Why Are the Lettuce Seeds Not Growing?

I dreamed last night that our entire garden area was just red Virginia clay in the middle of summer: nothing grew. Nothing lived. Desolate.

And so I started my day.

Buttercup didn't load. Phil actually managed to get her halfway up the ramp, but she backed down again. Perhaps we won't eat her. We don't want to kill her now, because our industrial freezer, purchased used, needs servicing, and besides, we don't need 200 pounds of sausage right now. By the time we might need her for a CSA, our boar will be ready to breed (around the end of May).

We missed an entire litter, then, since she could have bred in December, and certainly in January. That was a very expensive unfortunate series of events.

My seedlings continue to die. The few mustard greens that had sprouted have since all withered. While I won't say I'm panicked, I will say that going into the greenhouse no longer gives me pleasure, but rather a pit in my stomach. If I knew what was wrong, I could fix it, but I'm faced with having no greens, and we are just about desperate for greens at this point in season. And I'm sure any CSA customers would appreciate them, too.

To continue the calamity of errors, Joe and I carefully seeded about 350 sweet pepper seeds. They looked perfect in their flat. My squirt bottle ceased working, and I didn't want to splash water on the little babies and wash them away. So I went to find my Haus watering can with the fine rose on top.

Sadly, the fine rose didn't start out fine, and the gush of water that emerged at first blew away maybe 60 of my little seeds. It's not the entire tray ruined, but enough that it looks damaged and nasty, and a significant portion that are simply vanished.

Eliot Coleman makes it sound like there's nothing easier than growing seeds, but despite praying over them while I plant, and doing all I can think of (I ordered the same potting soil he uses even!), there's just not much good success right now. May my dream of last night not come to pass.

Phil, after dealing with the unpleasant task of working with the books, is working on a new chicken pen. It looks good so far: very sturdy.