I'm also basing it off my LFD. A bunch of my tomato seed packets were packaged by a local seed company, and they claim 6-8 weeks before the last frost. Mine is May 6th, so the earliest I should be starting my tomatoes would be March 11th. I might start them a little earlier, but that also depends on when I get my equipment (seed mix, seed tray, etc).

I am in zone 6a.

I know it seems super early but I went ahead and started my Eggplant seeds because they seem to take forever to germinate. Then once they germinate, they seem to take a long time to really get growing well....at least for me.

I will probably start my peppers 8-9 weeks before my last frost date, tomatoes 7 weeks before LFD, Cantaloupes and Watermelons a couple of weeks before LFD.

Everything else will be directly seeded in the ground.

When I enter in my zip code at a certain website (won't let me list the name of it here), it says that it is almost guaranteed I will not get frost starting May 9th. I have planted my garden as early as the end of April and as late as the third week in May. One year I did get a light frost but I just covered everything up. I am pretty sure that was the year I planted in late April.

This year I am aiming to have everything planted in the garden sometime around the second week in May.

This post was edited by Christacharlene on Sat, Feb 7, 15 at 17:21

I started tomatoes 2 weeks ago, and based on a couple of ~1ft volunteers I already have in the garden, maybe I should have started earlier. Peppers started at the same time as tomatoes. I'm seriously considering throwing some bean and squash seed in the ground to see what happens since our LFD is right about...now....and we've been sitting in the 70's-80's during the day and mid-upper 50's at night already. Think I might.

I'm planning on planting out Mother's Day weekend, which seems to be the common time for our area. I'm going to start peppers in about a week and tomatoes on March 1st. I already have onions, leeks, celery, parsley, rosemary, lavender, spinach, kale and lettuces on my seed starting rack. Onions are the only thing that's made an appearance yet, but it's so great to see something green!

I use LFD as a general guideline, but often put in the ground a couple to a few weeks after that depending on conditions. Mother's day this year hits right around my LFD, but I'm betting that I might end up closer to Memorial day for actual plant in. So I plan for a set out date of LFD with set out meaning staying in pots for hardening off/able to take back inside if it gets too cold, but usually end up planting in closer to Memorial day- one year I had to wait till beginning of June because it stayed so chilly and crummy.
And some of my decision making after LFD is the extended Farmers Almanac forecast- it isn't perfect, but it can give me a general idea of what it might be like.
But from there it depends on the seed itself. Some of my tomatoes are listed around 80-90 day, others are as short as 55-65 day, so I won't be planting all my tomato seed at the same time.
My peppers are the same way, some take longer and some shorter, so I end up staggering my planting. Like right now, I have a half dozen kinds of peppers already started, but some of them will be in a week or so along with my earliest two tomatoes, then more will get started later on with more of the tomatoes.
Oh, and I have three "indoor" tomatoes I started on New Years that we shall see how big they get or not by the time it's time to plant out. I meant them for indoor goodness, but with how long they are taking, they might end up outside.
And lettuce, spinach, and asparagus have already been seeded.

This post was edited by BeesNeeds on Sat, Feb 7, 15 at 17:34

The Sey Hey kid, I'm starting mine about Feb.15. Putting 6 plants in my new 4 x 4 grow tent and LED lights. Should have a real good head start when I plant in early May. If we have a normal summer I could be eating big ones in mid July instead of August. Good luck to yours this year.

If I don't have a running crop, I target average historical daily lows' over recent years breaking 50 F and plant outdoors at the first forecast after that having a few rain-free days actually above about 50 F as the low. I count 6 weeks before to start and they are transplanted @6-8 weeks old weather permitting (no rain or cold snap). I am usually mad I didn't start a couple of weeks earlier but that is easier said than done ;-)

If I do have a running crop (like now I have tomatoes still on the vine from autumn), I may use larger pots and transplant them as long as 10-11 weeks later to give me time to harvest the prior crop.

PC

I will start germinating this week, but only a few seeds. I like to stagger seed starting 2 weeks apart because in this highly variable northern Nevada climate the USDA zone system and last frost date are really not representative of what can happen.
We have a short, but intense growing season. LFD is officially May 15th, but it is not uncommon to have snow showers over Memorial Day weekend. Conversely, daytime highs the last few weeks have been hovering in the 50/60s and for the last few years March has had a few 80 degree days. It's just that the lows are still right around freezing all the way up to late May/early June. It can make for a frustrating gardening season. I'm saving up to buy a geodesic dome greenhouse kit, as that is the only kind of greenhouse that will survive the winds we get out here.
I have a pretty small backyard in which to garden, and with year three of our lovely drought I'll probably only do 10 tomato plants max, so it's not much trouble to set up wall of waters around the plants, which means that I can cheat a little and plant out starting in early May. I had pretty good results last summer with starting the plants mid Feb and potting the seedlings up a couple of times, and being able to take advantage of the good warm daytime sun and then moving them in at night, but this is only practical for a limited number of plants. I do start a lot of seeds, but some of them are for handing out to family and friends at Easter.
So there's my two cents. For what it's worth, that first year that I moved here and built the raised beds, and knew nothing about growing anything, was the year where everything grew like gangbusters. Hasn't happened since :)

Seed starting and planting out by farmer's almanac moon calendar.

Does moon affects the seeds in your basement ?

Seysonn

Does moon affects the seeds in your basement ?

Only my wolfbane.

I'm started my onions and some snap dragons. I like to have a lot of flowers for bees. Not for tomatoes but for stone fruit, strawberries, and blueberries. My mom used to grow them, so I added them to think of her. I grow other flowers too, I prefer to direct seed them. Many annuals are self seeding and come up every year anyway. March first peppers, March 15 tomatoes. later melons and watermelons. I have to figure out when to do them yet.
Garlic was seeded last fall.
I also have raspberry seed going from a cross I made, and some from a breeder that he never released.

Lets talk about Azoychka

I have not grown that one, but on other boards I have heard high praise. I have seeds, maybe next year. I grow one or two for general use, but most are for sauce, kinda boring but ton's of paste and sauce types to try. A couple cherries too.

Azoychka

is a top yellow/orange some say even better than KBX. I would like to try it and Orange Minsk. I grew Amana Orange it was impressive to me, and very prolific for a cold zone. I would grow it again, but Azoychka,

Orange Minsk and KBX are rated higher. Azoychka

is an early tomato too. Good luck!

Tucson is a different place. We have two short seasons, separated by a killing heat in the middle and by weak frosts at the ends.

The last frost date, depending on which "reliable" authority you listen to, is February 28 to March 8 predicted, or March 14 historical average. This year's reality was January 4. How can you plan around all that?

Tomato and pepper plants went in the outdoor beds about the second week of January. I had a stack of emergency cloche units (well, five gallon buckets) on hand that I put out two nights upside down, one per plant. If by some chance we have a frost upcoming, those buckets will go back out, but some plants will be rubbing up against bucket walls and they'll get double buckets.

We're getting warmer. Weather is changing. If you don't play around and wing it, it's back to the grocery store for those plastic clam shells of pointless tomatoes.

II envy you in a way, the last few years we have been getting colder. Currenlty right now it is 16F. The Great Lakes have been staying cold and winter comes early around here too. It's been decades since they have frozen over, but they did last year. Every year is that much colder. I'm really getting tired of it!

AN UPDATE :

After soaking overnight , I sow 8 varieties on 2/16/15; This morning the have all sprouts. 4 days ( 4 x 24 hrs). Now I have become a believer in soaking.

The varieties :
Hahms GT, ..Purple Heart ,,, Pink Passion ,, Polish Dwarf ,, Rosella Crimson ,,Siletz ,,, Cherokee Purple ,,, Brandy Boy (hyb)

I still have 20 more vars. that I will germinate end of FEB.
I have about 5 weeks + , til our LFD.

So ., how you been germinating lately ?

Seysonn

Getting close now for the major germination event.
After starting some of my peppers tooo early , I have learned a lesson : Not to rush it.
I have 35 days til our LFD here. And plant out date maybe 2 weeks after that. Plus, I have already germinated and growing some early and dwarf varieties.
So I should restrain myself for another week or so.

I have to work on my mini portable hoops that go on the raised beds and have to improve my cold frame to shelter some of my plants in case of emergency.
The beds are already covered with black plastic to keep them dry and help to raise the soil temperature.

OK. lets hear how thing are going in your neck of the woods.

Seysonn

Re moon dates

From personal experience- I do not have any about whether seeds are affected by moon dates grown in basement, potted plants and dormant bulbs do change their status of dormancy after some time in the basement so they have some kind of internal clock- my experience anecdotal of course. When ER gets one patient with seizure, there is very good chance there will be second and third person with seizures that day, there is seasonal affective disorder etc. We are all affected one way or other by daylight and moon status, animals, plants and humans- my conclusion. Thus- following moon calendar of farmers wisdom.

In regards to wolfbane- just for those who wants to know, LOL, this seed does not do well with drying and needs either to be very fresh when started or moisture preserved in vermiculite and winter sown outside / have long periods of stratification.

P.S. I have had great difficulty on resigning to new forum so now might be two different signatures- sheltieche and lindalana are the same.

We started seeds this week, a couple days behind schedule, but not much.

Hi Tom.
I think your 7 zone, is close to north Atlanta, GA (7) where i have garden for about 10 years. I remember LFD over there was April 7. But the thing was that the temperature climbed real fast after that. So with some protections ( like wrapping a small cage with bubble wrap, plastic ..) you can even plant out before LFD. Got to check the forecast though.

Okee dokee.
Have a good grow season y'all !

Seysonn

Can't resist anymore .LOL
Today I started 12 more vars. They are soaking now. In 5 or so hours I will put them in soil and on the heating. mat.. The varieties in this batch are:

==ARBUZNYI ,,,ANANAS NOIRE, ... AZOCHKA, .. BIG RAINBOW, ... BLACK FROM TULA, ... MR. STRIPY, ...BLACK CHERRY, ... DRUZBA, ... JBT, ... KELLOGGS BREAKFAST, ... RIO GRANDE, ...RUTGERS

I have about 8 more to follow. in a day or two.

Seysonn

I just went ahead and sowed all remaining 24 varieties on 3/1/16.
Still nothing is showing any life But is has been just 3 days.
So this wraps up my 2015 sowing, both , peppers and tomatoes. .
What a relief. selecting and ordering the seeds was the most difficult part. There are so many varieties that you want to grow but so little garden space.

Seysonn

I live in 6a and started mine late january through early february. I know it seems early, but I couldn't wait any more! I also plan on growing some in containers, so i can get them in there before the last frost date anyways. The other i plan on trying to find large pots if necessary. I also started more seedlings than I can use, so I will try to plant before the LFD by a couple of weeks, and if I lose them I will have back-ups. This is my first year growing more than 5-10 plants, so I am still learning :).

I have a few more that I started.

As well as a few in my closet that have been going for a few weeks.

A few more on the other side of the shelf





Ran out of space, and had to put some on the shelf on my reloading bench. I was working on hardening them off. Then the dadgum yankee scum decided to share the crappy weather with those of us in the Promised Land. (Sarcastic humor intended.) The weather is predicted to get better by Sunday here. Then I can start the harden off process all over again. Then they go into my ghetto low tunnel at night, to come out during the day.

I am planing on planting in ground sometime around Easter Sunday. I am not going through all the crap I had to endure last year this time around. If I have to I will pot up to larger containers until plant out. Last year I had too many times of cover, uncover, cover. Top that with some rain storms that turned to ice with 2 or 3 days of below freezing high temps. Pull those start again. Wash rinse repeat. This year I will just use the low tunnel and wait.

Nate

Started about 70 peppers and 200 tomatoes today. Hope to get lucky and have them in the ground around the first of May. Will start the second wave in a couple of weeks to have ready around the May 10th LFD.

Finally, Hoosier .... 200 tomatoes ?! Do you own a farm or what ?
Would you post the name of the varieties that you are growing ?

Seysonn

In the place where I grew up, the summers were short, cool and wet, so we started everything early, just to get something. Here in Omaha our LFD (50%) is April 27. I sew peppers at the last week of February, since they germinate and grow slowly. And I sew tomatoes during the two first weeks of March. After they show their first leaves, they go in our cold basement, where they grow slowly. The weather in April is very tempting sometimes, but I know that we usually have freezes every two weeks. After acclimatization of plants during the last two weeks of April, in the beginning of May, if no freeze is predicted I plant them out in the low tunnels with plastic sheeting. Cold soil or not they grow really fast in the tunnels. The only pain is to open sheets every day for ventilation and to close them every night. Last year I missed hard frost at the end of May. If I knew I would through old blankets above row covers and the plants will be fine. As it was, the leaves that touched plastic sheeting were frozen. The plants recovered in a week or two and still were the biggest tomatoes in neighborhood. My plants which were planted out in the ground without any protection in my friends house were completely killed by this frost. So my idea is that early sowing of tomatoes works very good if you are willing to provide the basic protection and to pay an extra attention to the weather changes after you plant tomatoes out.

Here are my tomato and pepper seedlings so far.

Antmary, ..those seedlings look very nice and healthy. They should be ready for plant out by early to mid May.
Though my LFD is around April 6, but it is not warm enough to plant out, unless I use WOW type of things and mini hoop over the beds. So that is what I do to extend my season from the front end.

Seysonn

Seysonn,

Yes I do live on a farm, but even though have room for tens of thousands of tomato plants, I will probably only plant around 50. :) I sewed enough seed that even if I only had 50 percent germination or culls I would get the number of plants I want. I grow out plants for several people as well. I ended up with about 200 plants last year and was able to get rid of all of them even though some of the people that were wanting plants would not wait until plant out time for them and went and bought some. This year I am going to have their plants to them early.

OP's

Cherokee Purple

Anna Russian

Pruden's Purple

Armenian

Kellogg's Breakfast

Green Zebra

Italian Heirloom

Pantano Romenesco

Neves Azorian Red

Big Beef OP

Rutgers

Roma

Full Flavored Paste

Opalka

San Marzano Redorta

Hybrids

Brandy Boy

Big Beef

Big Boy

Better Boy

Hoosier, ..you have a very nice grow out list. Probably there top 50 and very popular to . I am growing/grown about 7 of them

Have a wonderful productive 2015 .

Seysonn

Seysonn,

What one's are you growing? We will have to compare how they do in different climates. Although the last two years I think our climates have been pretty close to the same. I am going to start calling this area the Pacific Midwest. :)

Hooser,

I am growing the following:

DWARVES - IN POT:
== Pink Passion
== Polish
== Purple Heart
== Hahms Gelbe Topftomate
== Rosella Crimson
IN GROUND -RAISED BEDS
1-- Ananas Noire
2-- Arbuznyi
3-- Azoychka
4-- Black from Tula
5-- Big Rainbow
6-- Black Cherry (no name)
7-- Brandy Boy
8-- Cherokee Purple
9-- Druzba
10-- Forth-of-July
11-- Japanese Black Trifele
12-- Kelloggs Breakfast
13-- Legend
14-- Mini Roma (no name)
15-- Red Cheery (no name)
16-- Rio Grande
17-- Rutgers
18-- Siletz
19-- Willamette
20-- Yellow /Gold Cherry (no name)
21-- Mr Stripy ? (no name)

(no name) = the seeds taken from srore bought

PS: I might add a few if I can get some seedings of varieties like following varieties from store: :

-- Big Beef -- Eva Purple Ball -- Neves Azorian Red....

Seysonn

Seysonn,

I like your list, several on there I wanted to grow this year but I am going to try some varieties I grew last year again to see if I can get more out of them. Let me know how you like Ananas, Azoychka, Druzba, and Eva Purple Ball. I am really going to try to fit them in next year.

Started seeding tomato seeds today.

Dave

I started mine on 3/8 so everything is up now under the lights. Among many others, I planted three varieties from 2006 seed, Brandywine Sudduth, Opalka, and Cosmonaut Whatshisname. I wanted to grow these primarily to get fresh seed for the future.

Two of these appeared on day 7 and the other on day 8, which surprised me a bit. I thought I'd be lucky if any came up because I'm the worst person regarding seed storage. I just keep them in the garage, so they get extreme heat in the summer and a few freeze cycles in the winter. I know I need to change my ways on this.

Tomato seedlings are very slow in the beginning. The ones I have sown on 3/1/15 (~ 3 weeks ago) just have their first 2-3 true leaves. They need probably another 3 to 4 weeks to be ready for plant out. The first 3 week not much foliage growth but probably more root development.
So 6 -8 weeks lead time (seeding to plant out) seems to be about right, I think.

Yippee, I finally get to post on this thread. Sowed 144 toms, 72 green peppers, and 72 broccoli this weekend. Whew , I didn't think the time would ever arrive.

Sowed 6 different varieties on March 22 in 18 cells. As of March 30 sixteen of eighteen had germinated. As of today, one cell's seedling is starting to show its first true leaf (I think it's a grape if I labelled the cells correctly -- oh, well, surprise me!)

Today I separated my 3/1/15 sown seedlings. Now I have close to 40 inside and about 15 outside in the hoop and cold frame.

My last sprout is Kumato, just germinated yesterday.

Seysonn