Seeds lean toward container trend

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It’s the most wonderful time of the year.

I took an evening stroll last weekend with Daisy, my dog, admiring daffodils, violets and the glowing flush of baby leaves. The air was crisp, and when we rounded the end of the house, the most delicious perfume was in the air.

The flowering wild plums that my grandfather planted several decades ago were in full, glorious bloom.

So while Daisy was sniffing the ground, I was sniffing the fragile blossoms, enjoying their presence, fleeting as it is.

Such is spring.

The cherry trees I planted last year are in bloom, while the apples are just showing their buds. I saw a few strawberries in bloom, too, when just a week before the plants barely had their new leaves.

The honeyberry is flowering, its pale yellow bells nearly indistinguishable from the new leaves. I have high hopes that I will get more than five or six berries from it this year.

I uncovered Banny the banana plant, only to find a smooshy, goopy mess. But that’s the way it was last year, too, so only time will tell whether the banana has survived another Maine winter.

The raised beds are rejuvenated with compost and manure. The weeds are pulled and the herbs are trimmed into shape. I’ve planted the onions and just Sunday I put in the oca, a new-to-me root vegetable.

And by the time you read this, if the week goes well, I hope to have two pesky whiskey barrels planted.

Pesky, you ask?

Yup.

I love my whiskey barrels. I have three that do amazing things every year, regardless of what I plant in them. I have one that does so-so. I have one that I usually forget to plant because it is in a perennial bed partially surrounded by really tall goatsbeard. This year I have every intention of putting in at least a few nasturtium seeds, even if it is the last thing I do. Which it likely will be, given my track record.

Then there is the pesky pair.

Last year, with all that rain, I had two lovely mud ponds. I remain unsure how that happened since I always drill holes for drainage before I pour the first potting soil into them.

But the plants were doing the backstroke or the butterfly, and I realized that those two barrels never had performed that well.

Something had to be done.

I pondered this for the winter, until inspiration in a catalog finally struck.

Pinetree Garden Seeds (www.superseeds.com or 207-926-3400) added a Container Greens section, which embraces the microgreens trend. They offer four different blends, but the one that caught my eye was the Pinetree Kitchen Sink Mix, a collection of 16 varieties that include lettuces, chards, onions, herbs and greens.

Tasty, huh?

And it sounds fairly easy: Plant the seeds “quite close together,” and when the third set of leaves develops, you can harvest at will.

As if 16 varieties weren’t enough, I also had to get the seedling pea from Pinetree. This, too, is a newer trend, where one starts harvesting the “succulent leaves” long before the peapods arrive. They are recommended for salads, although I suspect I will toss a few into stir-fries and quick soups for fun.

I may wait a couple more weeks to plant the barrel that gets the most shade. My hope is that it will extend the harvest well into the hot days of summer.

Then again, I may be so enamored of the Kitchen Sink Mix it might replace the nasturtiums destined for the third barrel in the perennial bed.

If only I remember it’s there.

Odd one out

I got one lonely response to my query last month on what odd or new-to-you varieties the gardening folk are planting this year. Fortunately for me, it was a stroke of luck to get just one, for it was all I could handle.

Dear Janine,

I am a New Zealander living in the U.S. for over 10 years. I have forever been looking for my favourite vegetable, what we call the New Zealand yam. Recently I worked out that this in fact was Oxalis tuberosa or oca. That’s when I came across your article and was amazed that you had acquired some to grow. I would be greatly appreciative if you could let me know where I could get hold of some to grow or indulge in. It’s a very common vegetable for the dinner table in New Zealand, and I miss this food even more than kumara (New Zealand version of what Americans consider yams/sweet potatoes). I am even willing to try growing this even though I have never ever grown a thing in my life. I currently reside in New York and am more than willing to make my husband go to Maine to buy me some.

Thanks,

Jodelle LaCombe

For more than a week, I tried in vain to find other sources of oca for Jodelle, because my source, Nichols Garden Nursery, had sold out for the year.

There are plenty of places in Australia and New Zealand, but they can’t ship to the U.S. because of agricultural restrictions.

After reading her e-mail, all I could think was how hard it would be to never have a favorite vegetable again or to hear of someone else having it and not sharing even a wee bit.

And you know she’s serious when she says she is ready to “make my husband go to Maine to buy me some.”

Last Sunday I counted out my tubers, planted half and e-mailed Jodelle on Monday to see if she’d entrust me with her mailing address so I could ship the oca to her to plant.

Tubers – with instructions – were off to New York on Wednesday.

It’s like Christmas.

But better.

Janine Pineo’s e-mail address is jpineo@bangordailynews.net.