Zombie Gardening!

countrynaturals 8/15/2017, 1:15 pm

When you have seeds that:

1) You can't identify
2) You don't want anymore
3) Are too old to be reliable
4) Just don't fit in anywhere else

Plant a Zombie Garden. The definitions are:

1) You want to bring them back from the dead.
2) You don't know what's going to come out of the ground.

If you start or already have a Zombie Garden, please share your story and pics, here. Zombie Gardening! 3170584802

countrynaturals 8/15/2017, 3:27 pm

Saturday, our son brought me a huge box of seeds that he found at a yard sale for $5. Most are store-bought, still new in their original packages from 2003! On the bottom of the box are several more bags of seeds that were collected by hand.
Zombie Gardening! Zombie11

At first I didn't know what to do with them, but then I took a tour of the yard and found the perfect bald spot, right at the edge of the redwoods, where we're already watering, that just screamed for a ZOMBIE GARDEN! affraid

After 3 days of hard labor, hauling rocks and leaves, it now looks like this:
Zombie Gardening! Zombie13

Now I'm going to add another heap of leaves, cover it all with shade cloth, weight it down to keep the chickens out, water it daily, and wait for some of these perennial seeds to sprout in containers on the deck. Today I'm going to plant the lavender seeds. I think I'll leave the annuals for next spring, unless it's not too late for nasturtiums. I've never grown them. Do I still have time in zone 9? Any other annuals that I could still plant this year?

(If none of these seeds sprout, I will still make this a Zombie Garden -- I'll just have to do it some other way. Rolling Eyes

)

CapeCoddess 8/15/2017, 3:39 pm

That photo of the seeds made my heart beat fast!
love the idea

You could always try half of the seeds now that you're wondering about. Seems to me that in zone 9 the time you have left would be about the same length of time as my whole season. hehe

Ooooo...plant food spikes! hyper

I gotta get away from that photo...but I keep scrolling back to it...

Plant the beans! Plant the beans!
OK, I'm leaving...

countrynaturals 8/15/2017, 4:01 pm

CapeCoddess wrote:That photo of the seeds made my heart beat fast!

You could always try half of the seeds now that you're wondering about. Seems to me that in zone 9 the time you have left would be about the same length of time as my whole season. hehe

Ooooo...plant food spikes! I gotta get away from that photo...but I keep scrolling back to it...

Plant the beans! Plant the beans!
OK, I'm leaving...

OMG! I didn't mean to make you crazy! affraid

I already soaked and planted the beans and used the plant food spikes. Maybe I'll plant all the home grown seeds from the bottom of the box and save the packets for next spring. My biggest challenge will be to keep the chickens out of it until the plants are established. Mad

Ginger Blue 11/1/2017, 11:24 pm

So, CN, how's your Zombie Garden growing???

countrynaturals 11/2/2017, 10:14 am

Ginger Blue wrote:So, CN, how's your Zombie Garden growing???

Only a couple of seeds sprouted, then promptly died. Mel says 5 years is about the limit and these were more than 10 years old, so it's not surprising. I still have some more of these seeds for next spring, but I'm not optimistic. Rolling Eyes

That garden bed is growing strong, however. A bunch of bulbs we didn't know were there started poking through the leaves, so that area is now for bulbs and tubers. I have several more varieties growing where I don't want them, so I'll gradually move them all into that bed. Bulbs seem more zombiesh than seeds, anyway. affraid

countrynaturals 12/29/2019, 7:02 pm

Time to revisit this topic. I just finished sorting all of my seeds, and I have a whole bagful older than 2018, so, as soon as the weather warms up a little, I'll dump them all over in the Pollinator Garden. That area didn't do well after the fire, and I didn't have time to revive it in 2019, so 2020 will be . . . THE YEAR OF THE UNDEAD MISFIT SEEDS! Zombie Gardening! 2027012869

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