In this unusually mild winter where it’s looking a lot like it’s not going to freeze after February (actually, February itself is starting off in the 60s day and 40s at night), my recent attempts to clean out the beds so they can be prepped for early plantings has taken on a bit of urgency. Moon is waxing (rising) for the next 8 days, so I’ve been folding newspaper pots by the dozen while sitting here at the desk.

Waxing moon is for above-ground plantings, so I’ll be starting peas, collards, bib lettuce, spinach and kale over the next week. The little pots fit tightly into glass cake pans, which makes it easy to evenly water from the bottom, which encourages early root growth. These will go onto shelves built to the big south facing window in the library. From there the seedlings can go straight into the ground (paper pot and all) by mid-february. If it freezes after that the pea cage can be covered with plastic at night, and milk jugs with the top end cut off fit nicely over the new greens. A new rush of peas should be planted as soon as the moon turns waxing again.

Once the moon has passed full it will be time to plant seeds for root vegetables. Which for early spring are beets, bunching onions, leeks, potatoes, carrots and radishes. Now, radishes are best planted to ‘mark’ rows of direct-seeded crops beginning in April because they grow so quickly and can be harvested early as the primary seedlings get established. But I like to grow a row of radishes for the spicy little seed pods they produce after flowering, so those I’ll start in paper pots indoors and interplant in the bed with leaf lettuces around the first of March.

Now’s a pretty good time to start the summer’s tomatoes and peppers as well, so the seedlings will be sturdy, well-leafed and quite full by the time they go into the cold frame in late March to early April. I’ll wait another six weeks to start the cukes, squashes, beans and pumpkins, as they don’t go out until May. Won’t need many new seeds this year, just carrots and more beets. Going to try Johnny’s “Atlas” carrots this year because long carrots tend to come out of the ground looking like man-roots in my soil, and the Atlas carrots are short and round like beets.

As for beets, I have to say I’m impressed enough with the hybrid “Moneta” I planted last year. Nice red roots that peel and slice easily and greens that are excellent in salads or as side greens. They also keep well and are vry juicy. In these days of leftover radioactive contamination from Fukushima, beets are about the best food-derived blood tonic anywhere. And since the blood/lymph system is where radiation does its most immediate damage, that’s something to think about. High in antioxidants, vitamins A, C. B1 and B6, beets are reported to have anti-cancer properties and also contain ample amounts of iron, magnesium, potassium and calcium.

Beet juice is also a fine health drink, always with a sweetness that is very palatable. I’ve been slicing those and the leeks I finally finished harvesting last week for drying, as they’re too old to make good side dishes or salads. I’ll powder the dried slices when I powder dried leeks, celery, carrots and tomatoes to use as soup broths and veggie-based table salts. As they are sliced I’ve been popping them into a bowl of cold spring water with ascorbic acid (powdered vitamin C) until I’m ready to line them up on the trays for drying. The water turns the most gorgeous shade of deep red, and I’ve been using that water to make lemonade (from bottled lemon juice). It’s redder than cranberry juice, but pretty and the sweet allows me to use less sugar. So far nobody’s complained, and it just makes the juice healthier than it otherwise would be.

Because so much of the garden was allowed to go fallow last year due to a constant excess level of fallout from the Fukushima nuclear accident’s plumes, I’m hoping to make good use of the extra months this year. Will plant twice as many beets and peas, spring and fall. More leeks, more bunching onions, more carrots and squashes. And yes, I am going to once again attempt eggplant and artichokes, even though that never seems to work out well. You never know what the weather’s going to be like, and global warming isn’t making things any easier to predict. But a peach tree ‘volunteered’ from the compost bin last year and is already over 10 feet tall, I’m hoping it’ll bear this year. Apples, pears and grapes all suffered miserably in the heat last year, I didn’t get enough out of any of ‘em to bother harvesting. If the peach does fruit I’ll get more, along with plums and figs.

And it’s not just me. The USDA [United States Department of Agriculture] just last week released a brand new Plant Hardiness Zone map (pictured above) which reflects changes due to warming climate. I’ve gained a whole zone, so peaches and figs should do fine. If I gain another one I’m going for oranges!

Do check out the new zones for where you live [Map Link], because for many of us this represents a whole new plan for how we go about growing our food. We can start relying on the extra weeks and/or months of growing season to plan our crop rotations, and even choose different cultivars we may have always wanted to grow but couldn’t.

Since this is one of the warmer winters in many regions, get busy right now making those plans. If I waited until 6 weeks prior to last frost in my old zone (May 10), I’d lose 10 entire weeks of growing time. So Happy Paper Pots all you homesteaders out there! Let’s make 2012 a super-abundant year for our yards, gardens and croplands in the hope that this year, none of our neighbors – far and wide – go hungry.

February has always been “The Longest Month” of the year. Which is no doubt why they made it the shortest month of the year. It’s cruel, it’s cold, it’s interminable as the days get longer and the longing for spring becomes almost unbearable. So February is when I start my early spring crops in flats, place them on shelves in the big library window facing south. Up right now and looking good are the Russian Red kale, Winterbore kale, spinach, white and purple onions and a first rush of 60 pea plants.

This February has been warmer than most here in southern Appalachia, which gets our hopes up too high too fast, I know. We can bet real money that it’ll get very cold again very soon, and we just might get a blizzard in March. So I have been careful not to get ahead of myself.

Grandson built a moveable cold frame of salvaged windows that is definitely going to come in handy, but we haven’t really started on the soil turning yet. Need to do that, get the accumulated weeds out, and dig in some good compost. We built a nifty pea support contraption yesterday of PVC, over which we can add the actual string supports when the bed’s ready. Then we can plant the first rush seedlings on one side, and direct seed a second rush on the other side to extend our crop and harvest time. Spinach seedlings will go in with direct-seeded lettuces, and the kales will go into a separate bed I’ll interplant with radishes.

Potatoes really must go in by mid-March, so thankfully my Ronniger’s Potato Garden catalogue got here in the nick of time. Now, many people will claim – with some validity – that potatoes are so cheap to buy at the grocery that it’s silly to take up valuable garden space with them. But good, varietal and organic potatoes aren’t that easy to find in the grocery store, and potatoes are actually so easy to grow that I think everybody should plant some! This year I’m going with some purple vikings, bison reds, and a nice yellow variety I haven’t decided on yet (so many to choose from!).

I am in zone 7 per my nice little microclime here at the ‘stead, which means I could grow two crops of potatoes a year if I wanted. Haven’t done it yet, but with more family moving in to get through the depression, I might go ahead and do a fall crop this year too. Going intensive on the greens, beans, winter squash, tubers, onions and such as well, and doubling up the tomatoes and peppers, planting plenty of celeriac, beets, turnips and parsnips. The root crops, winter squash, pumpkins and potatoes will keep all winter in hay in my under-shed root cellar – I want it to be full this year. Grandson and I will have to build another solar food dryer too, so we can keep up.

Deal is, you don’t need multiple acres and expensive equipment to produce a lot of food. Urban and suburban homesteaders can produce quite a lot. My actual truck space in the garden is about a third of an acre, I’ve kept it for nearly 20 years by myself, will have some extra hands this year. Which is good, because I’m 60 years old this year! Planned well and managed well, only the long-season crops put space out of commission so long you can’t get at least a couple of crops before next winter. And if you’re willing to do the work, interplanting and intensive planting can definitely return a lot. Always amend with good compost and some fish fertilizer if you can get hold of some. Have a ready supply of very hot habanero juice for managing soft-bodied bugs, get used to stripping hard-bodied beetles with your hands (they don’t bite) and getting rid of them. Twice a day for some crops.

Today it’s nearly 70º, the lady bugs are swarming out of their winter havens. While pruning grapes, apples and roses, I left all the mantis ‘nests’ I encountered. Encouraging helpful bugs works almost as well as picking off the unhelpful ones. And if you are like me and don’t spend any time in the hot summer sun if you can help it, plan to do your garden chores early in the morning or in the evening hours after the sun is down. The garden will love you just as much for it, but you won’t be too sweaty and uncomfortable while doing your jobs.

Oh… and by all means, get busy on those newspaper pots! These cost you little or nothing, are easy to make, and can be planted out just like peat pots when that time comes.

In another [post] the idea of porch and kitchen gardens was introduced. Growing herbs and some vegetables in containers in your own kitchen (if it has a sunny window or two), on your deck, porch or patio can be a lot of fun, and can lend personality to your environment through the different types of containers you choose and arrange.

There are some great ideas out there, as well as some wacky ones. You can add height with hanging planters, accessibility with window boxes, depth with different size containers arranged in groupings. You can build your own, go ‘thrifting’ at your neighborhood garage sales and secondhand shops, or raid the shed, garage, basement and attic. Heck, you can even put those discarded fixtures from when you remodeled the bathroom to eclectic use!

Old copper teakettles, worn out cowboy boots, old 55-gallon trash cans with holes (metal or plastic, cut short), old buckets, boxes and drawers… anything that will last awhile in the weather, can be made to drain water and will hold dirt can be made into a planting container or patio/yard conversation piece.

How about an old toilet with flowers growing in the tank and a bird bath in the bowl? An old claw-foot bathtub on the patio edge with a recycling fish tank water pump fall, water lilies and goldfish? That rusty old oil space heater can be sanded and painted, set in the kitchen or porch corner to hold that gallon-size copper kettle full of basil.

Old Easter baskets can be turned into hanging containers, just line with plastic and attach some chain or rope. Those 55-gallon plastic trash cans can be cut down and filled with enough dirt to grow tomatoes, peppers and herbs all planted together and trellised into nice arrangements. Paint them any color you like, add some decals or designs.

Coffee cans and cookie tins make excellent planters for herbs. Your kids’ old toys and wagons work nicely as containers, either for small succulents (in the bed of that big old Tonka dump truck) or a nice clip-able lettuce crop. An old chest of drawers can make a very nice kitchen planter, with drawers opened step-wise and sectioned with boards to hold dirt only in the space of their opening.

Check out some of the cool links below, and see what you can create from the ‘junk’ you’ve got sitting around!

Links:

6 uses for your old bathtub

Weird, Wonderful and Whacky Planters

Unusual Ideas for Planters

DIY Network: Container Gardening