Plant Spa Day

Today I had my help coming in and had a lot of work to do on seedlings and houseplants.

Feeding the seedlings for the first time was top of the list. I make a custom mix to feed the seedlings. It includes Plant-sure, SeaCrop, Neptune 2-3-1, Armor Si, and Pepzyme.

Next was feeding all the house plants. I try to do this once a month. They also get a custom mix: Plant-sure, Seacrop, Miracle Gro, Armor Si and Pepzyme. Over 25 years ago I bought a HUGE box of Miracle Gro and I am still trying to use it up.

While my help fed everything, I gave the mesclun a haircut (lunch!) and spread them out in their own tray so they would not become tangled together.

Some of the bay laurels had picked up scale and I got the 90% alcohol and Q-Tips and removed it.

Next we planted the cured ginger root and put it on the heat mat. One of the bay laurels has yet to root, so it went into the tray with the ginger.

Then I started emptying pots with dead plants to save the stones I needed for drainage in my next project.

I had started bay laurel plants months ago and they needed larger pots. They had been in the big tray that was now under the ginger, and would need humidity trays. I had gotten a big bag of glass pebbles from BuyNothing and they would work beautifully in the humidity trays.

One of the bay laurels had died, so I am down to 4 now: the one doing the best in my office, the one that hasn’t rooted, and the 2 to transplant. I had a bag of organic potting soil given to me so I was going to use that for the bay laurels. They were put into 6” pots and then under the high density light.

My African violets had not been doing so well and I wanted to start some leaves to root before I repotted them. I wasn’t sure they would survive the repotting. So we found the little rooting pots and made a humidity tray for them also.

We cleaned up the mess and had a cup of tea before resuming work. I had started more seedlings on Tuesday and none were up yet, but would be in the next day or so. They would need lights at that time.

We had gotten the frame for the bottom shelf and light built, now it was time to get the rest of the shelving and lights up. We nearly finished getting them up and it was lunch time.

Homemade borscht and dark rye bread for the helper and quinoa, greens, sliced almonds and dressing of sesame oil, balsamic vinegar, tamari, celery salt and pepper for me, with ginger water to drink.

We finished getting the lights up and working and I sat down to make notes about all we’d gotten done. Keeping track of when I do things gives me a good idea of where I am each year. I’ll know how long it took the ginger to come up with heat under it, the African violets will hopefully sprout leaves in a timely manner, and I will be able to see if there’s a growth spurt due to feeding. The Armor Si is a new addition to the feeding mix, and I will be looking for glossy strong leaves.

So that’s the Plant Spa day at Golden Oak Farm.