How to direct sow seeds in late winter/Garden Style nw

[Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] hi everybody Debbie here with Garden style so today I am finally able to get out into the veggie beds and start refreshing them getting some seeds planted uh had a little delay this past week we uh got a surprise snow overnight and it was five or six inches of really really wet snow and that caused our Greenhouse to collapse at the nursery so been busy cleaning up after that um and it's all okay we uh have cleaned it up since then we managed to save the plants that were on the inside but that was quite the surprise to walk in the next day to work and see the greenhouse flat as you can see in the picture that I have in front of you now so now I'm showing you the blank spot that is sitting there and uh we have a new greenhouse on order we hopefully we'll get that back in here in the next two to 3 weeks and build a new one so meanwhile we've had some really cold temperatures at night we've had a a really weird like cold snap that has hit this first week of March so it's made it very difficult to get outside and honestly you don't want to be outside cuz it's been so cold but today we finally have a break in the weather and I'm taking full ADV vage and I figured I would just bring you along as I start to freshen up the veggie beds and get them ready for seeds and I got to move quickly here um it's already the first week of March and I'll be planting things today like carrots and radishes of course lettuce and numerous other items that you can plant right now here in the cold now it's real important you look at the back of your seed packets and see when your last frost date is and for us here uh in zone 8 is April 1st so it's a good idea to count back from your last frost date and figure out the exact time that your seed should go in the ground and they will give you all that information on the back of the seed packet so for instance I'm planting lettuce today and it only needs 40 to 45° temps in the soil uh and that's actually temperatures during the day that will help warm the soil and it doesn't need to be that warm in order for a lettuce to come up uh same with spinach carrots radishes uh kale I'm waiting on the broccoli I usually get broccoli starts rather than planting them by seed so those of course won't be going in probably till the end of this month uh weather permitting of course we don't get any strange surprises from Mother Nature but today I just thought I would uh show you what I'm doing to freshen up my garden beds for vegetables so I started one let me flip you around that's the finished product right there there so it's all ready for seeds and this one and all the rest of them are raised beds that I'm going to be refreshing today now here in the Northwest we are very blessed to have Olympic mountain fish compost and this is something I've had really good luck with it with uh in the past especially with my veggies as you can see here it's very high in uh nitrogen which is really important especially for your green leafy veggies so I always throw in some fresh compost every year and for my beds here they're not real low a lot of times you know if you get a lot of rain and stuff they'll compact down and you just need to add more and I encourage you to add more anyway um just so you're adding more nutrients to the soil and at this point um when I start refreshing all these beds look at that all kinds of garlic I got onions coming up already but by refreshing them you're not only adding nutrients to the soil but what I do is I kind of turn the soil over and get air in there with all the rain that we have it really compacts them down and makes it difficult for little seedlings to push their way through so I go through all of these beds and put in a fresh layer of compost and I mix it as best I can with the original soil that was in there and little and behold it is ready for seeds so you can go ahead and follow along with me here as I work on this to show you the steps that I go through so here we [Music] [Music] [Applause] go [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] oh [Music] [Applause] [Music] a [Music] okay the seeds are in and now I got to throw some deer netting over the top to keep my lovely kitty cat from digging around in the bed so I'll show you how I do [Music] that [Music] okay and there you have it so this is just a real thin sheet of uh deer netting and what I used was some old rebar uh pieces that I had left over when I tore apart some Landscaping so they're coming in handy now as they will help hold that netting in and it's kind of a rough surface so I don't think I need anything to like secure the netting down you know in case of wind that kind of thing but it's just enough to irritate the cat so he'll move on and stay out of my garden beds until my seeds come up so we'll definitely follow up on this a little later um so that you can see the results but you're probably wondering what type of seeds I actually planted and uh let me grab the pack here and I can show you so I planted some radishes and this is called uh Cherry Bell right here and this is all from territorial seed good Heavens I can get it to focus there you go but you'll notice on the back of most of your seed packets right here it's going to tell you what the soil temperature should be like 45 to 80° is what these seeds will need and that's about what we average now now at this time of the year and of course days to germination radishes take no time at all 4 to 11 days for them to start to sprout um but I will tell you when you're planting seeds especially here in the month of March Mother Nature can certainly give us some surprises just like she did this past week so just thought I would show you what I do uh at this time of the year I really enjoy direct sewing as opposed to starting seeds indoors it's just easier for me um some of you may enjoy starting seeds indoors but that's great however if you've got some real tender seedlings like that just be really careful that you're watching the overnight temperatures before you put them outside and if you do put them outside make sure you've got a covering of some sort either a frost cover you can cut up milk jugs and cover them up um you know CL cloches or another one that you can use CL I guess is the proper term but either way you want to look for frost at night and these early season veggies that I put in um are capable of handling a couple of frosts although I will cover them I have you know a real thin Frost cover that I can slide over the top at night if I feel it's going to freeze but right now I'm not too concerned it's so wonderful to see sun today which is helping to warm the soil and that's the ticket is make sure your soil is War enough and most of your seed packets on the back will tell you that so anyway I planted some cherry Bell uh radishes this is one of my favorite lettuce mixes from uh territorial called London Springs lettuce mix um and it's just a nice mixture so you have a real pretty salad and lots of different flavors and of course spinach and this is called regiment spinach and I find this to be it's like a SA boy spinach and I just find this to be fantastic when uh mixed in with other things in a salad so so anyway that's a start and the next thing I'm going to plant are carrots and I've always had really good luck with them at this time of the year and I'll show you the variety here these are called can you see that moch nties carrots but look they're like all different colors so that's really fun and they have a really nice flavor to them so that's what's getting ready to go into this bed I've got the fertilizer down now I just want to mix it in we'll get the carrot skin and covered up and I'll continue on the rest of the beds here oh my gosh look at the sunshine it feels so good especially after a week of freezing temps we've had rain mixed with snow it's just been kind of miserable this past week but I'm seeing signs of spring everywhere um I'm seeing the periwinkle flowers I'm seeing plum trees and cherry trees starting to Blossom out so whenever you can get a chance to get out in the yard now is the time to do it and try and get ahead of things so just a little recap for you um the biotone seed starter that I used is full of not only really good nutrients to get your seedling started but it also has micro Ry in it and those are just Little Critters that go in into the soil and that actually helps your seedlings take up nutrients even faster than they normally would um let alone giving them the nutrients that they need so I'm a True Believer in putting a seed starter of some sort into the soil before you put your seeds in um straight up compost is great but it always helps to give those little seedlings an extra boost once they do Sprout so that's kind of the followup to that and just to let you know the deer netting that I've put on here is just a real thin sheet and I will raise it up I've given myself some room here I've used old rebar from an old Landscaping project that I had but you can use Stakes or you know little uh hooks or anything just something to keep it in place and keep the wind from blowing it off and at the same time keep the cats from getting in and it's just a real light netting um deer netting is what I'm using at this point I had a lot left over cuz we do have an issue with deer coming into the yard but it's real thin as you can see it's just super thin just like that but it's just enough to keep the crit the kit cats if I can talk my lips are a little Frozen because it's only about 42 de out here the day um but that definitely helps the kitties from getting in and you'll notice that I've got oldfashioned metal uh label markers here and I reuse them year after year and um they just come in handy and of course they can put up with the rain here in the Northwest so that's kind of what I use to help label my seeds you guys probably have your own system but just kind of cluing in to what I'm doing and uh of course I get random onions every year you think you get them all out and they're just random they come up in places cuz a lot of times I'll Circle my veggie beds with onions or garlic and that helps keep rabbits and things like that out just CU they don't like the smell and they're easier to get to if they're sitting on the edges and that's kind of what I do with all my fruit crops uh like carrots uh radishes um anything that is growing underground I tend to put them on the edges of my raised beds so they're just easier to get to now as these start to come up of course with carrots you always have to thin them out no matter how careful you are putting the seed in you always end up with a little extra um but that's okay anything that comes up real close except for my lettuce I just let them all grow in together cuz I'm just cutting the tops off anyway when I'm getting ready ready to put them in a salad but uh there you go now we wait and the radishes will be the first thing to pop their heads through and the lettuce will probably be next and then we'll see the spinach and the carrots so it's all about timing um just make sure to read your seed packets carefully and I wish you all the success in the world this coming spring for a Bountiful Harvest there you go okay so there you go there's my quick rundown on kind of the steps I go through in the vegetable garden uh in my next video I'm definitely going to be covering the perennial bed so I pray that next week when I get another chance to get out here I could take you through the steps and what I do to clean up my perennial beds and get those ready as well but uh it's time if you haven't planted your seeds by now Now's the Time to do it especially here in the Northwest in zone 8 get those early seasoned veggies in the ground as soon as you can um I will also be putting in some new seed potatoes this year along with uh some onion sets and all those things we have received in the nursery now so I'm now I'm getting excited I can finally make some progress here in the art all right you guys of course if you have any questions or comments you can put those in the description box down below if you'd like to get a hold of our monthly newsletters just go to sunnyrest nursery.com and you can sign up for that and I will see you next week hopefully it looks like it's going to be some decent weather coming up this coming week I mean we might actually hit 60 wow that would be awesome meanwhile hope you guys are getting your hands dirty out there and we'll see you in the next one bye for [Music] now