I hear what you all are saying, but if I had a nickel for every seed I planted that never made it to adulthood. I'd be rich from my black thumb newbie years. A kit like this might have improved my odds and taught me a bit along the way. Forty or fifty years ago the country was swept by a Pet Rock craze. People weren't buying the rock, they were buying the the writeup that came with it. I see the same thing now on E-bay. Information is the value-added component of many, many transactions. But information alone won't help newbies if they don't have an easy-to-grow selection of seeds like lettuce, radish, basil, tomato, zucchini, and summer squash. If I were putting together a spring planting package, I would also include cucumber and pepper seeds although I personally I find them more difficult to grow. (But then I'm one of those who does great with beets and can't grow beans for beans! ) And, since this is an organic gardening package, the purchaser needs to be told that radishes are a trap crop for the svb and and cucumber beetle and a few plants should be left to go to seed. I would also include marigold seeds, because they, too are easy to grow, are good aversion crops for everything, they make the garden look friendly I'd recommend small rockwool cubes for seed starting They do away with the problem of the medium being too moist or too dry and make it easy to pot up seedlings with no root disturbance. Be sure to tell consumers to presoak the cubes to bring the ph down. Aluminum foil pans covered with plastic shower caps hold my starters until the seeds sprout. You could include more elaborate seed starter systems, but I recycle these again and again. I like to transplant to 20/24 oz. recycled styrofoam cupsthese because I can write the vegetable name and variety on the cup and they are larger enough to hold the seedlings until they are ready to go outside. (I'd prefer to use large cardboard cups, but no one carries them). It's true you can't do much with a kit to help those with problem soil, you could give them instructions on diagnosing their soil problems and-- my personal favorite fix-- building lasagna beds. As for those midseason surprises, here again education is good. A selection of recipes for homebrew sprays would be a great item to include. Printed on recycled paper, please. jan

I just bought "9 miscellaneous succulents" and "9 miscellaneous cacti" on amazon. Both are really inexpensive, it looks like he raised the price of the plants & lowered shipping costs http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/ol/B005WCKBQO/ref=olp_tab_all here's a link. When mine came in the mail I was so happy they're really cool & diverse & they were all healthy so I'd definitely buy from them again. The only down side is that they don't identify any of the plants for you. I've also purchased a lot of succulents from Home Depot but beware I bought a couple of plants that were infested with spider mites that spread to one of my herb plants. Also I'm not sure if it's my lack of experience or what but my Home Depot succulents don't survive.

No, the small trays they had are still larger than the ones in your link. They looked more like 2x2 per cell but definitely not the typical 6 cell. I use those in your link for starting mine but then transplant to 4" pots. Yes, they had lots of hot peppers out! Mostly hot peppers actually. I don't grow hot peppers so can't help you with types they had (other than habanero haha!) but probably 5 or 6 varieties from memory. All the vendors had hot peppers, most had other varieties too. The California Wonder I only saw from the one vendor. If you are familiar with the layout, the seedling vendors all seem to be on the northern leg of the "L" shape market layout- along 17th street. This particular vendor was on the furthest east stand (nearest Park ave) on the side furthest from 17th street. Hope that makes sense. Shouldn't be a problem in any event, lots of them selling today and I imagine more on Friday.

I buy from local plant stores, neighborhood plant sales and the Green Markets throughout the city. However I recommend buying seeds online. I try to grow from seed when possible. There's something about seeing the seeds grow into plants indoors when it's cold outside. Also, buying seeds gives you more options and varieties than what you can purchase as plants at local stores. My two favorite online sources are: sample seeds seeds now (esp. the free shipping offers)