As another Lame Cherry exclusive in matter anti matter.
This is the million dollar knowledge, as the source of information is entirely on tomatoes and cabbages, but in this I wondered this past year, just what Swiss Chard would respond to in sprouting like tomatoes inside and transplanting them.
Chard is of the beet family. It has numbers of seeds in a seed pod that can become plants. In planting a packet, I tend to waste 2/3rds of the seeds as some do not sprout, and most are too close in sprouting in bunches. That all saddens me in waste and death. The chard variety I use is a type of spinach substitute that is not uber big in stalks or those frilled leaves.
So I dumped about 25 seeds into a plastic pot to see how things would go, and in two waves they grew. I worry about my seed source at times, as most of the sprouts were red like a rhubarb and some were green. Time will tell me if I got contaminated seeds or what is up.
I found out some things which are important in the million dollar knowledge. The first is, like tomatoes that are too leggy, you can plant the seedlings deeper than they are growing. This is important as two of the baby plants broke in the stems and instead of throwing them away, I just put them deeper and they are growing as if nothing happened.
That is most important if these projects out as it seems, as it means the chard are more friendly to transplanting.
I have them in 9 packs now that I saved from cabbage I had picked up a few years ago, and sitting in the window sill.
Oh for the window, I put a masonite strip about 5 inches mounted onto the window board. It worked very well as it keeps plants from falling and makes it a nice greenhouse in the porch.
The thing is chard does not need to be indoors after sprouting. It simply just has to sprout not in the cold ground, in order to get a month ahead of the growing conditions. If you have a cloche or cold frames, you could gain 2 months probably on the growing season.
The reality of this is when Swiss Chard appeared in America as a main crop, it was a wonder, as it had no insect problems. The problem started in the late 90's in chard started getting eaten by pests non stop and looking horrid during the summer. The cure was to cut it back according to Glenn Drowns and let it resprout and the new tender leaves will look like spring growth.
The hope in the month early sprouting is to get a satisfying crop before the pests arrive, and then administer maintenance, and prepare them for the fall crop. The fall crop then with cold frames or cloches will extend this into December if things go well.
The sprouting of the chard means that I can space these plants for the best possible production, and in the past I have dug the best plants up, and overwintered them in a bucket in a porch. The idea now is to cold frame them, so that as chard is a biennial, I can get seed from these plants, as they do produce huge amounts of seed if watered.
I am attempting this with parsnips too, but I doubt I will move this to beets, but if it works with chard, I have what I am looking for. I intend to have the money next year in having cold frames constructed for early chard, lettuce and spinach, as it is ridiculous to be paying 3 to 5 bucks a bag for fodder at the grocery. A few packets of various lettuce is all that is necessary for late fall plantings and getting things going in the spring too.
I have an idea of some long row trays, like plastic ones for margarine that I have of about 6 inches which I could sprout lettuce in February for the cold frames. There are a great many plans in this, including broccoli, cabbage for seeds, cauliflower and my favorite in brussel sprouts.
Sprouts are like 135 day crops and the plan is to do it early or late in the frames to avoid cabbage moths. That being the case the cabbage moths will not bother extremely early or late cauliflower and broccoli.
I am still working on the fine points of this, but Swiss Chard is apparently a crop which can be leveraged to comply with the will of man a bit more than is usually the case.......the point is, most growers live in some God's Country like Boston, Chicago or San Diego where it is not necessary to extend seasons for chard, so it is just easier to not deal with chard. With my need though, I desire to get what is for me, another growing season out of my chard.
This is working as the chard is in the window and looking happy like the tomatoes out on the sill looking glad to be alive.
Just keep at things, look for some junk throw away stuff, and make yourself some family structures to help with your food bill.
nuff said
agtG