Tiny choosing gardener style
By Karina | February 27, 2008
Friend of Tiny Choices Frank posted recently about starting seeds. I love seeds. I love planting. I love thinking about gardens. I love seed catalogs. I wish I had a yard or something better than a bunch of windowsills above hot winter radiators in which to grow things. But I don’t, so I live vicariously through people like Frank on the internet. And last Friday, Frank started some seeds, and I am a tiny bit jealous. But he also answered a long-time question I’ve had - what’s the deal with those weird peat moss planting cups?
I hadn’t thought about peat moss in much depth, but every time I see some peat moss I do think to myself “where the heck does this come from? it is so weird and versatile!” Commercially available peat moss is decayed and compacted sphagnum, a moss that forms in bogs, and takes an awful long time to take up enough mass to be harvested for other uses. (though this page says it’s not significant.) And because it takes so long to develop, in Europe and Britain peat moss is a protected resource. Now - that first link says to use Canadian peat moss, but if it’s overfarmed in Europe and Britain, why would we want to overfarm it in Canada too? I know the faqs say that it can be an ecologically balanced system win 5 to 20 years, but wouldn’t it be better to do as Frank does and make little newspaper plant homes?
Plus, by recycling your paper at home you’re saving 1. ecological effects of peat moss production, 2. transportation effects of the moss from Canada or beyond, 3. transportation effects of the paper leaving your home (though minuscule for the few sheets you’ll need).
Two different newspaper pot styles: [one] and [two]. Frank, any tips?
Also, here’s something I could really use - a DIY kit to allow your houseplants to twitter when they need to be watered. Do you twitter? because Tiny Choices does!
Do you plan on planting a garden from seed this spring?
1907 Seed catalog image via Flickr user Burpee Gardens via creative commons license.
Topics: Food |
I don’t really have the space plus my kid gets into everything, but I will start some stuff from seed directly in the garden… you’ve got me hankering to pore over some catalogues….
I know, I just love seed catalogs! I also subscribe to mother earth news. sigh.
mmmm, seeds…Yes, I will be starting some herbs from seed. And lots of yellow columbine for the shade garden. Also bronze fennel for the swallowtail buttefly caterpillars–they love it! Then we bring the chrysalii inside and watch until they hatch and then take the butterflies back outside. (Life is a little slow in the deep south).
Hey there! Thanks for the mention! I feel like a BlogStar lately!
The technique I used for mine was, in fact, the first one you linked to, but it is a cheap geocities-hosted page, and I think your legion of loyal Tiny Choosers have swamped the site, causing it to overload.
I will try to put together a little tutorial that I can host on my own site, but it might take a little while.
I have been dithering over whether to start twittering, but I might have to cave in now and start. If I do, you will be my first twitter-buddies.
you are a blogstar!
you can also start seeds without pots at all, a la martha stewart (god help me I love her). there are molds that you pack with damp-to-wet mix, and then turn upside down and pop out preformed little squares of soil with an indentation in them. it’s kind of awesome.
also, peat moss is used extensively in soilless mixes, potting soil, etc., and as a soil amendment. Coir, which is coconut husk fibers is a MUCH better choice for all of the above, though it’s harder to find especially in a mix or a potting soil and a little pricier.
However, coir does come in really cool compressed blocks (I got a few coir mulch blocks from www.gardenerssupply.com last year), which ship well and expand in water.
also there are a lot of seed places that are using organic and environmentally friendly methods to harvest seeds, etc., and specialize in heirloom varietals. It’s worthwhile to seek them out, rather than just go straight for the burpee. Not that I don’t love some of burpee’s varietals, but I’d rather go through the seed savers exchanges, or get them raised and harvested organically. plus, burpee doesn’t carry like 10 varieties of blue potatoes!
My worm bin that I got back in November came with a brick of coir fiber. I had never seen it before, but the stuff has a fascinating texture.
The worms like it too! Unfortunately they seem to prefer eating the coir to the food scraps I wanted them to eat!
So a major part of the soil that is in those paper pots used to be coir fiber!
i love the idea about making newspaper starter pots! i never thought of that before! i usually just use small plastic ones, but this makes a lot of sense, if they don’t disintegrate before i have a chance to get them in the ground. most seeds just get misted until they get quite a bit bigger, so it seems like it’d work.
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