J.I.T.

On Demand.

The Cloud.

In the garden, this philosophy looks like medium sized tomato plants that have not yet been put into the ground despite a date in April in a temperate region of California. Sure, given how close we are to the bay and our average last frost date, we could have planted our tomatoes. We could be fully committed, and done with the major physical labor of amending the beds and putting in the plants.

But, the recent rains and cold weather have made me quite glad that we exercised some caution. We refrained and waited to plant — so we’ve been taking the plants out into the sun when it’s nice and taking them into the garage to protect them when it’s too cold, or too wet (like today).

As a result of waiting until the last possible moment to be irrevocably committed to the ground and exposure to the elements, we will experience less loss and will have the freedom to optimize where appropriate.

Yet another garden analogy that works for startups.

The rains have brought prolific propagation in the garden.

The problem being, of course, that many of the big plants that took over in the absence of our discipline are weeds, or overly mature plants with nothing to offer but removal of nutrients from the soil. Sure, many of them are flowering pollinators (yay local bees!), but, if we are honest, they are weeds all the same.

This weekend, we spent much time culling. It was unpleasant and a task we put off for entirely too long, which made it even more difficult than it should have been. But now, after getting rid of the things that had been growing without a plan, we have room to put in the summer plants and enjoy bountiful harvests.

This post, of course, is a metaphor for my start-up companies. I’ll avoid the overly precise analysis, because experience has taught me that this is one of those lessons, whether in the garden, or a seedling company, that must be learned first hand.

Here’s to culling when you need to, new beginnings, and the celebrations of spring!

The time has come to start harvesting the winter garden.  We’ve had delicious broccoli and cauliflower treats, some great leafy greens,  and I (well, technically, my husband) finally managed to dig out the world’s largest carrot:

Much like my fledgling law firm, the seeds for the summer garden are germinating away:

Supposedly tomatoes take 7-10 days to germinate.  Unfortunately, I didn’t check ’em ’til day 5, and found that we’ve got overachievers this year, where 45% had germinated early and left us with tall spindly sprouts searching for the sun (aka the lights I quickly turned on the timer).  I hope I didn’t create weeklings that won’t be able to stand up under their own weight, but if so, the good thing about planting entirely too many is that even if I’m left with half I’ll still have over 500.