How do you satisfy your gardening itch in Winter?

Dogzilla, for myself anyway, I can stand gardening with such a short growing season because I have a 12 month growing season indoors with my tropical plants. I don't miss a beat, outdoor gardening just gives me more of it to do in the nice weather.
Christine

Oh, and if anyone would like to put their snow shovels down for a while, I've got a bunch of exotic, invasive asiatic jasmine that needs to be ripped out of my front yard.

And a guest room... ;>)

Amazingly enough, even tho I'm in Canada, we don't get snow in my zone significant to shovel until January. Smarty pants, you wanna send me an airline ticket too?? I'll come and rip that puppy out for ya!!

Hey DZ, I think even your off-season would be too hot for me. We start pealing down to shorts when it hits 70F... the few times we hit 80F, we actually wade out in those glacier fed lakes for relief!

Here in Southern California there's only Spring and Summer and occasionally Autumn. Back in Scotland, when we used to get fed-up of being inside we'd go out and pull the heads off sheep. What fun we had!








Just kidding! It wasn't sheep, it was the English!



Still JUST KIDDING!!!

Sounds like it would behoove the sheep and the English to keep you entertained indoors! LOL!

Winter sowing or starting seeds indoors- containers

If any of you know nurses, ask them to save saline bottles for you. They are one liter, clear plastic square bottles with screw tops. I've cut them in half, poked holes in the bottom and used them for indoor seed starting. Now I have to go see if I saved the top halves to tape back on for winter sowing outdoors. (thanks for the link to the winter sewing forum- the FAQ page was great!) I think I did, thinking of cloches for planting out early. Operating Room nurses can get you a bunch of them. (no, they won't bring you dirty ones, they rarely come within 8 feet of a patient!). The square shape is handy for saving space.

Former (hopefully forever) OR nurse turning landscape designer Susan

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Thanks for this reminder! I have some Brugsmansia seeds to plant!

Other than that, I have bags of flower heads drying, that I will collect seed from, divide, etc.... it is quite the hobby, and I get many seed & gardening catalogs in the mail, that keep me occupied.

I also draw pics of what I'd like to do in the Spring - new gardens or just renovations.

I try to hold back from all of this until after the New Years. The holidays keep me busy, and it is January, February & March that really drag on for me.

I wish I did more arts & crafts.

Hey, we're still waiting for some of you East Coast and Midwest folks to show up here in California and help us out, LOL! C'mon, airfares are cheap right now and the weeds are growing faster every day......

Winter garden fixes always available upon request, hee hee.

Whatever you do..DO NOT do this to your family TV room. They will ban you from the house. This is what my winter itch turned into last winter... http://www.victorialeshay.com/mygrowroom.html

This message was edited Dec 4, 2004 8:11 PM

Kim, you are a piker. My main rack in the basement can hold up to 75 trays at once and I always have to set up extras. Once I got carried away with gourmet pepper and tomato varieties and had to take them to a farm market to get rid of them. Thank goodness the owner knew me. By the time I got them there the plants were all a foot tall and she sold every one of them at twice what I expected. There were over a hundred of them. I kind of cringe now when I plant purple peppers and chocolate peppers and etc. :) Jessamine

LOL LOL!

sfk, thanks for the idea. I though the did IV's in bags these days! Goes to show I watch too much television. I'll have to ask about those at our local emergency hospital.

Kim, my DH built my greenhouse just to get his kitchen table back. When I filled both the greenhouse and the kitchen table, he started building PVC racks downstairs. He's on the second greenhouse now!

What do you do when your DH can barely hammer a nail in the wall??? LOL LOL. I guess you turn into SuperWoman and go build one yourself! ha ha ha. I'll figure something out...he he he.

Well, I figured out the answer to my own post...How do I cure my gardening itch??? Have a baby right before the holidays!!! LOL :) I'm actually thankful that I don't have any poor little plants out there depending on me to keep up in the garden right now! LOL. My hands (and heart) are full indoors this winter :)

P.S. But I do still DG :)

hug did you have your baby? oohhh :)

come on gives us details... when? girl? boy? weight? length? name? pic?

jump on over to the parkinglot and start a thread and give us all the "dirt" ;)

hugs

Here are my babies (for anyone who missed the "announcement")
http://davesgarden.com/forums/t/471591/

I don't think I have ever visited that forum, haven't been any kids in this house for a long time ;) Thanks for the link!

Your girls are beautiful!!! Congrats on the newest wonder! Thanks for sharing!

Wintersowing seeds definitely cures my "itch" during the winter time! In fact, I will begin sowing my seeds in earnest tomorrow-----December 21st-----the Winter Soltice!!!

Well, guess you can call me scrooge. This morning I took down my tree and the few decorations I had up for a total of 4 days. I am over Christmas and ready for Spring. All I want to do is get out there and start some lettuce seedlings and anything else that might make it under two layers of row cover. I have a plan.... there is an excavated area facing south I had dug out, ready for the day somewhere in the nebulous future when I can afford a greenhouse. (it can't hurt to dream, can it?) It's nothing but red Georgia clay but if I amend the soil and get lucky, I think I can grow some cool weather stuff. I blame it on watching the Victory Garden on saturday. It was a re-run from late sping in Boston and Kip the gardener was setting out pea seedlings he had started in peat cups. It made it seem like Spring was here and January and February really weren't going to be all that cold or all that long. Well, I am a dreamer but I have nothing to lose but a few packs of seeds.

Roseone--I wouldn't think of calling you 'Scrooge'. I think four days of Christmas decorations is about right! I love Christmas, but I think it starts too early and goes on too long...

So, for the winter gardening itch--I've been reading books--garden classics such as Katherine S. White's "Onward and Upward" group of essays. Great way for this new(ish) gardener to learn about the lore and personalities of gardening. Also Jamaica Kincaid's My Garden (Book).

Also, started lots of bulbs in pots and I'm ready to start "Winter Sowing" which I tried last year and was great fun! (Want to get some plants ready for the Spring Round Up in Cincinnati)...

Also took up Backyard Birdwatching, which isn't quite the same as gardening I guess, but somehow ties in...(see Wildlife Forum threads). Also we go on Birdwalks in our County Park (Woodland Mounds) as often as possible.

Am trying to learn nature photography and editing (but no success so far.)

Also, Huga, you are probably too busy with the babies, but Ohio State is putting on a P.L.A.N.T.S. seminar in Sharonville on January 22. The topic is home landscaping--which might be of interest to you...

Also, I'm still planting BULBS!

Have a Happy New Year! t.

tabasco, that reading material sounds good. I'll have to check my library. They don't have much, imo, but maybe I'm looking in the wrong stack. I wrote elsewhere that I started about a dozen miniature zinna seedings yesterday. I hope they live up to their promise of blooms in 6 weeks. Glad you got your bulbs started, I have a couple of bags of marked down bulbs I picked up at walmart that never got planted. I'll have to get them out of my garden shed and see if they are worth forcing. Thanks for reminding me.
The birds get seeds everyday and any stale bread or leftover popcorn. They are so cheerful on a dreary winter day.
Happy New Year to all!

Took my tree down too! I think it was up about a week.....long enough for me! DH took down th outside stuff too because it got above 40* and it's supposed to get really cold later this week. Bettr now than later, sez me. I'm going to try some winter sowing too, so I'm excited to see how well it works here in the frigid wasteland of Wisconsin!

Yes, Christmas is over, although I realize some celebrate til January 6th. I still have some cut evergreen branches wrapped with tiny blue lights on my entry porch, they are coming down today. I'll put the branches on the blueberry bed. Trying to figure out some way I can afford a grow shelf with lights but so far I don't think so. I do have an old "portable" plastic greenhouse that fits over a metal frame I bought on ebay a few years ago. My ex is going to come over and set it up for me, it's way more than I can manage on my own. Then I can get some things growing.
Almost forgot, I celebrated New Year's Day by getting out all my old seeds and cataloging them so I know what I already have. Some seeds are in open paper packs and are 3 or 4 years old, any easy way to tell if they're still viable?

Hi Huga--hope your little ones are thriving and you are enjoying the quiet (garden) season and I loved your pics of your family and new little one!

Roseone, yes, i love to spend time in the library but sometimes have to use the Interlibrary Loan since they don't have as many books as they used to--but they can usually get them for me. No new gardening books to report--am reading Time Travellers Wife, though. Pretty good.

Truth is I haven't gotten my bulbs finished--still have lots of little allium to do around my hostas so my plan is TODAY *for sure* to spread out the bulbs on the ground and then cover them with planting soil mix. (I think I over did it on the bulb buying!)

On birdwatching--am getting better at ID-ing so we are planning to do the Audubon/Cornell Backyard Bird watch starting February 18-21. It sounds like a good winter project for those of us with feeders or with families, or really anyone interested in birds and you don't have to have much experience or knowledge, just a basic interest in backyard birds that come to your feeder....
something new for us to do...Here's the link if anyone is interested...

http://www.birds.cornell.edu/pr/GBBCfollowuppr.html

Am still fooling with the camera with no good results. thought i would try Gardenwife's recommendation to try to edit pics with GIMP software...a free download...maybe that will help!

Am starting the Winter Sowing. Also thought the pictures of the home made Seed Racks posted elsewhere were interesting....

My bulbs in pots in the garage are starting to come up--don't know if it is too early for them...Is spring just around the corner? Uh,,,,, don't really think so but it's nice to play pretend! At least the sun is out today!

take care. happy gardening. t.

I learned how to knit, and ticked off the Hubby with a jungle of house plants.
: )
Dena

Today the sun came out for the first time in 17 days...so i pulled some old weeds in my garden! I can't believe there's no frost in the ground. If it's going to be winter, I sure wish we had some snow. My husband and I pass our time snowmobiling in the winter. When there's snow that is! Working on my seed list helps too. To early to start seeds, I think. I'm new to gardening and really want an organic garden this summer. I have such visions for an awesome garden!

We're having unseasonably mild weather here in Alaska, for sure. Some nights it dips to freezing, but during the day, it warms. What little snow we had has melted off and there is standing water in the yard. Really strange.

I've been working on my seed orders, first checking my seed tote for stock, then making a list. Our days are short now, so it is good to keep busy, and if I get cabin fever, I can always look through my garden photos from last summer.

I scratch my itch with an 18 in. stack of gardening catalogs- LOL.


OOPPS.... and DG of course! [said very sheepishly]

This message was edited Jan 11, 2006 12:43 AM

Oh, yes, I forgot the hours I spend in the Garden.

I've lived in zone 9 for the last 17 years - this is my first winter in zone 6! My mom still lives in zone 9 and her daffodils are budding out. I'm itching, I'm itching!

I've been so desparate for "green" that I "rescued" a sweet potato from our Thanks Giving dinner and it is now leafing out nicely on the kitchen window sill. I wish I had rescued more. I'm thinking of buying a few more the next time I go to the grocery store!

I've never had to start seeds "indoors before your last frost date" before, either, but I recently bought a seed starter warming mat, and will soon be putting that into use.

I've never had space, before, either, so I have a bunch of graph paper, building lavish, wonderful, impossible things out of paper and colored pencils. And the first of the seed catalogs are rolling in... poor DH doesn't know that his wife is catching/has caught a terminal disease!

Taking winter "shade/sun" readings to see where we should situate the "some day" green house. No harm in dreaming! It's the first step to making a reality.

Wishing I was back in zone 9, but thrilled to be out of the suburbs and with a few acres - even if they are covered in tan sand at the moment. (It's sand at least 10 ft down, but they say it's easy stuff to weed...) Took us18 years to get out of the city and back to a rural area, but we did it. 18 years of dreaming and planning and saving and drawing castles in the clouds. I can't wait for our first spring on our on plot of land!

Unseasonably warm right now, so probably I should water our baby trees before the next freeze visits.

Jeez Louise, It got to near 50 degrees on Saturday, so the top 3 inches of the front flower beds thawed enough to actually get outside and do some garden cruising! I weeded out some stray pansies, brought all the cardboard out to the vegetable garden to lay down between the raised beds, raked up some really wet leaves to put in the leaf barrel, and kept pinching myself to remember that I live in Northern Vermont and it's only January! When I noticed peony shoots, new growth on the delphinium and globe thistle, then I started to worry. When the temp dropped 50 degrees overnight, froze everything solid and then we only got a tiny bit of snow, instead of the 6-10" forecasted, then I really started to worry. Oh well, I guess I just need to go back inside and start reading the catalogues again!

Yes, the strange (warm and sunny) weather is playing tricks on my peonies too. Hope they won't be harmed when the ice and snow come next month. Oh, well...

In the meantime--putting in my seed orders, getting ready to winter sow, and I finally took my Amaryllis out of storage to try to get them growing.

Oh, I also paid up my various garden/plant society 2006 dues today.

I'm not getting many catalogs this year so I'll have to rely on on-line ordering. Not quite the same or as fun, but I guess I'm saving paper...

Have fun. t.