No, we are pretty set in our ways. We have a cherry tomato we call “Carrie” after my wife, because she found in growing in the mulch pile a couple decades ago and like it. One called “Pansy” after her aunt which has been in the family roughly forever, and Brandywine for slicing. Burpee put out a sauce tomato called Big Mama that we have had a lot of luck with, so those are what it will go up against. 
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The first of the seedlings are started. Early spring leafy greens, and various peppers that have a long germination time.
I’m also working on a plant incubator idea. I have access to these large Styrofoam boxes that are watertight. If I mount a bright-enough puck light to the lid I could make a plant incubator for people who have small apartments. The idea is you could stick this in a small closet, then transplant to small pots on a patio/balcony when it warms up. The challenge is getting puck lights that put out around 1500 lumens in the 5000-6000 kelvin range.
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We’re doing something kind of similar. We repurposed an old cooler instead of your awesome style of box. It’s for mushrooms so we replaced the opaque lid with a clear bin inverted over the top. Since we can have it out in the room near a window, we don’t need additional light.
We’ve kept a sensor in there to monitor humidity and CO2 levels, and the CO2 gets surprisingly high, even when we prop the lid open.
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This cooler was used to transport medical testing reagents to a hospital lab. They have to be kept cool throughout transportation. Once delivered these boxes are discarded.
Just for prototyping purposes I stuck a 8W LED grow bulb into the lid and ran a temperature test. The bulb does not get hot so no concerns about melting the styrofoam. It got from 70f to 100f in only an hour. Water in the bottom should moderate the temperature though. I will also add some vents in the lid that can be closed off.
The box is 24" wide. There is a stepped in level where I will put a layer of acrylic when the seedlings are germinating. The box has a pleasing purple glow when the bulb is on.
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Imagine opening someone’s darkened closet and finding that thing in there! That’s some Pulp Fiction level mystery going on.
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I started my tomato seeds a couple weeks ago, based on the old farmers almanac, and I’m pretty sure I’m north of you.
I’m betting on a warm spring.
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I usually start 3/1, anticipating setting out around 4/15, give or take. That’s (historically) our avg last frost, but that needs updating pretty badly.
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Started tomatoes yesterday. Peppers and eggplants are up, already potted up the artichokes. Planning for 4/15 being able to move them outside, but we’ll see. Trying an experiment with strawberries and lettuce, there were a couple 4" PVC pipes left over from the remodel and i drilled them out to make “towers” and gonna try vertical gardening to maximize space.
Experiments are fun!
Seed starting rig in our cellar
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too cool! (RE: vertical garden towers) i want to try that also for our arugula and mustards and tatsoi greens. it looks so simple. i am watching your experiment!
as early as our season is, we started peppers mid january and are now getting growth in the starts and already getting jalapenos from the sets we planted at the same time.
beans and squash are getting big enough in the starter pots to move into the raised beds that all got amended with new compost and manure tea and drenched with organic horticultural oil to minimze whiteflies. also populated the beds with beneficial nematodes to fight cut worms, aphids, thrips and other larval, pupal and newly morphed pests.
we are looking at a good season 
, i think.
also have grow bags with ginger, garlic, radishes and unique carrots (gotta love those guys at Baker Creek for the cool, weird stuff!) and onion sets. we’ve been digging like mad and got a decent head start on the season. hoping we beat the brutal heat of what looks like a MF’er of a hot one!
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Installed and filled. Will need to top up once they settle a bit, but actually went easier that i expected. Going for $0, so filled with soil left from the excavation, which we need to do something with anyway, amended with some compost i made. We do have the advantage of really deep, rich, river bottom soil here, so our average dirt is probably better than most of what you can buy. Let it settle, and in a month or so we will see if it’s worth expanding the experiment!
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Today was a big day in the garden. Finally pulled out the kale, kohlrabi, cabbage and onions from the grow room to start hardening off, planted peas, beets, rutabega, daikon, carrots, parsnips, radishes and turnips. Also tilled up the beds and planted wheat, oats, barley, buckwheat and chickpeas. Had to replace my old Mantis tiller, and took a chance on the Ego one, since we are transitioning everything over to electric. It worked like a charm, tilling up over 500 sq ft wothout a hitch, or a dead battery. Unlike my riding mower, not electric, but won’t start with a dead battery. That’s the next thing to go electric, but way expensive right now.
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I was sick for a week so if course my seedlings got neglected. Spending the day trying to recover the mess.
Here’s the result of a comparison between growing under fluorescent bulbs and growing under LED grow lamp.
Basil does much better under LED. The pack in the center was the fluorescent bulb and the other two were LED.
Red cabbage looked about the same though. Also a seed trial to see whether some older seed was worth keeping (2022 vs 2021). Clearly it isnt.
ETA: updated error
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i find myself saving seeds year-to-year and being disappointed when they are not as vigorous. i wonder…
anyone here have recco’s for “keeping” seeds? freezing? other techniques for ensuring some viability after just one season? i have the worst time with squash. the first season, they grow well, the next - the same packet of seeds, kept cool, dry and dark - not so good. peppers tend to decline from packets, but generational propagation works for a while before they get smaller and plants weaker, overall. beans seem to keep well enough and propagate really well.
i guess my question is, what do you all do to save seeds from season to season? can we “save” packet seeds, or just propagate from select produce? (heirloom seeds - not store-bought veggies).
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I’ve generally had decent success keeping seeds. Last year I was still growing Jalapeños from a 2019 packet. This year though I’ve had poor success with germination in general, mainly doe to neglect I think.
I got a small dormitory fridge a few weeks ago to use or seed storage going forward. We’ll see how that goes
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I’ve had luck refrigerating seeds, put them into winter dormancy and they’ll remain viable a bit longer.
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How’s the Kiss Me Deadly box working out so far?
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I call it the energon cube
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