the the amount of sunlight hours and days from solstice and days to sprout and figured I had a good chance of getting some starting them now. Well, everyone laughed their ass off and said that I was wacked. At this point only successful plants will save my reputation I think. But it sounds like you have have experience with starting this early so at least I have some hope.....

Well, if you buy greenhouse plants, you will get ripe tomatoes about a week before freeze-up in an unheated greenhouse down here (Interior is different). Broccolli/cabbage/cauliflower/lettuce excepted. Or you can pay $18 a tomato plant for something that works..

Considering your weather over there- you are probably doomed!

But give it a shot anyway.

Cool, i was giving my dad chit when i was visiting the other day, he had started to plant seeds in pots in various places around the house, while outside it was 15 degree's and 2 ft of snow still on the ground. guess he aint to bad if you AK guys have started already!

he dont have a greenhouse, so by the time the garden starts looking good, the elk normally take care of it!

poor dad has been trying to grow a garden scince his retirment, just to keep him busy, as of yet, all he has done is fed some of the local wildlife!

I really need to get a green house going. Waiting until June to plant cuc's is for the birds. Sounds like you got it all down.

I remember seeing the pictures! will be needing directions to your abode about July.

Just look for the old guy in the leopard-skin loin-cloth and purple goose-bumps.

Mmm!! Cabbage!

Las, You met a fishin guide named Gary Conradi yet??

Nope. I do inadvertently know a bunch of others, tho.

I don't personally fish where guides fish if I can help it.. And I use a 60 foot gill net to get the salmon I need for the freezer. Except for that one day- that leaves me free for the rest of the summer for fun fishing where people ain't.

But I do have an apartment to rent for those who want to play with their food.

How big is Soldotna?

When I started reading that line, I saw an old sprite, prancing with the water can.....NO-O-O! Thank goodness for loin-cloths! (Tell me one can't "prance" (properly) in a loin cloth).


Now, if the cat would stop going stir crazy looking out the window at snow that falls lazily or blows sideways every stinkin' day and, thereafter, tipping the planters over so that the soil is lost, perhaps we could get something started here too.

The tomatoes are up. Well some. I've got everything from 0 to 3 per pot. which is why I plant 3 seeds per pot. I'll give the dead-heads a few more days- until I've got secondary leaves on the early ones.

I'm just sitting here watching them grow. It's about as exciting as watching the tide come in up your way in winter.

(For those not in the know, Barrow, for example, has 6 inch tides, when ice-free. That's a Spring Tide, too! Storm waves may vary your milage!

It's snowing.

Two nights ago it was 18 below. About 5 degrees the last two, mid-20's during the day.

I'm not looking for the loin-cloth just yet.

It's a small reassurance, but we're grateful for it!

What do you bet the popularity of home gardens skyrockets this year?

I'll bet an "Early Tanana" tomato.

I won't. Only one of 9 came up so far.

The Swede tomatoes are nearly all looking right healthy. (don't they always!? )

You mentioned that your seeds are purchased a year ahead. Do you freeze the seeds until you are ready to plant?

Nope. In cold weather, I wear insulated bibs!

God, I love a straight line!


The answer is I throw them in a drawer and over-plant. Whatever grows, grows.

We don't want no wussy tomatoes...