Sowing vegetables outside

For a lot of crops it is time to start sowing, we still get frost at night while during the day the temperature rises to 15°C. The sun is already very powerful and starts warming up the soil. A few years ago we had made something like a very small foil tunnel to sow underneath, but I dedicated a whole plant bed as a seed bed. So the rest of the plant bed gets covered by straw (not to much). Straw isolates nicely and protects the upcoming sprouts from being eaten by the birds.

I started with the plastic cover. I marked the size of the cover and sowed small rows of the following:

• Celery root Porthos
• Romaine lettuce
• Pick lettuce, different kinds (3 rows)

Then I put back the cover. I had a thermometer in the ground under the cover and the ground is there about 12°C.

Then I prepared rows over the entire bed and started sowing. I put a marker with the variety at the start of the row and sowed following:

• Red cabbage Rodynda
• Wilde Rocket
• Sweet peas Heraut
• Palm cabbage Nero di Toscana
• Onion red Robelja
• Onion Rijnsburger 5/ Bajosta
• Onion Cuisse de Poulet
• Broccoli Calinaro
• White cabbage Dottenfelder Dauer
• White cabbage Holsteiner Platter
• Cauliflower Neckarperle
• Swede Wilhelmsburger
• Leek Herbstriesen 2/ Hannibal
• Kale Lerchenzungen
• Oatroot (vegetable oyster)
• Oak leaf lettuce Red Salad Bowl

Partly I emptied the entire package on one row. Once the seedlings come up and have there first set of real leafs (not only the seed leaves) the small plants will be transplanted to another bed and planted with the needed spacing. The oatroot, of course, will not be transplanted, but will be thinned out as the plants grow to the spacing they need. The lettuce also stays in this bed, and I will pick these as they grow for baby leaf to make nice salads until they reach the needed spacing. After that I will pick only the outer leaves of the lettuce, so the plant will grow on.

The sweet peas where sown with a useful spacing, so these might stay in this bed. How ever the onions where sown very thickly, so I must be careful when I transplant them. We use a lot of onions, so I wanted to sow many extra (beside the onion sets I already put in the ground). I also want to use the green of these sowed onions in green salads during the spring and summer.

While selecting the varieties I did not pay enough attention to what could already be sown, so I sowed the kale to early. That was to start in Mai, but that is only 2 weeks from now, so I am positive that this won’t be a problem.

I am very excited that finally the growing season is starting again and I am looking forward to finally harvest some lettuce again. It always makes me so happy when everything is starting the turn green again.