Last week my bales were delivered! We are still two months away from planting in Wisconsin and I haven't even started my tomato seeds or watermelons yet.
I like to get the straw early and let nature do it's thing. I will probably give them a few doses of nitrogen granules to start the decomposing process and then add the 10-10-10 fertilizer a few days before planting.
Like most gardeners, the anticipation of spring is one of the most exhilirating times of the year. I started my eggplant and peppers two weeks ago, as they take a long time to sprout. I'm using old seed, but they have been stored in the root cellar and most all of them have sprouted. I don't mind repotting them if they get too large for their little pots, as I have a sunny garage window I can transfer them too while we wait for temperatures to warm up enough.
Last year I had terrific luck growing my Baker Seed Malaysian Eggplant. I did an experiment, three plants in bales and 1 in the ground. The ground plant grew much larger, and yielded about the same as the plants grown in straw. This year I will be planting all of the eggplant in straw. Why? Because it's much easier to pick and they recieved less bug damage than the plant grown in the ground. We had some high winds and some of the plants toppled over (I didn't know that they would need stakes) they were top heavy with fruit.
I did the same experiment with Baker Seed Bell Peppers. The plants in the ground grew much larger and did slightly better than those grown in straw. I think I will continue to experiment with the peppers. All of the plants were sowed from seed indoors and then transplanted.
I was able to spend some time in March breaking down last years bales and using them as mulch to protect the bare dirt where my tomato plants will be this year. Of course this should have been done in the fall, but life is good and I'm not worried. One thing I have considered is crop rotation. Since straw is my medium for the most part, I doubt this will effect new plants in new straw, but what about using last years eggplant straw for this years watermelon or potatoes.
My plants were not diseased, except for some end-of-season powdery mildew on the zucchini.
The ease of harvesting has me hooked on straw bale gardening, and I love the residual mulch material for the following year.