when to plant vegetable seeds

It's definitely time to sow seeds now. Here are some suggestions to figure out when is the best time to plant different types of seeds.

- Try the iPhone calendar apps I wrote, I use these to plan when to plant: Skippy's Vegetable Calendar App and Skippy's Flower and Herb Calendar App.

- Or try my old, very simple, and free online planting calendar: Online Vegetable Calendar.

- Johnny's online tool works pretty much the same: Johnny's planting calculator

- The University of Minnesota has a nice page on starting seeds indoors. Some tables too.  So if your climate is similar to theirs, it's a good resource. UMinn Seed Starting.

- I also like a colorful chart that shows planting and harvesting times: Urban Farmer Seeds chart for USDA zone 6.

Let me know other suggestions!

updates for our PlantIng Calendar Apps

An update for Skippy’s Vegetable Planting Calendar IPhone app will be out in the next few days. It will fix bugs including saving input frost dates and crops. Also vegetable planting information is updated. if you purchase the app now, you can use the update at no extra cost. Also anyone with the app already will be notified to download the update (no cost).

The Vegetable Planting App is here HERE. I’ll be using this app to start my onions and celery this week. Be sure to email me any comments or suggestions you have regarding the app.

Our Flower & Herb Planting App can be purchased through the same link above.

when to plant spring seeds

To time when I plant my seeds, I use an app that I’ve written. Skippy’s Vegetable planting calendar. We’ve been working on this for a few years and a new update is due out next month. This update makes the app retain settings and fills in some missing planting information and is free for any previously purchased apps.

I have about 100 vegetable varieties that I’ll plant this year. The app is a very simple way of planning when to plant vegetable seeds.

This year I entered info from all of my seeds package into an excel table. I entered time to harvest and planting date. I then sorted by planting date. This gives me a “calendar” for planting. But it doesn’t have any more information than my app except for corn where I want to plant two varieties and spread the planting dates to make sure they don’t cross-pollinate.

If you have suggestions for our app update, please leave a comment here and let me know.

Please go to Apple Store for the current update on Skippy's Calendar app. It corrects the bug on the fall date changer. Yes, it's time to start thinking about fall planting. I planted my Brussels sprouts a couple days ago. I'm hoping to have some for Thanksgiving this year. It seems pretty far ahead to plan for that!

update of planting calendar apps

I'm so excited about our new updates of our planting calendar apps! I think they are great. We put a lot of work into both our Vegetable and our Flower & Herb app.

 - We added many, many more plants. Now more than 100 vegetables and 100 flowers & herbs.
 - We added an "info page" for all of the plants that describes how to plant and grow it.
 - We added many photos of plants we have grown.
 - And ... we added several photos of Skippy, helping out in the garden.

The updated Flower & Herb Planting App is now for sale at the Apple Store for $3.99

We haven't released the new Vegetable app yet, but we'll do that very soon. The old Vegetable Planting App is still for sale at the Apple Store for $1.99. The new version will have a price increase, but all users with the old version will automatically get the update at no extra cost. (Hint: Buy the old one now and save a couple bucks!)

We love it when people leave comments about the apps. Here are a couple we've gotten:

- Simple, clean, easy. All the vegetables, all the dates co-related and synced automatically to my region. Weekly task list and reminders for indoor start dates, transplant dates, direct sow, and consecutive plantings for spring, fall, winter. Also contacted Kathy about some ideas and amendments... Heard back immediately. Cottage industry app. Love it!   - by AreYouReady?

- Simplicity of this app is perfect. Less time with my phone, more time in the garden. It includes marigolds, sunflowers, nasturtiums. I'd like to see borage and sweet peas added. Thank you!  - by Garden12312

 And, yes, we now have borage and sweet peas added  - in the Flower & Herb app.

it's time to plant onions!

I sowed my first seeds of the season. A tray with several types of onions, leeks, and celeriac. My planting calendar said it was time.



I couldn't find my leftover plant labels from last year, so I cut up a plastic tofu container. I'll get better labels before I need to mark the rows outside.

I'll start up a post soon with a list of the onion varieties I planted. I'll continue fill in this list as I plant more seeds. Next on my planting schedule are cabbages and escarole, but that's not for another two weeks. Until then I'll just watch my onions germinate. (That usually takes 7-10 days.)

app updates

I've been working on updates to Skippy's Calendar apps. It's really fun - like imagining a summer garden in the middle of winter! We'll have more plants and more seed sowing information added to both our Flower & Herb app and our Vegetable app. Updates will be available in a week or two (or three) to all purchases made now or later.

updates are out for Skippy's planting apps

Updates are out for many of our calendar apps, including Skippy's:
Vegetable Planting Calendar
Spring Planting Calendar
Fall Planting Calendar

Of course, if you have these apps, you already know this, because the updates show up automatically at the Apple App Store.

Updates for our Flower & Herb Calendar and the Winter Calendar will be out soon. The update corrects the reminders function so it works with any iOS version.

Note: If any apps freeze after installing an update, just delete the app and reinstall it from the app store. You won't need to pay again.

Happy planting!

it's time to start planting!

The first event on my planting calendar is winter sowing. Many flowers need a cold period and winter sowing in plastic milk bottles is an easy way to start these seeds.

I used Skippy's Flower and Herb Calendar App to make my sowing calendar. I have a large new bed at the front of my vegetable garden that I want to fill with flowers for my bees (and me) this year. So, I'm looking forward to starting lots of flower and herb seeds.

Today I planted seeds in four bottles: Anise hyssop, wild NE asters, a bee mix, and a butterfly mix.





I collected my plastic milk bottles from Starbucks. I was a bit disappointed because I asked at the counter if they had empty milk bottle they could give me and I was told "no". But I since I saw them using lots of them, I went around back to their dumpster. Lot's of empty gallon bottles there. (I wonder why they weren't recycling them?) I pulled out four, a bit smushed and scattered with coffee grounds. There was even a nice paper bag to transport them. (Other places I've found plastic bottles are my Town recycling center, and curbside bins on recycling day).

Directions for winter sowing in plastic milk bottles are in the app. Also on my previous winter sowing posts.

a seed give away!!

GIVE AWAY IS DISCONTINUED - We've just come across information that Apple has started removing apps that offer incentives for reviews. Sorry. (1-13-2016)

I have a lot of seeds that I saved from last year. Perfect for a seed give away. Just leave a comment on my calendar app at Apple or Google Play, and I'll send a sample of seeds of your choice, until my collection runs out.

Our apps really are worth trying. There's nothing else like them on the market. Simple, easy-to-use and uncluttered, with no in-app adds or purchases. Enter your frost date and your crops and you get a nice weekly calendar of your planting tasks on your mobile device. There's sowing, transplanting and succession sowing information. The Flower & Herb App will also have instructions for plants that require special sowing conditions. Over 50 vegetables to choose from and over 70 flowers & herbs.

The Vegetable App is here: Apple and Android. When our new Flower & Herb Calendar App will comes out any minute now, and I'll post the link here. (all are $1.99)

The seeds I have are:
Pink cleome
Magenta cleome (one of my favorites)
White New England asters (these are the small wild ones that bloom late in the fall)
Tithonia (Mexican marigold, a giant plant with brilliant orange flowers)
Anise Hyssop (the bees LOVE this)
Judy's Giant marigold (3 ft tall with single orange flowers)
Tromboncino squash (named after a trombone for long curly shape, use as summer or winter squash)
Shung Wang pole beans (a crisp blocky white bean given to me years ago, one of my favorites)
Thai hot pepper (dries easily, nice and hot)
Basil Eleanora (basil downy mildew resistant - I bought a giant package last year)

After you leave  your comment, email your address to me at kathy@skippysgarden.com and I'll mail out the seeds. Thanks!!

app reviews please :-)

We could really use some reviews of our seed planting app. For any one who used it last year, could you give it a brief review? Here's the preview link: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/skippys-garden-spring-planting/id970091991?mt=8. Click "Open in iTunes" and then click "Reviews". Thanks!

Here are reviews a few gardeners left for us last year, but they didn't post them to the Apple Store.

"Thanks for the nifty app! " - MIchaeldg
"Love the simplicity... Very easy to use... very useful" - Mayhew
"It is a wonderful app....I will be able to carry it with me to the garden without printing out my garden plan. I especially love the transplanting calendar because most books and seed packet instructions do not tell you when to transplant. - Nancy

BTW - We are making a bunch of upgrades this month for release in January - just in time for 2016 seed planting! Let us know what upgrades you would like.

notes on Skippy's planting calendar app

- Use app for planning your 2016 garden: A gardener emailed me that she is already using Skippy's planting calendar app to set up her vegetables for next year (she says: "early but I want an easy place to remember what I want to order")

- Fixed glitch: The app had a glitch with the season transition. It was opening but displaying nothing. We've fixed this and an updated version is now available for download at Apple App Store updates.

- Android available: We've released an android version of the app. It's available here: Skippy's planting calendar android. Please let me know feedback on this version. Right now, I think it has the season transition glitch, but it will be updated and fixed soon.

- New features for 2016: We have several updates in the works for the app. By 2016 planting season, they'll be available as a download to update your version. As we get closer to completing them, I'll explain the features we're adding. We had so many good ideas from users and are excited to encorporate some .

Please let me know any feedback on this app. I'd love to hear how you are using it and any improvements you would suggest. And, if you have used the app this season, we'd love it if you leave a review at Apple or GooglePlay.

sowing seed for my winter garden

Even though my last year's winter garden was eaten to the ground by voles, I'm planting another one this year. I'm planting all of the crops included in my Winter Planting Calendar App (part of my Full Season Calendar App). I'm using the dates recommended there. It'll be a good double check of the app.

The app requires an input of my "Limited Daylight Date", which is the date when my area falls to less than 10 hours of sunlight per day (also called the beginning of the Persephone Period). This is November 10 for me.

The week of September 1 (this week), I'm planting kale, bunching onion, collards and radicchio. Next week, I'll plant Swiss chard, cilantro, lettuce and turnip.  I'm planting indoors in pots as the weather is still so hot and I don't have a good watering system outside. I'll just baby the seedlings indoors for a couple weeks, and then set them out.

For cold protection, I'm planning to use greenhouse plastic over PVC hoops again. I plan to use double cold protection this year: I'll add a second layer of Agribon floating row cover over the plants. For vole protection, I'm planning to dig in a 6 inch deep layer of hardware cloth all around the edge of the bed (as soon as the weather cools down a bit). I'll attach it to the outside of the raised bed. I also plan to soak castor oil into the soil at the edge of the beds. I'm thinking I'll be bold and set up two raised beds for winter this year, rather than the single failed one I set up last year. Why not.