lessons learned today

I thought I would share a few mistakes I have made, and lessons learned today.
I have 35 squares of peas and have been gradually planting and everything was going well until just the past few days and about a fifth of them are becoming extremely pale and anemic looking
CAMPR asked if they were different varieties, and after thinking for some time and going back to my packets, I do have a few varieties growing, at least 3 different seed packages.
One packet was perhaps a few years old. and each packet has different advantages and disadvantages, and since I did not keep close track, I have no way of knowing which ones are thriving and which ones are dying.
It sure would be helpful to be just a smidgeon obsessive compulsive when gardening.
I have one packet of MR BIG almost full, and one packet of GREEN ARROW almost empty and one packet I threw out because it fell apart, and I think it was old. :tsk: :tsk: :tsk: so please do not do what I DID.....OR do not NOT do what I did NOT do..
Any reading suggestions to learn obsessiveness.

After each action in the garden, put it here.

so whats that??? some new computer program...??

A blank page? Yep, that's my brain when I'm in the garden

oh I forgot, you will need one of these too...

Ooooh! CampRN, I so love the new data entry modules!

Ooooh! CampRN, I so love the new data entry modules!

user friendly??
I am going to get right onto it

http://images.search.yahoo.com/search/images;_ylt=A0oGdXObg7BPCj8AiwRXNyoA?p=crumpled+paper&fr=yfp-t-701-1&fr2=piv-web

this is what our keeping records looks like *found in our pockets*

hugs

rose

camprn wrote:
oh I forgot, you will need one of these too...

OH! That's my problem — no green stylus.

Lol GWN. This cracks me up, I have been planning what to put where for months now then I go out with some seed packets and just go crazy. I write things down I know where everything is but I didn't keep track of different varieties. It's early so I just need to crack down on the next batch of plantings! Good luck with your peas!!

Getting organised in the logical order of a journey along a long road is the answer

You have to get the start first and progress on with sign posts and turns to get to your destination.

I got a load of air tight tubes and jars . made a series of colour coded labels to suit all three types of container and then proceeded to decant seeds out of the packs according to end year of the packet or using a seed viability chart that showed average life if stored correctly till the viable time was up.

180 odd labels later I had everything relocated in a dry and airtight containers. Next I produced an Excel sheet that is a planting guide and a calender all in one , shown in weekly slots of 30 lines per A3 sheet .

Then I made up a master Excel list of all the seeds and various information like names alphabetically and a seed storage rack location number. Off this master I can drag off seed store numbers in sequence or the plant names for sowing that week .

It's now a simple exercise of drawing off the relevent week and getting an alphabetical list of what can be planted .

I have zillions of extra long plant8 inch long label sticks made of plastic rain guttering which are just over 1/2 inch wide ( 15 mm ) and can be easily written on using as china graph pencil

Once I draw of the likely sowing list I check against my A4 sheet to see if I need to sow any of the list and mark what's needed on the a4 sheets I just printed off , then pull out the seed containers and put them in a bowl and go sowing. Once a seed is sown the container is put in another different coloured container ..this goes on till the list is sown.

I then sit down for a few minutes and put the seeds back in their racks and bring the A4 sheets up to date with a soft lead pencil . I have now got an instant coloured & filled in planner with all crops sown .

The whole exercise has progressed over a year or so for I was lazy and didn't get stuck into it ..perhaps it has taken me just 8 or 9 hours in total to do .

I didn't do these lists and decanting because I'm suffering from OCD or a strange mind set I had to do it because I'm slowly losing memory as I get older and with 180 seed packet floating around it was essential to get organised before things ceased to be viable as seeds . I put the whole of the Excel sheet on a DVD and took it to our nearest Office World , where they printed it out on A3 heavy paper for me at a few pennies for each sheet .... min order applied of 20 sheets.

This is part of the seed stores the colour codes allow for five years till seeds reach their end of viability period .







This is my filled in chart ..i hand wrote thing in for i can write a lot quicker and more accurately tahn typing things in .

Norte the things that look like mistakes .. that is where i found several types of seeds or found that some were way way out of date and once I'd tried to gernimate then they filed to pass muster so got binned.

I have one or more such sheets for specific thngs.

ie Front garden bulbs corms and tubers , herbs , flowers and those for the back garden vegetables.



.

Dang Plantoid... you must have been a scientist of some sort in your earlier life...

woah ! Nice job

Some might say you have way too much time on your hands.....WOW but I would say you seem to have just the right amount of time on your hands and use it wisely.

Just WOW at Plantoid... That's awesome.

I got a load of air tight tubes and jars . made a series of colour coded labels to suit all three types of container and then proceeded to decant seeds out of the packs according to end year of the packet or using a seed viability chart that showed average life if stored correctly till the viable time was up.

Question about viability, when seeds start to lose their viability, do they just NOT germinate, or do they germinate and become weak plants?

plantoid
I hope my post did not seem offensive, I admire people who are organized, and I envy those who have time.
I wake up every day that is not a work day and say YIPPI I can garden all day.
My life has been so crazy busy for so long I almost feel guilty for having a day to just garden, but that feeling is starting to go away.
Thanks for showing your incredibly wonderful system, and I am sorry if I seem glib.

Very impressive system, plantoid.

When I have a free square to plant, I rifle through my baggy of misc. opened and new seed packets and look for something that suits my fancy at the moment!

When I have a free square to plant, I rifle through my baggy of misc. opened and new seed packets and look for something that suits my fancy at the moment!

Question is, do you write it down?

Mine is simpler but accurate. I draw my plan out on cardstock, with the squares marked. This comes out with me on a clipboard and with a pencil. As I plant seeds or transplant, I enter it in the relevant square very lightly in pencil. Indoors, I write it in ink.



above: cardstock garden plan. At a glance I know if I've sown from seed or transplanted mine or a purchased seedling, its variety and when. If I've seeded too much, I enter they need to be thinned later. I bring this out with me anytime I go to the garden so I can check squares, water those that might need moisture, check on growth, reseed if things are taking too long, etc. Another good thing is next year, just by looking at it, I know where I should or should not put the next brassicas or tomatoes or whatever so I can rotate my next crops more easily.



above: closeup of one of the beds with entries



above: In a notebook, I have a full-page plan of each bed so that I can enter pertinent data. Such as when the crop started harvesting (that's how I know if a variety is as early as claimed on the package), if its prolific, taste, worth the trouble for next year or not, any disease probls, when its pulled out and any new fall crop seeded or transplanted in the same larger block. It helps to choose seeds for the next year.

GWN wrote:

When I have a free square to plant, I rifle through my baggy of misc. opened and new seed packets and look for something that suits my fancy at the moment!

Question is, do you write it down?

Oh heavens no!!

boffer wrote:

GWN wrote:

When I have a free square to plant, I rifle through my baggy of misc. opened and new seed packets and look for something that suits my fancy at the moment!

Question is, do you write it down?

Oh heavens no!!

Hey, that's my method too! I am getting better about at least putting a markers in the squares. Then I found some critter neatly pulled several markers but they were still laying in their squares.

I am finding that many of my plants I can easily recognize now
Even though I planted several varieties of tomatoes, I can now tell which is which just by the shade of the leaves and the shapes.

Plantoid, suggest you have your method programmed into an app. Sell for mega-bucks, retire and garden full time!

Nonna.PapaVino wrote:Plantoid, suggest you have your method programmed into an app. Sell for mega-bucks, retire and garden full time!

It's taken me since 1987 to learn the basics of word for windows and Excel , now you want me to play with app's ???

Psssstt ... " What's an app when it's at home ?"

If an old duffer like me can squeeze five minutes a day for a few months or more into making up the charts etc , then a nerdy kid should be able to race run it without even having to pause to take a breath and also make it better and more universal.

I retired at the age of 44 ( just didn't know it at the time ) , so I'll pass on the app's side of things to enable me to just bumble along with my ANSFG beds . Simply enjoying the value of the moment and the cachophony of shades of green of the new plants etc ..... cos at my stage of life the old birth certificate seem's to be running out much faster than it used to , I'm slowly losing my 20/20 sight & I'll be a long time dead.