spring chill

I thought the coldframe house would be enough protection against the weather for my seedlings and young plants, but found out otherwise. We had a few very chill nights, and I lost all my tomato seedlings, all my coleus plants, all my echinacea. These last I had recently potted up out of their seedling tray, they were doing better since the last picture. Now they're not. Not alive.

So I'm starting over with some things. At least I still have coleus cuttings inside in jars, and I cut all the wilted ones down to soil level, left them in there just in case the roots can regenerate some life. Doubt it. Yesterday I seeded new trays with tomatoes, also started some peppers (my bigger pepper plant was also outside and died that night- but I still have the four-year-old one in the house! Not letting that baby out overnight until after mother's day now), more marigolds, a few tithonia, nicotiana, bush green beans and cucumbers. Some of these went into milk jugs. I noticed that even though the seeds in my jugs took a lot longer to germinate than those started inside in trays, the seedlings that did come up are already more robust than their sheltered fellows.

While I lost all the echinacea that had been babied on the windowsill inside, a few have emerged in the milk jug cloche. So perhaps there will be a few more.

Another note: carrots and beets have not come up yet. But everything I transplanted into the garden space is doing fine so far. I've only lost one pea plant- looks like slugs ate it. Trying to keep on top of watering regularly; last year's gardening attempt was half-hearted and I'm not so sure the plants failed for lack of sun. It might have just been lack of attention from the gardener!