Ballard Sprouts – begins 10th year!
March 2022 Update
Started planting seed trays on Feb 14th, Transplanted them on March 4th.
The Sprouts 2022 season started with volunteers planting 20 trays of seeds in the greenhouse. Three days later we had sprouts! We had to keep these trays on the heating pads during the week of cold weather, Feb 20-24th. Then we moved them to the 2nd greenhouse where they grow until they are ready to transplant. Meanwhile we planted another 20 trays of seeds and put them on the heating pads. On March 4th we brought back some of the original trays and started transplanting. We put 5 plants per pot. The transplanted plants are set outside where they are covered with row cloth at night and on cold days.
We will continue planting seeds for the next few weeks. We want 80 flats of seeds or about 20,000 plants. We will continue transplanting all month.
In April the original plants will be ready to go to the Seattle Giving Gardeners who will grow them to maturity and donate the harvest to the Seattle Food Banks.
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Ready to start 2022 planting season
Ballard Sprouts is ready to begin the 2022 season on Monday, February 14th. This will be the tenth year of Ballard Sprouts.
We will start by planting 20 trays of seeds and placing them in the greenhouse on heating pads. We have an outdoor tent for preparing the seed trays and filling the soil into the transplanting pots. Once the plants have germinated we will move them to another greenhouse until they are ready to transplant. We transplant 5 plants per pot.
We are planning to grow 20,000 plants: Kale, Chard, lettuce, Asian Greens. These plants are given to the Seattle Giving Gardeners who will grow them to maturity and then donate the harvest to the Seattle Food Banks. The plants will be ready to plant outdoors by the beginning of April. This gives the gardeners a head start on the growing season with small, healthy, organic plants when the weather warms up.
The Sprouts and the Seattle Giving Gardeners are part of the Seattle Giving Garden Network, see SGGN.org for more information.
Donations to the Sprouts Project can be made by specifying SGGN on your contribution to Grow Northwest who is the fiscal sponsor of the Seattle Giving Garden Network (SGGN). https://www.grownorthwest.org
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