Time to Get Growing- The Soil Blocker

It's March here in Indiana, and although the cold temperatures and snow covered ground don't conjure up the feelings of gardening in the summer sun or picking bright red tomatoes, we realized it's time to start planting- indoors of course!

We love starting our own seeds. And when I say love, I mean LOVE! We love that we can control what kind of soil blend we are growing our seeds in and that we can choose not to use any chemicals on them. We love that we can save money, I mean, what's not to love about saving money, right? It's actually a pretty steep difference. One plant at the store alone can cost around three dollars, so even if you spend three dollars on a packet of seeds, you can still get 20-30 plants for the same price as you could get one!

Not only have we grown a lot of seedlings over the last few years, we've lost many too! It's definitely not very fun to spend weeks babying seedlings only to lose them during the transplanting process. But have no fear! Last year we discovered the superhero of gardening tools- the soil blocker!

Soil blockers make transplanting plants a breeze. Gone are the days of damaging the seedlings as you try to squeeze them out of a plastic container! No longer will your delicate seedling roots have to attempt to grow through a thick peat pot. Once you make your soil blocks and plant your seeds, all you have to do is transfer the block directly to the garden- we're not kidding!

To get started you will obviously need a soil blocker. You can find these online. You will also need to make a special blend of soil, so that your blocks will hold together.

For the soil blend you will need compost, peat moss, perlite, and fertilizer. We used compost from our compost pit, but you can also purchase it in most stores that have a seasonal gardening section.

There are no "exact" measurements. The blend we use is 2 parts peat moss, 1 part compost, 1 part perlite, and a small amount of fertilizer. As you can see above, we used a planter filled to the brim to measure out our parts.

We used around 1/4 cup of organic fertilizer.

 

Mix it all together! (Definitely the best part!)

Moisten with water until you get a pasty consistency.

Press your soil blocker into the soil mixture and wiggle it around so the soil is tightly compacted.

Release the soil blocker on a firm surface.

Viola! The perfect container to grow your seeds in!

Cover the blocks with plastic until they sprout and then place them under grow lights until you can transplant them outdoors!