Gardening in the Office

We had a pretty mild winter this year. It never really hit freezing temperatures here in New York City. Well it probably did get to that point, but only for a few days at most. The unusually warm temperatures have had me thinking about all my summer time activities all season long. Up until just last week I’ve actually been able to stop myself from cleaning all my fishing gear, putting air in my bicycle and prepping all my other sports equipment. One thing I couldn’t stop myself from thinking of and doing though, was planning my Spring and Summer gardening.

On Leap day, February 29, I finally had enough with the somewhat warm weather taunting me. I had amassed a bunch of seeds through seed swaps and purchased from stores and online. This year I’ve decided that peppers will be the star of the show at my Summer vegetable garden. I’ll be growing my other staple crops too (Tomatoes, Asian squashes, string beans, cucumbers, scallions, etc) but the majority of it all will be many varieties of hot and sweet peppers.

I like using the coffee filter and baggy method to start my seedlings. These seeds are from Shishito Peppers, a Japanese variety of bite sized peppers. I’m working on a disposable plate so I don’t make a mess. Then I just stick the filter in a Zip-Lock Bag and toss it in a drawer where I’ll forget about it for a few days. In this case I’ve tossed it into my snack drawer at work. A neat trick I learned is to stand the filter up so all the roots grow downwards instead of all on top of each other.

I noticed a bit of root beginning to emerge from most of the seeds by March 9. At that point I plucked the seeds off the filter and placed them into peat pellets. By the next week they looked like this with their seed leaves. The seedlings in the pint containers are Momotaro Tomatoes and Shishito Peppers in the container on the right.

After the first set of true leaves emerged I brought them all home and transplanted them into red plastic cups with holes poked in the bottom. I just filled the cups with good potting soil. Then back to work they went to sit on the sunny window sill at my workstation. Here's some Anaheim Peppers and Black Beauty Eggplants by the window today.