Max,
"But having a CSA farm makes the scale of your plantings reasonable."
Just to clarify, it's not really my farm, but I have a work share membership, and the owners have been generous enough to let me work for greenhouse bench space and a row in the big garden for my tomatoes, in addition to my weekly bushel of veggies. They lost a huge amount of melons, squash and their own tomatoes in a week, when a herd of 60 deer suddenly showed up after leaving the place alone for 2 1/2 seasons. They will put up a double electric fence next year.

@Maxx2 - I use heat mats for eggplants, tomatoes, peppers and whatever special flowering plants I've chosen that year. Here, WS tomatoes and such come up much later than the indoor heat ones and we don't sell seedlings at the Master Gardener sales. For myself, I have wall-o-water and row covers so I can plant out earlier.

My fave for indoor are Root Trainers (you can get them at Amazon) as they take up so little space but give you something you can put right into the ground. I can get a bunch of them on my heat mat and then under the lights.



Rootrainers are 4 per row, 8 rows - so they start 32. And you can see when placed by the cups (24 in the box when full) how much less space they take.



And then right into cups to harden off.



The cups are 18oz from Costco, they're more squat and don't tip over as easily as other cups, I re-use mine.

Ok, time to sway me. What houseplants ya got in the swap? Looking to expand my collection of indoor plants.

I think Lisa and I both have Calla Lilies/Zantedeschia listed. Well, they're houseplants where I live, anyway They do go outside for the summer. They don't seem to pick up pests and bring them back inside

Popping in to say that I've been trying to collect more seed and get my number of packets up to how many folks wishlisted an item. I am still able to go out and harvest seed - even still harvesting tomatoes (ripe, not green). When you're done tonight, if you had something of mine wishlisted that was not bought and it wasn't available - ping me and I'll see if I have more..

The only one I know I don't have more because a bunch of folks wishlisted was the dwarf pink columbine. BUT - and we've all been there - you collect seed, put your dishes out, answer the phone or do some work and the next day go ????. I do have one envelope that could make 2 packets of 20 that I labelled "probably pink dwarf columbine". Don't have it up for trade as not 100% sure - but the seed heads (I left a few in) are smaller than my Krystall so I'm pretty sure that's what it is. I'll give those for free into your baggies. Just let me know if you want to try it. It is Definitely columbine.

@okieheart - it looks like there is A LOT of Coleus still available to dib. Many folks consider them houseplants.

I've made a new resolution. I have a database built for the seeds I have. I've resolved to fill in all the info for the seeds as I win them while the reason I bid on them, where I want to use them, etc., is fresh in my mind. I tried to resolve that I would only bid on what I knew I could plant next year but that just wouldn't fly.

Great idea Leslie! Sorry to hear I'm not the only person who finds herself staring at a flat of seedlings, wishing she could remember where she planned on putting them

okieheart said:Ok, time to sway me. What houseplants ya got in the swap? Looking to expand my collection of indoor plants.

I've also been eyeballing Bomarea distichifolia

@Joolie How do you think this one would do? (I should add that DH doesn't approve of houseplants, so my "eyeballing" is mainly fantasizing )

@okieheart - Julie's special Sinningia is gone but Audrey still has one listed. They also make good houseplants.

Nabbed some photos of seedheads yesterday when I collected more so you could see that I really am still able to collect certain ones

But, first I'll show you the Rose of Sharon starts so you know we did have normal colder weather a bit before this warm spell and the plants with seedheads I'm showing look a LOT better in growing season, the're alive but it is mid-Nov, so look a bit scraggly with my thinking they'd be dormant soon and not deadheading. The Hibiscus are just doing what they should be for this time of year.



Seedheads - one of the Scabiosa (the birds like them so I leave them up for them).



Floral Showers Snapdragon (once I cut those seedheads, it'll bloom until a hard frost)



Salvia Coccinea Texas Hummingbird Sage (another that with deadheading will go to a hard frost ).



THis shows the purple calyxes better.


And, tomatoes still harvesting all of the offered ones (the specks are because I'd pulled the squash up off the ground and it scratches them, they're normally smooth). I have more fermented and dried I'll pack today.



I'll be making more packets to keep up with wishlisted items, but not for much longer , so if you think you'd like something before the swap ends - put one star next to it so it'll show for me.

FREEBIE - in addition to the Columbine mentioned above, I had another seed mix up you're welcome to by letting me know and I"ll put it in your packet.

If you plan to grow BOTH Eva Purple Ball Tomato and Chocolate Cherry Tomato, I had two dishes fermenting that the cats knocked the labels from. One is for sure Eva Purple Ball Tomato and one is for sure Chocolate Cherry. You'd know which is which as soon as it set flowers as the cherry grows in clusters. So, you could label them then and know moving forward which is which. These are free to a good home, mention here or ping me if I should toss them in your baggie.

Chocolate Cherry lower left, Eva Purple Ball center top, Peacevine lower right - they're normally a bit bigger (though not as big as Chocolate Cherry, tend to be the same as Cherry 100+) but I had critters disturbing roots in that bed.

The bomarea and sinningia both make excellent houseplants! If I'm out of ninja packets I'll go see if I can dig up some more, because I can't recommend that plant highly enough as a houseplant - even without flowers, the leaves are so gorgeous. I keep telling mine, "Look at you, you're so pretty!" 😂

The b. distichifolia is also great because it's so well contained. This bomarea is not a vine, and each stalk grows only so tall. Every stalk flowers, too! The stalks are not terribly forgiving if you let it dry all the way out to the point it wilts, but it'll put up new shoots quickly.

NOT a good houseplant: the impatiens laurentii. I got it thinking it might be, but nuuuuupe. That is the stickiest, messiest plant ever, next to the iochroma, which it was in fact next to. What a whole mess.

Cape sundew is a great houseplant. I'm gonna try to dig up a few seeds today to add, at least some of the funkier stuff. Maybe some teacup flower, I have more of that than I need. And mini bell peppers, those actually make good slightly larger houseplants too. Plus they feed you. 🤔

Mariposamaid will be joining in on night #4 as suggested for someone with under 12 packets offered on day 1...

If you had her seeds wishlisted, check out her offerings now.

Lisa/iShare

Yes, I'll be offering poncirus trifoliata Flying Dragon
https://www.gardeningknowhow.c...

Fish pepper, and Hairy Balls!

Faerygardener said:FREEBIE - in addition to the Columbine mentioned above, I had another seed mix up you're welcome to by letting me know and I"ll put it in your packet.

If you plan to grow BOTH Eva Purple Ball Tomato and Chocolate Cherry Tomato, I had two dishes fermenting that the cats knocked the labels from. One is for sure Eva Purple Ball Tomato and one is for sure Chocolate Cherry. You'd know which is which as soon as it set flowers as the cherry grows in clusters. So, you could label them then and know moving forward which is which. These are free to a good home, mention here or ping me if I should toss them in your baggie.

Chocolate Cherry lower left, Eva Purple Ball center top, Peacevine lower right - they're normally a bit bigger (though not as big as Chocolate Cherry, tend to be the same as Cherry 100+) but I had critters disturbing roots in that bed.

I want chocolate cherry, and I'll be happy to try Eva Purple ball, if there's enough to go around.

Faerygardener said:
If you plan to grow BOTH Eva Purple Ball Tomato and Chocolate Cherry Tomato

I'd like to give them a try -- a couple seeds of each would be plenty.

Does the Eva Purple Ball get darker? (or do I need new glasses?!)

Thanks!

@Faerygardener I'd like some too. I already had the chocolate cherry wishlisted.

Soooooo, anyone interested in mystery tulip seeds that could be 'lady Jane', 'little beauty' or anything in the 'wildflower tulip mix'...(or if you believe my completely wrong husband, may even actually be fritillaria though I'm 99.99% sure it's not, ROFL) I'm not going to plant them, but they were so ripe and volunteering themselves I had to collect them even though I'd long forgotten what the bloom had looked like since it's a mix there. 🤷🏼‍♀️ I don't generally expect them to give me seeds so I never bothered to keep track.

I ran across them while digging up my ninja seeds and thought I'd put that out there.

Just gotta love caladiums. I wish these made seeds!