More seeding and early garden maintenance

Our early spring continues with the birds (these are waxwings) flocking up and the geese starting to fly overhead.

Jess and I continued the seeding yesterday, with some marigolds.

The tomatoes we seeded two weeks ago are now germinating under lights in the basement.

Outside, the garden is beginning to wake up with the early tulips in the back pushing up through the soil. These survived the snow we had earlier this week.

The spinach we planted in the cold frame has also come up.

I few years ago I snagged some wild onion seeds from the river valley and dusted them along the south side of the house. These have started to turn into a new patch and are back again this year. To encourage its spread, I spread the seeds from its heads last year around in the same spot.

We stopped in at Apache seeds this morning and picked up 1000 pounds of cow manure to add to the beds. Many places are still froze, but the top couple of inches of the raised beds were soft enough to stir in the manure.

Around front, last year's garlic is starting to emerge. I was a bit worried that nothing had emerged yet so I'm happy to see these shoots.

I left Jess to spread some of the manure around in the front beds. We're slowly improving the soil in a nasty little corner of the garden. She's also keen to pull out the irises below her window and put in some strawberry plants. But we'll need to wait a month or so before we can start that project.

With the weather looking better as spring break moves on, I am hopeful we can get the rest of the manure spread out (some of the bags were frozen) and maybe look for some onions to plant. If I get ambitious, I will also pull the Jerusalem artichokes and move them.