Seeding komatsunas and pak-chois

Today I seeded komatunas and pak chois in an extra space in my garden.
Originally I had a plan to seed pumpkins there but it's too early to do it.

I will seed pumpkins in the head of June when the space will have been unoccupied after the komatunas will have been harvested.


Even in warm days, I have to be cautious about changeable climate in this season since frost can be expected too suddenly for us to recognize.
I set up a vinyl tunnel for the komatunas and pak chois


Now I have 5 vinyl tunnels in my garden. It looks like " a vegetable factory ".



-- from iPod touch

How effective are my vinyl tunnels for growth of vegetables?

I found out some spinach sprouts germinated outside a vinyl tunnel and we can easily see the difference between the growth of sprouts outside and that of ones inside.

Can you guess which is the sprouts inside the tunnels?


Sprouts inside the tunnels have grown to 10cms high with wide leaves.


Sprouts outside is just 5cms high with thin leaves.



-- from iPod touch

Shopping in a local home center

I believe shopping is enjoyable for people even if we are spending austere and frugal days in the world economic slowdown. In addition to the Japan's economic slump, we are facing soaring oil price caused by unrests in the northern Africa. I have to admit we are gonna deal with the situation by spending cuts and seeking low-priced goods.
I don't mean I would give you some lectures in the world economy but we have to find good shops in my neighborhood where can offer discounted goods with good quality.

Today I went shopping at one of local home centers for seeking some goods for my garden. The shop is the biggest of all home centers in my city stocking regularly wide variety of gardening goods, seeds and sprouts.
It has a large parking lot and that's why many gardeners and farmers come to the shop especially in a weekend.


Just seeing inventories of gardening goods like packs of composts, insect screens, irrigation hoses is very enjoyable, isn't it?


Today's purchases are,,
1. a 1.5m-wide vinyl sheet
2. 5 plastic round arches
3. 10 plastic pegs

Those are used for setting up a new vinyl tunnel.


Shopping can sometimes allure us to buy something which we don't know if we really need. In many cases, they could be some gorgeous gadgets with latest technologies like a compact battery-driven cultivator shown below.


I sometimes enjoy IMAGINING how conveniently I could cultivate hard soil as an woman in the poster shown below,,,,.



-- from iPod touch

How do vinyl tunnels work out?

As I blogged in the past, I set up a thermometer inside a vinyl tunnel to find how warm the tunnels make the air inside.
Today's temperature outside is 12C high but the air inside was 16C as the thermometer shows. It's cloudy through today so the air inside could be warmer if it is sunny.
In winter in Japan the air is usually dry and cold but the inside the tunnels are always moist, which can give a good effect to my vegetable's growth.



I opened a vinyl sheets up for putting some fertilizer on the soil and many spinach sprouts have grown in the past few days.







I found not only the growth of spinaches but that of komatunas.



-- from iPad

Thinning out pak-chois

Today I thinned out some pak choi sprouts since the planting beds inside a vinyl tunnel were crowded with the sprouts. I'm very happy to see arrays of pak chois which have been struggle with cold temperature and I feel worth setting up the tunnels.



I tried to re-plant thinned out spouts whose roots were intact experimentally.
Usually thinned out sprouts are thrown out but I found a space for them inside the tunnel. It's very lucky if the sprouts can keep growing.



-- from iPad

Japanese plums are blooming fully

I found a Japanese plum tree shows full blooming of the flowers in my neighborhood. In a nest few weeks we can find white, pink yellow plum flowers, which can remind us of warm spring coming slowly but steadily.



-- from iPad

Trip on bullet trains

Yesterday I took bullet trains which was bound for Tokyo where my cousin' marriage party was held. The Japan's bullet trains are not only one of the important transportation for long distance along with airplanes but one of the Japan's greatest techniques which can be proud of to the would. The topic is not irrelevant to gardening but I would like to introduce my trip.
The service I used was the super express from Osaka to Tokyo (about 550km) which can arrive at Tokyo in 2 hours and 30 minutes at a max speed of 300kph. It costs about $150 for an adult.


This is the inside of the car. The seats are a bit larger than usual economy class of airplanes. Those seat has reclining function with arm rests.



Vending machines of juices and foods are seen in some corners in the cars. Even flushing toilets and powder rooms are available.



After the comfortable trip to Tokyo I arrived at a hotel where the wedding party were held. The Tokyo terminal is located near the hotel so that's why I took the bullet trains.



Here is the bouquet flowers the couple gave me as a present.



from iPad

Growth in snow

Inside the vinyl tunnels young sprouts of pak chois, komatunas and spinaches are growing despite sudden cold weather with heavy snow.








My onions look so healthy. Heavy snow could be a serious threat but scenery of green vegetables in brown soil covered with white snow is beautiful isn't it?



-- from iPad

Early spring has gone away again.

During the past few weeks it had been so warm that everyone would assume that spring had been coming soon. But that assumption clearly ended up with "assumption" when I saw all gardens in my neighbors were covered with heavy snow. My kids and their friends were enjoying snowball fight but I could not help worrying about what happens to my garden.


I'm very scared to see what really happens to my garden because we've faced that scale of snow coverage for the first time since opening my garden. I worried about my vinyl tunnels but they seem to bear with weight of snow barely.


Unfortunately, one of my tunnels was "flatten" by snow accumulation.



-- from iPad

Germination in early spring

I found some of my spinaches and pak-chois, which were seeded about 2 weeks ago, have germinated at last! They are so tiny that I had to get closer to the surface of planting beds to find them but it's expected more sprouts of them are going to come up out of the soil.
Young sprouts might give us hope for good harvests but especially germination in early spring can give not only excitement but uplift feeling.





-- from iPad

Deep purple

The color of the cabbage shown below is so beautiful that it reminds me of my favorite band.
I found beautiful purple cabbages in other gardner's plot and I asked him where he got the sprouts. The purple color can be generated with anthocyanin inside the leaves while I don't know the detail mechanism.
Now I'm wondering how beautiful and colorful salad will be when the cabbage is added with listening my favorite song of the band, "Smoke on the water"


-- from iPad

Hidden growth

Even in the middle of cold winter, 100 onions look so healthy judging from their brisk, sharp and greenish leaves. Dry air in the winter can vaporize water easily out of soil so I regularly water once or twice a week.


Most of onions hide in soil but even tiny part of them which can be seen on soil can let me expect prospective harvest.


-- from iPad

Waiting for warm days

It took a week since komatunas, spinaches and pak chois but no germination has not been found yet.
That could be expected due to record cold winter but I can not help feeling anxious about delayed germination.
The vinyl tunnels can keep the air inside warmer than outside and it will start to be warm at the weekend according to weather forecast. All I have to do is to wait patiently for "hopeful moment".


-- from iPad