are you new to gardening as mizuna is easy to grow from seed. just make sure you don't overwater seeds, plus to allow the young seedlings to be kept moist, not drenched.

i have some Da Cheong Chae seeds also but i haven't gotten them planted yet. Have you grown bok choy? i think the culture and growth habit will be similiar. Rich, fertile soil, ample water, probably benefit from a little shade in hot weather. Mostly i use the choys to make a quick slaw-slice thinly, toss with other thinly sliced greens (a little arugula is great) or shredded carrots/daikon (or not-time permitting), dress with papaya seed or chinese chicken salad dressing and toss with crunchy wonton stips or crispy chow mein. Yum. Sometimes i stir fry it with a few other veg (carrots, onions, snap peas, etc) and aromatics (garlic, ginger, lemongrass) and add to fried noodles. Sauce with whatever you like and have available-hoisin with soy, fish sauce with oyster sauce, black bean sauce, a dash of sesame oil and always-sambal oelek. It can also be stirfried by itself like any other leafy green. When stir frying it's good to start the stalks first and add the green leafy bits when the stalks are almost done. Sometimes i braise baby bok choys but i think the habit of the DCC will be too open for that.

It's my second year vegetable gardening as well, and I'm loving it! If only the sun would come out! Fruit Trees: *Cherries *Melrose apple *Redfree apple *Peaches *blueberries (multiple varieties) In raised beds: *Lettuce/greens: black seeded simpson, green oak leaf, red deer tongue, Australian yellowleaf, cracoviensis, rouge d'hiver, merlot, arugula, spinach *Tomatoes: black giant, black, bali, red russian, eva purple ball, russian 117, yellow peach, stupice *Peppers: gypsy, jalapeno *Winter squash: small sugar pumpkin, potimarron, musquee de provence *Summer squash: ronde de nice *Beans: vermont cranberry, rattlesnake, purple, jacob's cattle, agate soybean *Peas: green arrow *Carrots: dragon, atomic red, scarlet nantes *Onions: rossa di milano, generic white sets *Potatoes (in wine buckets): russian blue, french fingerling, alaskan sweetheart, caribe, german butterball *Cucumbers: lemon, armenian, boothby's blonde, straight eight, tondo di manduria Herbs: *greek oregano *italian parsley *lemon thyme *rosemary *mint *cilantro *garlic chives Still to go in: *Rosa bianca eggplants (under lights) *Genovese & Christmas basil (under lights) *Long Island Improved Brussel Sprouts (from seed) Beans: Rossa di Milano onion: Greens:

Bon, Home-made seed tapes work just fine. You can find instructions all over the internet. Just be sure you let them dry thoroughly before you put them up to await the day you plant them. If you put them up wet, the flour/water paste can turn moldy. You can use newsprint (not the glossy inserts), paper towels cut in strips, toilet paper, etc. Rodney, It is nice to have you visit us from the land of ice and snow. I hope our endless conversations about the early arrival of warm weather (it arrives every week, stays a few days, and then turns cold again) doesn't make you too crazy. Spring may arrive early here sometimes, especially compared to how late it arrives there for you, but then the cold nights keeps coming back and coming back and coming back. I'll had the temperature go down to freezing when tomato plants were knee-high to waist-high and covered in fruit. Last year, we harvested our first tomatoes on the last day of April (from plants protected on cold nights with frost blanket type row covers), sliced up that tomato, made BLTs and enjoyed every bite. That night or maybe the next night, we had our last freezing temperature of the year. By then, I had tomato plants that were 4' tall and loaded with fruit. C'mon now, is that normal? Nope, but we have to deal with whatever wild, crazy ride the OK weather brings us in any given year. So, while we talk of planting early, we also have to protect plants relatively late. What a terrific grow list you have! I would have thought you'd have idea conditions for the brassicas and for potatoes. Even here, potatoes do well most years, but if we fail to harvest them in time, the heat and humidity can make them collapse into a soggy, rotted mess some years (not necessarily all). Bon, I agree with Rodney. To my taste buds, garlic tastes like garlic. I like it all and never have had any I haven't liked. Today's weather-related surprise (Rodney, you should skip this little announcement of mine if you love asparagus and if the thought of us harvesting it now is going to make you crazy): this afternoon, while working in the garden, in 70-something-degree heat, I harvested the first asparagus spear. I washed it off, pinched off the tip that had been in the ground, broke it in half, and Tim and I stood there and ate that tender, yummy taste of spring. We both were shocked. I am pretty sure we've never harvested asparagus in early February before. I'm not even sure if we've ever had any to harvest in late February. March is more typical. This needs its own thread, and maybe it will get one later, but here goes. Today, at the Wal-Mart in Gainesville, TX, across the Red River from us, they had all kinds of veggies. All kinds. Including tomato plants and a handful of pepper plants. It is far too early for tomato plants--even Gainesville's average last freeze date surely cannot be much earlier than mine (March 28th) and far, far, far too early for pepper plants. So, what's a gardener to do? Especially when their own tomato plants are just tiny sprouts? Yep, I did it. I bought one of each variety they had: Big Beef, Early Girl, Celebrity and Sweet 100. They were in small (maybe 3 or 4") round peat pots. I repotted them into gallon pots and they are sitting on a shelf in my mudroom. I was going to put them in the unheated greenhouse but we're headed for a low in the 30s tonight more than likely, and I had left the doors open all day until sunset so there was no build-up of heat to keep them warm. It is likely that the first tomato we harvest in April will come from one of these plants. I hope the folks at that store remember to cover up the plants this weekend when we're expected to get pretty close to freezing. And for anyone in my neck of the woods wondering if the Wal-Mart in Ardmore has any tomato plants in the store, they did not, as of yesterday. Usually Gainesville gets them at least a week or two before Ardmore does. Oh, and we had to go across the road to the Gainesville Home Depot to get something Tim needed. I made a beeline straight to the garden center and they had the exact same tomato plants and pepper plants that Wal-Mart had, as well as all the cold-season veggies and herbs and tons of flowers. After he found what he came for, he had to come drag me out of the garden center because I was going to stay out there with all those plants all day.