We have sprouts!

The bunching onions and spinach seed flats both have plenty of sprouts popping up through the soil! Here's the spinach....I actually did a pretty good job of not over-crowding them.


And here's the bunching onions, or scallions... You can see some of the sprouts still have the seed pods attached to the tops of their stalks.



And the first round of lettuce seedlings, which I started back on January 18th, are doing pretty good. They don't look like great lush plants that are bulking out with lots of large leaves, but you can't really blame them - they're indoors, under grow lights, with an occasional small fan turned on them to simulate a breeze, and they're still growing in soilless seed-starting mix. So almost no real nutrition aside from what's in the mix, plus the occasional fertilizing with worm pee that I give them.


When it comes time to plant them out, they'll look pretty haggard for awhile, and some might not make it. That'll be because the transplanting process is pretty rough on them - these plants are all really close to each other, and they have their roots entangled with each other. Also, they'll go from the very protective micro-environment in the basement to the rough outdoors...where cold breezes will try to dry them out or chill them, bugs might try to munch on them, and things will be quite a bit more intense with temperature changes. However, this will also cause the survivors to thrive, and their roots will settle in to the soil that I'll have added compost to, and they should really take off once they're settled in.