final sowing

Moved my bay leaf tree into a slightly larger pot, and the rest of coleus into deck pots. In the 4" pots they vacated, I planted purple pole beans, cucumbers, zucchini and cantaloupe. Will start them for a week or two indoors, then move into the garden. Or the squirrel would feast on seed. I also started my garden experiment of the season- I planted lentils!

Just a few. Into these large pots set onto a bench I made by laying two boards across a few of the old wild cherry stumps. Near my sitting spot under the deck.

Here's the deal with lentils: I'm very fond of them. But only a certain kind. For years I tried different spice combinations to get the flavor I thought was THE flavor for lentils. Never was quite right. Then one day picked up a different kind at the grocery store. The small brown pardina lentils. Had exactly the flavor I remembered! I was thrilled to discover this.

But then one day the store no longer had my favorite lentil. I went to other grocery stores and couldn't find it. I tried a few other types- red lentils, 'horse gram' lentils, green lentils, French lentils- not the same. A year later pardina lentils showed up in my nearby grocery store again, and I bought a ton to stock up! I still have all the other kinds as well, ha.

Idly reading gardening stuff the other day, found out you can grow a lot of dried beans, peas, and lentils straight from the grocery store. I looked up the other lentil types and beans we often have in our house (black beans, pinto beans, great northern white beans, cannellini beans, split peas, limas . . .) Turns out most of them would be tricky or impossible to grow in my climate. But I might just be able to grow some lentils- if I keep them under the deck so they don't get too hot in the middle of summer. Not sure if the humidity will be too much, but I'm game to try at least once!