Blunder Woman: Storm Damage

Have you ever put your seed trays out in the sun and then, without thinking about the impending bad weather, gone inside for a quick nap? No? Just me?

Pictured: the contents of my third seed tray. Not pictured: the third seed tray.

Now from the outset I knew that this wasn't really the way that you're supposed to start seeds. When the instructions talk about "starting seeds inside" they don't mean on a tray on your dining room table. Especially when your house is as cold as mine is - these little things, really, have barely got a headstart over being planted outside. But still they sprouted, and their true leaves were coming in - if slowly - and it was so exciting to have them right there and so easy to see every little change.

As the weather has improved I've been setting the trays in the sun during the day, but as things have still been very unpredictable I'm not quite ready to leave them outside permanently. It had been a little blustery but it didn't occur to me that we would have a full-on gusting storm or that there would be a danger to my trays, though, when I succumbed to the urge to have a little afternoon nap. When I headed outside a few hours later to pack everything up for the evening it was an unpleasant shock to see that my newest tray, planted with basil, had been totally flipped over and scattered over the yard. Some of my existing seedlings were buried, too, and a few had been snapped off.

I guess I won't try that again until I have a proper greenhouse setup of some kind, though I still have hope for the little plants that survived.

My ill-fated seeds weren't the only victim of the wind: despite weathering so many other such storms over the winter, this one was the final straw for one of my artichokes. I had initially assumed this was still just a single plant but it turns out another has popped up beside the one I originally planted, and it is that 'baby' (it's nearly the same size as the original, to be fair) that has been torn down by the wind.

It still seems to be green so I'm hoping that the stems aren't actually totally broken. I considered trying to prop it back up but there's nothing beneath it and really, at this point, it's going to be more work than it's worth. If I'm lucky the flowers will still open and if not, well... at least I'll reclaim a little of my garden bed.

And, while we're on the subject of the garden beds, don't they look sweet all snugged up under the straw mulch that I finally got around to putting down? At the moment there's not a lot in the ground - the onions and garlic, strawberries and artichoke, and a handful of herbs. It seemed as good a time as any to get a layer down in the hopes that it might keep the weeds at bay until I was ready to plant my summer crops.

Did you know that straw can sprout? It all seemed fine until we had a bunch more rain and then, after a single day away from the house, I came home to THIS. Tall, grasslike sprouts covering the main beds where the straw lies. I'm not even sure how best I should try to deal with them - it's a pain to try to pull them up (as just pulling on the exposed tops doesn't get the root, but that means digging down between the mulch for every plant) and frankly I can't afford any less fertile mulching materials.

Also I ran out of chicken feed... on a Friday night. Contrary to every other chicken I've known mine aren't terribly impressed by 'people food', and they looked on my offering of kitchen scraps with disdain. They did eat it all, though, when they saw that nothing else was forthcoming.

Oops.