Starting seeds

It’s cold out today, so we figured we’d work inside on a couple of seed related projects.

The main job was prepping seeds of various nitrogen fixing trees, namely Black Locust, Mimosa, Palo Verde, Bird of Paradise, and Esperanza. These are needed throughout an orchard to help feed the other trees and plants, and they also provide food for animals. The problem with most nitrogen fixers is that their seeds need to pass through the digestive tract of an animal in order to germinate. You can replicate this effect using acid (similar to the acid found in the stomach), but we prefer to nick the outer seed casing by sanding or grinding it. So, we got out our Dremmel tool (useful for so many jobs!), and used it to grind into the harder seeds. We then put them into a tub of hot water and will soak them overnight before planting them in cone-tainers.

The second task was planting some annuals in flats, which will later be transplanted into the garden once the risk of a freeze is past. These include things like tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers, eggplants, cucamelons, tomatillos. This is a much easier and faster job, but it did require that we braved the outside for long enough to fill the flats with soil!