Change that rain to trackable snow. One snow day down and two to go, according to the local Snow Witch.
The seedlings in the cold frame outdoors look great, even after brushing an inch of the slushy stuff off the storm window. When I was telling of the construction I failed to mention I laid down a layer of black landscape fabric to serve as a heat sink.
Today, gardening will be indoors tending to the plants in the grow racks and reading garden blogs.
My latest tray of seedlings on the heat mat is looking good. Planted 3 or 4 days ago with cosmos 'Pimk Pop", carrots 'Danvers', and Celeraic 'Brilliant'; the carrots are already up. Carrots are sometimes difficult to germinate here. You can plant them in cool weather and suddenly the weather spikes up to the 80 and 90 degree mark, making it almost impossible to keep them moist for the lengthy germination period.
These carrots I planted to use as transplants following an Australian gardening model. In Australia, carrots are planted almost the way we plant onion sets. I have been looking at pictures of Australian Community Gardens and I have been impressed at the lushness of their plantings. They look better than the Community Gardens of which pictures are posted here in the States. For this part of Wisconsin, planting carrots as "sets" should possibly be recommended as a "Best Practice". I will continue to follow up on this and post my results.
Additionally, I have planted a very early cropping carrots 'Little Fingers' directly into the garden. The growth habbit of this cultivar reminds me a bit growing some sort of radish.
