From the land of perpetually dirty fingernails...
Cold, wet, windy Michigan spring weather is the perfect time to get those fingers in the soil. Truthfully much of the work was done in our grow tents except for the potatoes which we started in the greenhouse about three weeks ago.
In the past we’ve done the potatoes in ground…this is a first in the bags…my knees are already happy. We’ll lay out a tarp and turn over the bag, then sort through the bounty. At least that’s the plan.🤞
Cabbage is coming along great. Moved the tomatoes out of the tropical environment of the grow tent and into the greenhouse. They adapted well even starting to flower. Out in the raised bed garden…radishes, spinach and two types of peas were stuck into the soil today.
Potatoes….3 kinds…Russet, Yukon Gold, Red. Some in 20 gallon bags…put some in 10 gallon bags. I had some seed potatoes left so I’m trying a 5 gallon just to see what we can get from the smaller size.
Love watching potatoes growing. Nothing…nothing…nothing…THEN the soil start swelling…a crack forms and the plant burst forth and our relationship deepens.🥰
The first time I saw cabbage start to grow it baffled me…it’s supposed to be heads, not leaves. Years have gone by and I’m still amazed at how they develop. Almost made me a head case…
Ahh… there’s my little beauties…2nd generation little cherry-like tomatoes that sprouted from the compost pile.
Please pardon the mess in the greenhouse…it’s not truly set up yet just hosting some early cool weather friends.
The tiny, yellow thing in the bag is a basil plant…it’s kinda like the canary in the mine…they are not very cold tolerant at all..it didn’t turn black which would tell me it got a little too cold down there at night. So alls good!
= new reply since forum marked as read
Thanks 2na. Little poke in the ribs. .
Ya ok?
I'm good, just hangin' 'round waitin' for the apocalypse, I guess.
We’ll be here for a bit.
Totally reusable, I’ve been using some of the bags for years. They come in all the comparable sizes as plastic pots, but much, much better for the root system. The bags ‘air prune’ the roots as opposed to plastic pots where the roots spiral around the pot.
Air pruning is very different, the roots searching for food hit the sides of the bag and stop not spiral. This is caused by the soil around the bag side is slightly drier than toward the center. Being a fabric the outside of the bag dries the roots hit this ‘barrier’ and split into more and more branches of roots, letting those roots to get more nutrients…more roots…more yield. With fabric bags it’s almost impossible to get a root bound plant.
I will caution though…there are some really cheap bags out there. In the picture you can see the big bags are a little floppy. The smaller 10 gallon bags have additional stitching around the top edge for better support.
I get most of our bags online. We stocked up before tariffs China was a big supplier. 
We used to grow them when my boys were small. Red Pontiac. Over the years our garden has gotten smaller and smaller.
However this year we just got 63 lettuce plants in the ground. Good thing, because it’s supposed to rain all next week. A combination of red leaf, green leaf, and green romaine.
8 tomato plants are ready to go in as well, but who knows when that will happen. In between the raindrops some time.
When they are kinda cheap at the store…it’s the taste of a fresh potato…incomparable.