Like the flick of a switch, we’re FINALLY into the next phases of our 2026 garden! We are finally starting to see the weather patterns we need for hardening off and beyond!
We’ll get more into the menutia of hardening off soon, but the gist is it’s an essential step to get indoor grown plants used to the power of the sun. We do this in several phases, typically when we’re trying to get certain plants into our heated greenhouse.
This season is definitely unique! We just didn’t have it in us to shovel the six inches of snow we recently received, so we’re just stuffing plants wherever the snow is not. What matters here is the ambient temperature, we’re finally into the mid-40’s Fahrenheit!
We normally do this process in much smaller batches, led by our super cold hardy plants like celery and onions. But, given how backed up we are this season, it’s a mad dash to get a ton of our plants into the greenhouse, stat! We need to clear room for several hundred more transplants that are on the way!
There are a few notable exceptions, for now. Our peppers and tomatoes remain indoors. These plants are much more sensitive to cooler temperatures, so we’re holding them back from the hardening off process until conditions improve further.
Our end goal here is to get these plants into our minimally heated greenhouse. We’re finally seeing weather conditions where we know the cost to heat it is less than the cost of operating grow lights. We’ll dive into this concept more soon, as it’s vital to understand well.
Our takeaway is that hardening off this many plants at once is not fun! But, we’re glad to finally be seeing a different phase of our 2026 garden emerge. We’re tired of being couped up, both us and our plants are ripping & ready to get outside!
