Our 2025 Garden analysis: winter sown beds

December 7, 2025December 6, 2025 / Re-Farmer / Leave a comment

Our 2025 garden started in 2024, and not just by planting garlic in the fall. Inspired by a video from Gardening in Canada, I decided to give winter sowing a try. Now winter sowing in milk jugs, etc, but actually direct sowing into garden beds in the fall.

You can see where I did these in my October 2024 garden tour video.

This was a pretty risky experiment. After going through my seeds, I decided to make mixes of seeds and broadcast them. This gave me a chance to use up old seed, but it also cleaned out all the seeds I had in some categories, both old and new.

The garlic I planted was from saved cloves. Besides that, these are the seed mixes I made and direct sowed before the ground froze.

Seed combo 1 Root vegetables	Seed combo 2 Summer squash	Seed combo 3 Kitchen garden	Seed combo 4 Tall and climbing	Flower combos
Carrots: Uzbek Golden and Napoli Beets: Bresko, Merlin, Cylindra and Albino Turnip: Purple Prince Radishes: French Breakfast, Champion, Cherry Belle and Zlata Onions: saved seed (mix of red and yellow bulb unions) Note: left over seeds from this mix were planted in a final bed with saved Jebousek lettuce seeds added in	Sunburst pattypan White Scallop pattypan Magda Green zucchini: Endeavor Yellow zucchini: Goldy	Swiss Chard: Bright Lights and Fordhook Giant Spinach: Space, Lakeside, Bloomsdale and Hybrid Olympia Kohlrabi: Early White Vienna and Early Purple Vienna Bok Choi: Hedou Tiny (saved seed) Shallots: saved seed Onions: saved seed	Sunflowers: Mongolian Giant and Hopi Black Dye Peas: Dalvay shelling peas (not saved seed) and King Tut purple peas (saved seed) Bush beans: Royal Burgundy Corn: Montana Morado (saved seed) Onions: saved seed	Main garden area: Nasturtium: Dwarf Jewel Mix Butterfly flower: Orange Shades (milkweed) Forget Me Not Maple grove: Western Wildflower Mix

In making these mixes, I had some Uzebek Golden carrot seeds left, 1 out of 2 packs of Hopi Black Dye sunflower, onion and Dalvay pea seeds left. All the rest, I used all the seeds I had. I really cleaned out my inventory in the process!

This is the video I made featuring the winter sown beds this past spring.

Let’s start with the complete failures, first. 😂

Summer Squash mix.

I was really looking forward to these. Unfortunately, not a single one germinated.

No, I can’t blame the old seeds.

I blame the cats. Mostly.

After the mulch was removed, the cats decided that this bed was a great place to roll around in. If anything survived the winter, I never had a chance to see them before they were crushed. In the end, my daughter and I completely redid the bed, digging a trench and planting potatoes. Which did much better, sort of, but I’ll cover those in my direct sowing post.

In the garlic bed, I was left with some space at one end of the bed, so I broadcast a bit of the root vegetable mix there. That, also, got completely rolled on by the cats – and I even saw things starting to sprout there! I did direct sow summer squash in that space later on, which I will also cover in the direct sowing post.

The winter sown summer squash, though, were a complete loss.

Tall and Climbing (mostly) mix

This mix went into a newly redone bed in the south yard, at the chain link fence. The fence would have provided a trellis for some things. The bush beans were there as nitrogen fixers.

I planned ahead on this. Knowing that this bed could be completely suffocated by seeds from the nearby Chinese Elm, I got mesh tunnel kits to protect this bed. These were dollar store purchases, and it took four of them to cover the entire bed from end to end.

As far as protecting from the seeds, they worked great.

They couldn’t handle kittens, though. Kittens that decided the mesh was great to play on, bending the wires under their weight, and to get under. They would use the bed as a litter box, but also just run around back and forth, playing. Or in a panic when they couldn’t find a way out again. The few things that started to germinate were completely crushed. Even the seed onions I found and transplanted along the edges were pretty much destroyed.

It was incredibly frustrating, and the bed was a total loss.

Self seeded lettuce; the only thing that survived in this bed!

The netting survived, but many of the wire supports were so badly bent out of shape, it wasn’t worth trying to straighten them out again.

The Flower combos.

There were two areas I winter sowed flower seeds. One was a purchased mix of wildflowers native to Western Canada. These are the sort of thing I would like to have growing among the trees, so it went into an area on the edge of the maple grove.

Unfortunately, yes, the cats caused damage there, too. The prepared soil was softer there, so they’d use it as a litter. The area was large enough, though, that if anything survived, there was still a chance.

I honestly don’t know if any survived. Nothing came up, but part of the issue in that area was the drought conditions and the fact that I simply didn’t water it regularly in the spring. It’s entirely possible that there are still surviving seeds in there that might germinate later on. I’d sown mixes of seeds in two other areas in the maple grove that also didn’t take, but since then, things have come up that I haven’t seen there before, so it’s entirely possible this will happen again.

For 2025, though, nothing seemed to have come up at all.

The other flower seeds went into a small bed at the end of the high raised bed, where I’d grown pumpkins last year. This one, I was able to water more regularly.

Yup. You guessed it.

Cats destroyed it. By the time I was able to cover it, it was too late. Nothing survived.

Starting over with flowers: much better!

I did replant that bed with more nasturtiums, Cosmos and some memorial asters, keeping them covered until they were too big to fit under the cover, and large enough that I didn’t think the cats would go into them anymore.

The nasturtiums did pretty well, though they were much smaller than they should have been. They bloomed and we were able to collect seeds from them. They did pretty good, but did not thrive to their full potential.

The Cosmos got really tall and looked great, but they were among the things that stagnated. It took so long before they bloomed that, even with a mild fall, they never finished blooming, and there were no seeds to collect.

The memorial asters were also much smaller than they should have been, and took a very long time to bloom. They were, however, also protected by the Cosmos, when the temperatures started to drop and frost hit. The Cosmos protected them enough that they were able to go to seed.

Some of the seed, I allowed to drop to self seed for next year, but I collected others to direct sow in other areas next year.

Now let’s look at what did work – and these really made up for the losses!

Kitchen Garden mix

This mix went into one bed in the old kitchen garden. As things started to warm up, I dragged over a cover to put over it. This allowed me to first cover it with plastic, to create a mini greenhouse, which was later replaced with mosquito netting. This cover is strong enough to withstand the weight of cats!

The first things to show up in this bed was the spinach.

Lots of spinach.

More than we could keep up with, spinach!

Some varieties bolted rather quickly, though.

What got me really excited, though, was the kohlrabi. I’ve been trying to grow it for years and, with the old seeds I had, I honestly wasn’t expecting much. For the first time, we actually had kohlrabi to harvest! That was what really won me over to winter sowing. The only other time I came close to succeeding with kohlrabi, they suddenly got completely destroyed by flea beetles.

Another reason for the mosquito netting!

Different things showed up as the season progressed and space opened up. The kohlrabi did overshadow other things, like the Swiss Chard, though we were still able to harvest some from under the kohlrabi leaves, too.

What I didn’t see until they bolted was the Hedou Tiny bok choi (which I kept misspelling as hinou instead of hedou). They were already from saved seed, and only a couple of plants seemed to survive the shade of the kohlrabi, so I left them to go to seed.

The most resilient in this bed were the chard. We harvested those as cut and come again plants, and they just kept going and going! Even when I finally had to clean the bed up and prepare it for new winter sowing, we still had harvestable leaves.

The “fail” of the bed were the onion seeds. Actually, the bulb onions and shallots seeds, both from our own saved seed, were a fail in all the beds. Those really need to be started indoors in January or February. Heck, I could be starting them now, and it’s still the first week of December as I write this. We just don’t have a long enough season for them to be direct down. I had hoped, however, that they would start to grow enough that we could harvest the greens. The kitchen garden bed was the only one that actually had onions start to grow. In fact, when it was time to redo the bed, I found so many tiny onions and possibly shallots that I kept the larger ones and replanted them with the winter sowing!

I also found a surprise. Two full head of garlic somehow got missed when the bed was being reworked. They were sprouting, so I ended up breaking the cloves apart and transplanting them into the wattle weave bed in the kitchen garden, as part of my winter sowing for next year.

I was really impressed with how this bed did, and the experiment helped me make decisions for next year.

Root Vegetable mix

This mix ended up being spread out over three areas. The high raised bed in the main garden area, and a small space at the end of the garlic bed, got the same mix. When it came time to use the last of the mix, in one of the low raised beds in the west yard, I added Jebousek lettuce seeds I’d saved from last year.

The three areas turned out quite different.

The tiny area with the garlic, as mentioned earlier, was destroyed by cats rolling in the soil.

The high raised bed had mostly beets, radishes and carrots show up, plus some turnip. Including one giant turnip I allowed to go to seed, except a deer ate it. So that got harvested.

I allowed most of the radishes to go to seed as well, as I was growing them mostly for their pods. Eventually, the deer started going for those, too!

They really liked the beet greens.

*sigh*

Still, we were able to harvest beets and carrots – including the orange Napoli carrots from old pelleted seeds! – as needed. What we really got a lot of, though, was radish pods. We tried those out in a quick pickle.

Which we all enjoyed. I don’t like radishes in general, but found myself snacking on fresh pods pretty regularly. It turns out that winter sown radish pods are milder than spring sown ones.

The third bed also did really well.

I did end up putting plastic over this bed as well. Mostly, though, I found I had to try and keep cats from getting under it.

The only “problem” we had with this bed is the Jebousek lettuce. Which we quite enjoy eating. There was just so MUCH of it! I couldn’t believe it! They actually got to be a weed. We simply couldn’t keep up with eating it all and I ended up pulling a lot of it and leaving it as a mulch. Only to discover they would re-root themselves and start growing again!

The radish pods did really well, though. Even after the deer got at them, they recovered and started blooming again.

In the end, the few beets that germinated got choked out. No onions germinated, that I could see. I didn’t think the carrots were showing up, other than the odd one, but when I started cleaning up the bed at the end of the season, I kept finding carrot fronds, so I left them to grow until it was time to clean up and prepare the bed for the next winter sowing.

This is what I ended up finding.

That was way more than I expected!

So that’s how the winter sown seeds went. There’s still one more bed to cover.

Garlic

As always, our garlic was planted in the fall. When I took the mulch off in the spring, they were already up and growing. I was really happy with how they did!

Unfortunately, yard cats were still an issue, and I ended up having to cover the bed (and the potato bed next to it) with netting until the garlic started to get too tall. By then, they were not at risk from the cats anymore.

I’m really happy with how the garlic did – and with being able to harvest scapes again.

We ended up dehydrating some of the scapes, then grinding them to a powder. It turned out to be a fantastic way to be able to include garlic in our cooking, and I definitely want to keep doing that.

This was less garlic than we tend to plant, but we still got a good harvest of what are probably the biggest garlic bulbs we’ve ever grown.

The biggest ones were saved and set aside to be planted this fall.

Conclusion

In the end, winter sowing like this has turned out to be a real game changer for us, and I fully intend to keep doing this from now on.

We did mixes this time, which I will not repeat. Instead, I’ve chosen seeds, from my new inventory, to plant in a more orderly fashion. Which is already done.

So, for next year, along with the garlic and seed onions, I have already planted spinach, chard, kohlrabi, purple savoy cabbage (first time trying to grow cabbage), beets, Hedou tiny bok choi, peas, carrots and dwarf peas. You can see where those went in our October garden tour video.

The other thing we seriously need to address is how to keep things out of the garden beds. Elm seeds, cats, deer, flea beetles, snails (we didn’t have a snail problem this year, thankfully – probably because we had so many frogs this year!!), etc.

With that in mind, I’ll be completely reworking the bed along the chain link fence, making it slightly taller and with supports to hold any sort of cover we want to add. Early on, I’d like to be able to put plastic over it to create a mini greenhouse environment. Later, I want to put netting over it to keep the seeds and cats out. Maybe frost covers later in the season. So the supports need to be something I can easily change things up on, too.

I’m just really excited about how well the winter sowing worked. Obviously, not everything can be winter sown, but as we reclaim more garden space and build more beds, I expect that winter sowing will make up a significant portion of our garden, year after year.

The Re-Farmer

Our 2025 Garden analysis: the challenges of the year

December 6, 2025December 5, 2025 / Re-Farmer / Leave a comment

Okay, it’s that time of the gardening year! Time to look back at how things went, what worked, what didn’t, what we’ll try again, and what we’ll set aside.

Plans were made and, of course, plans changed as time went on. Here is a video I made of what I was planning, before starting seeds indoors.

Aside from a few things changing from my original plans, the entire year turned out to be quite a difficult one.

This was the first growing season since the average first and last frost dates were reset. “Climate” is weather over a defined region, averaged over 30 years, plus or minus 5-10 years. We crossed over that 30 year mark and the new averages for our area tell me that our last frost date range (they don’t have just a day anymore, but a span of days) is in the end of May, instead of June 2.

Yeeeaaaahhhh… No.

This year, our last frost date turned out to be well past June 2, so I’m glad I didn’t try to direct sow or transplant anything in May. May was a very frustrating month. We had some very warm days all month, but the overnight temperatures were quite cold. The soil never had a chance to warm up and stay warm at a temperature favorable for many things. Especially for transplants.

Then, we got hit with a combination of drought, heat waves and continuous smoke from wildfires. I’m honestly surprised some things did as well as they did. Many things, however, simply stagnated. When cleaning up some of the garden beds in the fall, I found that weather was not the only issue, but so was invading root systems from nearby trees!

One thing we did differently was winter sowing mixes of seeds in the fall of 2024. A couple of beds were complete failures, while others did surprisingly well. It really was a game changer for us, and I’ve already winter sown several beds for our 2026 garden.

So I’ll be doing things differently for this year’s analysis, too. I’ll be categorizing things by winter sowing, transplants, direct sowing, and food forest/perennials, before doing a last post with my final analysis and plans for 2026.

I’m hoping to get one of these out every day over the next few days, if all goes well. I’ll be going over a lot of old posts and videos in the process, so it can take quite a lot of time to put together.

Hopefully, these will be as useful for you as they are for me, as we go over what succeeded, what failed, and why – as best as I can determine! I can already say now, though, that a lot of our future gardening plans are going to involve protective infrastructure. 😄

As always, I’d love to hear your thoughts and feedback in the comments.

The Re-Farmer

Going to the post office should not be weird

December 5, 2025 / Re-Farmer / 6 Comments

Okay, I’m back from getting our parcels at the post office. I meant to actually stay in the store and see if there was anything I wanted to pick up but, instead, I was rushing home.

I’d left the gate open, you see, and was no longer sure that was a good idea.

Our main driveway is just 300 feet or so from an intersection at a main gravel road. Both roads – the main one, and the one past our driveway – have a surprising amount of traffic. Having been looking at trail cam and security files since 2018, thanks to our vandal, I’ve gotten to recognize regular vehicles that go by, even if I don’t know who is driving them.

So as I pulled through our gate, I didn’t think anything of the little black car that I saw go past the intersection. It looked like one of several non-descript little black cars I see going by regularly.

With the inside handle of my truck door broken off, and a post office trip being so short, I decided not to close the gate behind me and just head out.

Then I got to the stop sign at the intersection.

About 200 yards down the main road was the little black car, pulled over on the wrong side of the road – the side closer to our place, and the main garden area.

The passenger side door was open and there was a man standing there, facing my way. Just standing, staring in my direction.

Because of the distance, I can’t say with 100% certainty that it was our vandal, but I would say I have about 95% certainty. Partly because, who else would it be? We don’t have any other stalkers. Plus, from the stance, and general body shape that I could see, it did look very much like him. He has a very… distinctive… frame.

I turned towards the highway and kept checking my rear view mirror. The guy stood there, still staring my way, for quite some time before another glance showed me the passenger side door was closed. By then, there was too much snow kicking up to see whether the car kept going in the same direction, or if it turned around. After a while, I pulled over and messaged the family to keep an eye out.

When I got back, I was checking the snow to see if there were any other tracks besides my own in our driveway. Thankfully, nothing.

But it does tell me that even a quick trip into town means we have to keep the gate closed behind us. I’ve already found that leaving the gate open for deliveries has had our vandal driving past, stopping, backing up, then sitting on the road, rubbernecking down our driveway.

Very frustrating.

I did get our parcels, however, and that was much more cheerful.

First up, my new acquisition for our resource library.

I’ve only just started to look through it but, as you can see by the next two pictures in the slideshow above, this is going to be a very useful book!

The next package was full of wonderful items from a dear and thoughtful friend and former neighbour from before our move.

With a Ghosty photo bomb.

I was so excited to see a 1kg/2.2lb bag of lysine! I’ve got pumpkin seeds to grind into powder, so I’ll be mixing the two together in a jar to add to the kibble as a supplement for the outside cats. For the inside cats, we can add it to their cat soup.

The freeze dried chicken is quite a treat. Something that might help us lure some more feral kittens into discovering that getting pets and attention from humans is a good thing!

There’s a box of ground staples of much better quality than the dollar store version of those. I’ve learned, you just can’t have too many ground staples! There’s a package of irrigation stakes; they’re threaded at the top for a water bottle to slowly water plants. Those will come in handy in areas too closely planted to do my usual 4L water jug version. I love the tiny terracotta pots, but that little bunny pot is just too cute for words! There’s some cotton cordage that will be handy in the garden, too.

The LED lantern is really nice. Something I’ve been eyeballing for a while, but couldn’t justify getting with whatever budget I had at the time. This would be great for the emergency kit in the truck, as it also has flashing red lights and a flashlight at the top. It’s not going into the truck now, though, as the batteries would just freeze.

That travel blanket, however, is another story, and will definitely be added to our truck’s emergency kit.

Under everything are four insulated shopping bags, with the suggestion of putting straw in them as something the cats could use as beds. I would never have thought of that! Worth a try, I’d say.

What a fantastic gift! I appreciate that some of these were passed on from other former neighbours. I will be reminded of them as I use the items.

Of course, going through all these left me with an empty box.

Which did not stay empty for long.

Hello, Tin Whistle.

So that was my haul from the post office today, which did a lot to make me feel better after the weirdness I saw as I was heading out.

Moving out here was supposed to get us away from stuff like this.

Ah, well. It’s still better than what we had to deal with while living in the city.

The Re-Farmer

Processing saved seed, and more Christmas music

December 3, 2025 / Re-Farmer / Leave a comment

My daughter has been working hard at organizing the cat free zone, aka: the living room, as it will be pretty much the only part of the house we’ll be doing any decorating and celebrating in. It’s where I’ve had saved seed set out to dry before processing them, and today I took them all down to my basement work area (another cat free zone) to process.

Most of the processing involved gently rubbing the pods and tufts between my hands to separate the seeds out, then very carefully blowing away the chaff. Some of the plant matter was heavier than the seeds, but I don’t mind a bit of chaff in there. The blue plastic bottoms from distilled water jugs I cut to use as protective collars in the garden came in handy. The divided bottoms and curled sides did a good job of holding the seeds, so most of the chaff could be blown away.

In the first photo above, bottom left, are the memorial aster seeds I was able to collect. Top left corner are the Jebousek lettuce seeds. Top middle are Uzbek Golden carrot seeds, and the top right are mixed red and yellow bulb onion seeds.

The tray in the middle has the purple asparagus seed berries I’d collected. Those had to be done a bit differently. Some of the berries were not completely dry, yet, but could still be opened up for their seeds. I just had to tear them open with my fingers.

Some of the seed berries were obviously damaged one way or another, and the seeds inside didn’t look too good. After getting as many of the seeds out as I could, I ended up using tweezers to select out the best, healthiest looking seeds, which you can see in the second picture of the slide show above. Since they weren’t all completely dry, once I got cleaned everything else up, I set the seeds back on the parchment paper and have left them out to finish curing. The new part basement, where this is set up in, is pretty cold as well as dry, so that will be good for the seeds.

Later on, I should test germinate some of these to see if they are even viable. I know asparagus has male and female plants, and this patch has both. Looking it up, it seems they can both self pollinate or cross pollinate. It would be nice we could start some from seed. Especially since the purple asparagus we planted this past spring did not come up.

Speaking of which, it’s that time of year when I do my garden analysis on how things went this past year, and how that affects our plans for next year. I’ll be doing a series of posts about that over the next while.

Until then, here is another bit of Christmas music, to help get into the mood for the season! Something much more traditional than yesterday’s selection.

The Re-Farmer

Books and trees

December 1, 2025 / Re-Farmer / 4 Comments

I took advantage of some Cyber Monday deals on Amazon and ordered a couple of books on my wish list, last night. Just now, I placed an order for some trees that will arrive in the spring. (None of the links below are affiliate links. Links will open in new tabs.)

First up, the books.

One is Back to Basics: A Complete Guide to Traditional Skills. Fourth Edition. I actually have a 1981 Reader’s Digest edition, Back to Basics: How to Learn and Enjoy Our Traditional Skills. I don’t know that these are connected, as the one I’m ordering has an Abigail Gehring listed as the editor. No Reader’s Digest listed anywhere. Looking at the preview of the one I ordered, it does seem to be an updated version of what I have. Which is an excellent book.

The other is 40 Projects for Building Your Backyard Homestead: A Hands-on, Step-by-Step Sustainable-Living Guide This one has even been shipped already, even though I ordered it just last night.

Both of these are supposed to arrive before Christmas but Canada Post hasn’t exactly been reliable of late. I believe they are technically still on a rolling strike. We shall see. I look forward to going through both of them over the winter!

Next are the trees.

One is a bundle of five Bleu Basket Willow. I’ve been considering for some time, where the best place to plant them would be. Willow propagates easily, so the plan it to expand them. The source, Prairie Hardy Nursery, also has two other varieties of basket willow in different colours that I plan to get, when the budget allows. The plan is to coppice them so that they can be used for things like wattle weave fences and, yes, weaving baskets. Thinking long term, these will be planted beyond the outer yard, and will need to include protection to keep the renter’s cows from crushing them by accident, until they get bigger.

The other is a single bare root seedling, as part of our food forest; a Manchurian Walnut. While we have black walnut planted, they may or may not have a long enough growing season here for fully mature nuts to form. Normally, they wouldn’t, but the ones I got were from a nursery in our province, so they are probably acclimated already. The Manchurian Walnut is hardy to zone 2b. It’ll be 10-12 years before they start producing. As the saying goes, the best time to plant a tree is 10 years ago. The second best time is now! They are also described as fast growing, so we should be able to enjoy the tree for its beauty before it starts producing. As with the black walnuts, these will be planted in the outer yard. They are self fertile, though it is recommended they be planted in pairs for better production. Which we might do, when the budget allows.

The nursery opened for the sales season in November, and the dormant seedlings will be shipped in the spring. I’ll get an email in April to work out the best shipping date based on our last frost date. If I am able to order more trees between now and then, they actually have a code to include to combine orders, so as not to increase the shipping fees, and everything gets shipped together. The shipping costs are relatively high, but they include insurance. Most places don’t.

It’s slow going, but little by little, we’re getting it things done!

The Re-Farmer

Our 2025/26 Garden: November garden tour

November 29, 2025November 28, 2025 / Re-Farmer / Leave a comment

Just a short garden tour, given the time of year, but here it is! I hope you enjoy it.

The Re-Farmer

Much progress made – and now she does it?

November 28, 2025 / Re-Farmer / Leave a comment

I’m happy to say that I pretty much finished all the stuff I needed to get done before the hard freeze hit, but I just had to share this first.

One of the adult females we’ve been trying to get is Adam. She sometimes allows us to pet her, but we just haven’t been able to get her into a carrier.

As I was going through the sun room this evening, I spotted her.

That’s her, peeking at me from one of the carriers, back in its spot on the shelf.

Well, at least she associates carriers as a cozy spot to hang out. If only she would do this when we can get her to a vet for a spay!

*sigh*

The first thing I needed to do when I headed outside this afternoon was set up the emergency diverter for the septic, now that the tank area is covered in straw. In the basement, I grabbed a length of foam pipe insulation to put around the pipe first, then pushed it as far as it could go against the wall. When the ejector froze last winter, every time the pump turned on and greywater was pumped out the emergency bypass, I would hear vibrating noises of pipe against concrete that always got me nervous. I’ve become rather paranoid about our septic system! The pipe insulation I used is one of several lengths I found in the old basement that is meant to go over water pipes, not the larger pipe from the septic, but it’s split lengthwise, so I could get it around the half that was against the wall. That’s all I need.

Once outside, I had to remove the insert plug my brother had put on the outside end, which was secured with a steel ring hose clamp. The plug he got has the ridges that help keep it from being pushed out by pressure, plus the tightened the ring enough to squeeze the end of the pipe tightly. Basically, it would have been a great permanent plug. Unfortunately, it’s not meant to be permanent. It’s meant to be taken out as needed. An ordinary, temporary, end cap would have sufficed, but my brother is very thorough! It took considerable effort, and an adjustable wrench, to finally get it out. Plus a flat head screwdriver to create space between the pipe and the plug, just to be able to move it at all!

Once the end was open, I could set it into the PVC pipe I had ready. Then I used the collection of boards, bricks and scrap pieces of Styrofoam insulation to create a gradual slope from the rigid pipe and along the flexible hose so that grey water could be diverted far from the house, into the maple grove.

Hopefully, we will never need to use this again, but it’s good to have it set up and ready, just in case!

The down side of having that set up is that it blocks access around that corner of the house from where the bale is. Once the emergency diverter was set up, I got the wagon and the wheelbarrow to get straw to the various areas I wanted to mulch. When it came time to do the old kitchen garden, I had to go the long way around with the wagon and wheelbarrow loads of straw. Not a problem. Just a bit inconvenient.

The first area I worked on was in the main garden. The above picture is a little preview. By the time I was done, light was starting to fade fast. I decided to do a quick, impromptu garden tour video. I’ll be working on editing that tonight, and will likely have it ready to post tomorrow. I have a few hours to kill before I have to go to my mother’s for her bed time med and personal care assist.

Before I finished for the night, I grabbed one more wheelbarrow load of straw and set it by the covered greenhouse. Tomorrow, I plan to clear out the water bowl house and set straw on the floor, removing the huge crocheted blanket entirely. We’ll set that over the kibble house roof as extra insulation. I expect to have leftover straw, and will find other places to leave it for the cats. The cats really, really like the straw! The last thing to do will be to rake up around the bale to clean things up, then cover it with a tarp for the winter.

I am so glad we were able to get another straw bale this year – and that the renters had one to spare! Next year, when it’s time to use straw as mulch on the garden beds, I plan to run it through the shredder chute on the wood chipper, first. In the past, I tried using the push mower to shred the straw, but it clogged up the air filter so quickly. We only have my brother’s push mower now, so I’m not going to be doing that with his equipment!

Getting this last bit of progress done before things got too cold feels so good! 😊

The Re-Farmer

Oh, I’m going to have fun over the next few days!

November 26, 2025 / Re-Farmer / Leave a comment

Yes!!! It finally arrived!

The family renting most of this property had a straw bale they could spare, but they’ve been really busy. This morning, however, she was able to deliver it this morning.

I never did get a price for it. I told her I had $50 set aside for it, but when I gave it to her, I told her, I knew prices for them have gone up, and that I hoped it was enough. She said it was, but I strongly suspect they sold it to me at a loss! I tried looking up what the going price is right now, but they varied significantly depending on type of straw, quality, etc. I did say I was okay with an older bale, since it was going to be used over the septic tank and in the garden, but I don’t think they had any older bales left.

As we were talking, I asked them if they did beef shares, since the family I’d been buying from before is no longer doing direct sales. She said no, not really. The problem is that they have to go through a provincially approved butcher to process the meat, and that costs so much, they can’t sell at a reasonable price. She said, they’ve had people saying that, with beef prices as high as they are right now, they must be making lots of money, but no. They aren’t. The overhead is so high, the profit margin is extremely slim.

That got us to talking about managing things. They are pretty diversified, with beef cattle and several different types of crops, all of which requires significant equipment. Plus, they are being nickel and dimed to death by government regulations, fees, taxes, etc. She told me how, in several recent years, they’ve managed to cover the costs only because they’ve got trucks and could do some shipping to make ends meet.

It is so very hard to be a family farm these days.

I’m very thankful that they were willing to sell me a bale, and take the time to deliver it!

The next few days are going to be relatively mild, with temperatures just a few degrees below freezing. Tomorrow, I’m going to unwrap the bale and start breaking it apart. It’s closed to the septic tank, which will need the most straw. I’ll be glad to have straw instead of the insulated tarp. The tarp does the job, but it freezes to the ground, making it hard to access the tank if we need to empty it for some reason, in the winter. Plus, if I need to walk around the area, it is shockingly slippery. There’s been more than a few times where I’ve almost fallen, and that’s even without snow to make it ever more slippery!

Since it’s starting to look like we won’t be getting a lot of snow this year, I’ll be adding straw to the leaf mulched, winter sown beds for more insulation. The saffron crocuses will get some, too.

Just as important, I plan to put straw inside the catio. The box nests and self warming shelter in there will do better with a layer of straw under them. It’ll help with the food and water bowl, too. Plus, when things start melting in the spring, any snowmelt that might puddle in the catio will be under the straw, so the cats, bowls and shelters will all stay warm and dry above it. I’m even thinking of redoing the space under the shelf I put in back of the water bowl house and using straw on the floor there, too. There are pieces of rigid insulation on the floor now, which could be set up against the walls, instead.

Oh, I am so looking forward to working on all that!

After the bale was delivered, I went ahead and opened up the isolation shelter. Pinky is doing just fine, with no signs of infection at the surgical site, and has been trying to tear her way out. Which means the bottom of the isolation shelter needs more of a clean up. Even the litter boxes, from bits and chunks of insulation! That will help get things ready for the next isolation cats.

If there are any.

Gosh, it felt good…

November 22, 2025 / Re-Farmer / Leave a comment

… to get some physical labour done!

My broken old body may betray me now and then, or the weather may not be cooperative, but gosh I do love it when I can do physical labour!

I actually ended up going into town again today. I realized we weren’t going to have enough kibble for the outside cats to last us until our first stock up shop next week, and with other things on my calendar, it was either get it now, or run out before then.

I did wait until later in the morning to go, though. While we got a smattering of snow last night, mostly we got freezing rain. The highway conditions group I’m on has been quiet the last while, other than warnings about deer activity or accident sites, as road conditions have been really good. This morning, I was seeing warnings as soon as I opened my FB app about how dangerously slippery various highways were.

Even as I was heading out, when things had warmed up, I almost slipped while opening the gate. There is a pair of large spruces that shade it for most of the day – especially this time of year – so it was still all ice. Today was pretty warm, and tomorrow is supposed to be even warmer, so hopefully it will all dry up before tomorrow night, when I have to drive to and from my mother’s, after it gets full dark and the temperatures are below freezing.

Normally, I would have gone to the nearest Walmart for more kibble, but with the cost of gas, I decided to try the other grocery store in town. They have a house brand kibble that the cats will actually eat, even if they don’t like it as much as other brands, that is more affordable. I lucked out. Their 8kg/17.6lbs bags were on sale for $17, which made it cheaper than the one 15kg/33lbs house brand bag that was available. Since I was there anyhow, I was able to take advantage of some sales and got a few more little things, but it was still mostly the cat food.

That done, I headed outside after lunch to see what I could do to take advantage of the lovely weather. One of those things was to set up the little scaffolding we picked up second hand, a couple of years ago, under my bedroom window that leaks. I was going to caulk it, originally, but changed my mind and decided to go with a spray sealant.

I’m glad I did.

While scrubbing off cob webs and debris, I got a good look at the outside of that window for probably the first time in my life. On the side that we used to be able to open, I could see that there was a pane of glass added, with moveable clips holding it in place. The other window has the clips, but not the extra pane of glass. The clips are painted over, so they don’t actually move anymore, but that could be changed, if necessary.

Looking around, though, I could see why the window was having issues with leaking, when the winds drove rain in just the right direction. The house was painted the summer before we moved in, and some of it was starting to peel away. I could see gaps that should have been filled. I don’t think they were there when the window frame was painted.

I hope the spray sealant works, but there might be issues. It’s supposed to be used at temperatures between 10-35C/50-95F. At the time I started working on it, we were at about 4C/39F.

The directions said to wait 10 minutes between coats so, after I applied the first coat, I set a timer, then started working into the spruce grove.

With the leaves down and the foliage dying back, I went through to find the last section of tree trunk from one of three dead spruces my brother cut down for me, several years ago, to use as raised bed frames. I step counted what was left, and figured I could get 18′ out of it, after trimming off the remains of the tree top. My daughter had already trimmed the branches away when we used part of the trunk for the low raised bed frame most recently completed.

There was still the issue of getting to it, and that required cutting away some new growth. I also noticed a lot of nice, straight poplars, as well as cherry suckers. In time, I went to get rid of that entire stand of cherries, as they are not the right type for our climate and don’t produce. They just spread through their roots. For now, though, I started to widen the opening into the spruce grove by cutting away cherry suckers. I was getting enough nice, long and relatively straight pieces that when my timer went off and I stopped to apply another coast of sealant, I messaged my daughter to see if she could come help. I dragged the pile with the straightest stems over to the branch pile (the more crooked ones went straight onto the pile), and she came out to trim away all the little twigs and branches, and setting aside the longest, straightest sections.

I got quite a bit of the cherry cleaned up – and two more coats of sealant on the window – before I stopped with the cherry stand and started working my way to the downed tree trunk. At this point, I was saving the straightest poplar suckers. Like cherry, these spread through roots.

All of this took a couple of hours of before I finally got things clear enough around the downed tree. This part of the trunk was fairly narrow, and I was able to trim the top of it with a pruning saw to get it clear.

Then there was the question of how to drag it out.

We have a rock pile near our power pole that I’d gone through to collect rocks that will form the wall of a flower bed near the gate, where my mother’s angel statue is on display. Lying upside down on the rock pile was an old child’s sled. How many decades it’s been sitting there, I can’t be sure. I decided to grab it and try something, to make dragging the tree trunk out easier. I brought that, some rope with heavy duty latch hook clips at each and, and a metal bar to use as a handle, over to the tree trunk. The sled went under the far end – the top of the tree – so that it would slide through the remaining underbrush, rather than dragging along the nubs of branches that were bound to be on the underside of the trunk.

At the near end, I looped the rope under the trunk, past some branch nubs, so it couldn’t slip, then put the metal bar through the latch hooks to make a handle.

It did actually work.

For a while.

The only problem was that I had no way to secure the tree trunk to the sled. After a while, the sled got hung up enough that the tree finally slid right off. By that time, however, I’d gotten it through the worst of the underbrush and could keep dragging it as it was.

Well… almost.

Without the sled, there were still branch nubs catching and digging into the dirt. When it got to the point that I needed to turn the trunk so that it could be dragged between trees and into the main garden area, I called my daughter over for help. The trunk itself was not that heavy, relatively speaking. The first section of it that we dragged out before was the thickest part of the trunk, and THAT was heavy!

Between the two of us, we maneuvered it through the trees and into the main garden area, near where the next trellis bed will be built. From the looks of it, compared to the nearby 18′ raised bed, I’d say it’s about 18.5′, maybe closer to 19′ long. Which gives me some wiggle room to trim the ends when it’s time to use it for a garden bed wall.

We “just” need three more 18′ lengths, plus four 4′ lengths for the ends, to make a matching trellis bed.

By this time, it was getting too dark to keep going, so we just gathered things to be put away and did some clean up. My daughter had managed to trim quite a lot of the cherry and poplar I’d harvested, and those got added to the pile on the chain link fence garden bed, where they will be used to make new, slightly higher, walls. I doubt I’ll be able to actually build them this year, but we should at least have most of the materials needed to do it in the spring. Since these will be deadwood walls, not wattle weave, I don’t have to worry about keeping the lengths flexible. They can stay where they are all winter, and still be useable.

Since it was so dark by the time we were done, I didn’t get any pictures of our progress, but I did get this…

Would you look at how that little mostly white kitten is splayed out? 💕💕

That tuxedo’s eyes are too big for its head. 😄

Tomorrow, I’m going to look around in the spruce grove some more and see what can be done next. Several dead spruces have fallen on their own already. The based of their trunks, however, are huge. The ones that are too big to use for raised bed walls without being milled, will be cut to 10′ lengths and set aside. I need a total of ten of them for the posts of the outdoor kitchen we want to build and, so far, I have only one!

Unfortunately, the space I’d set it aside in, with plans to add more as I was able to harvest them, now has my brother’s baler parked in it. I’ll have to find somewhere else to store nine more 10′ logs!

There are, however, more dead spruce trees that need to be cut down, that are not so wide at the base. Not only am I looking to harvest them for the pairs of trellis beds that will become trellis tunnels, but there are another 5 or 6 already prepped low raised beds that need walls. The trellis beds will be 2 logs high for starters, but the low raised beds will be one log high for starters. We can add more height to them over time, as we are able, but the main thing is to get them framed. The goal is for most of the beds to be 4 logs high, like the current 9′ long high raised bed. That one is the perfect high for excellent reach without back or joint pain. Some beds will remain lower, to be used for tall climbers or things like corn, but I still want them to be at least two logs high.

I’ve been thinking ahead to the open area closer to the food forest. I’m hoping to have at least two more pairs of trellis tunnel beds beyond what is being worked on now. Give the amount of sun, etc. the open area gets, I am thinking of how to set up polytunnels. Perhaps we can continue to build more pairs or raised beds, but instead of forming trellis tunnels over the paths in between them, we can add supports to the outsides of the beds and cover them with greenhouse poly. I think we’d have room to build two, maybe three, pairs of beds as we get closer to the food forest area. If we can do that, it would allow us to grow perennials that would otherwise not survive our winters, and extend our growing season significantly. With the amount of direct sun that area gets, a polytunnel would be very warm, even in winter. We’d just have to find a way to keep it from getting too cold overnight.

Things to think about!

We will, eventually, run out of dead spruces we can harvest for this and will have to go further afield to find materials. Once we’ve cleared the spruce grove of dead trees and underbrush – and those spirea that I’d pulled out but came back anyhow! – I want to start transplanting spruces from other areas and make the spruce grove a spruce grove again. With how poplar spreads through its roots, it’s taking over. They are a useful material to harvest for various projects, but they are not as good at protecting from winter winds as the spruces are. With all the stumps we are leaving taller, we’ll also be able to use those to create benches and tables, and make ourselves a nice little park in there. When I was a kid, I used to be able to mow in there. Not any more! It would be great to have a space in there that my husband can go into with his walker, and just sit and enjoy the outdoors. Plus, once we’ve cleared out the cherry stand and all the dead spruces, we’ll be able to finally build that outdoor bathroom with a composting toilet I’ve been wanting to build, to replace the outhouse over a pit.

It’s hard to believe we’ve been here for 8 years now. When we first moved here, we’d developed a year by year plan on what we wanted to work on, staring with the inner yard, then moving outwards.

Things certainly have changed. Not the main goals, perhaps, but how and when we plan to reach them. That all four of us are also now broken, one way or another, with three of us officially considered disabled (my older daughter still won’t see a doctor and, really, I can’t blame her), that has changed our focus as well.

Which makes me appreciate days like today, when I can get out there and do things like drag tree trunks around! Even if I do need some help from my daughter. 😄

The Re-Farmer

Some progress, and isolation kitty update

November 20, 2025 / Re-Farmer / Leave a comment

Today turned out to be a decently warm day, with a slightly higher than forecast high of 4C/39F. Thankfully, most of where I needed to work was sheltered from the wind.

I decided it was a good day to start collecting material for the walls on the chain link fence garden bed, to replace the temporary walls we have right now, as well as cutting things away and clearing up at the same time. This is progress so far.

The first stack is maple suckers that are strong and straight enough to be used as vertical supports for the garden bed walls. For what I have in mind, and the space I’m working in, I’ll need a total of 48 stakes, with a quarter of them double the length of the others. The longer ones will be used to support a cover for the bed, to keep it from being choked out by Chinese elm seeds, or used as a litter box by the cats. They’ll be cut to length, sharpened at one end, and peeled of bark. For now, I am mostly aiming to do the wall against the chain link fence, so I need only 24 stakes to be able to get started.

The next picture in the slide show is a collection of poplar, maple and willow branches and suckers. I will need a LOT more of these, but it’s a start.

Some of the material came from maple and willow I needed to cut back to get branches away from the power lines. I wasn’t able to clear it completely, as I needed a ladder to reach. It was a bit too windy to safely use a ladder there and, by then, that wind was causing what promised to be a massive ear ache, if I didn’t get inside soon!

Meanwhile, we have been keeping an eye on the isolation shelter. Pinky is doing very well and seems quite content in there with the three littles.

One of my daughters was able to get a look at her incision and it’s all looking excellent. They are all quite enjoying their special isolation shelter treat of wet cat food. Hopefully, this means the little will start gaining weight and getting bigger!

The angry looking little fluffball tabby is so chill for a mostly feral kitten! Totally enjoying the shelter. None of the littles have shown any interest in leaving it!

I think we have a name for the angry looking kitty.

Furriosa.

😄🤣

That little tuxedo has the smallest, roundest eyes. They look huge because the kitten always has this stunned expression on its face. I’m able to pet him (her?) and the white and grey pretty regularly, but Furriosa allows touches only while s/he’s eating.

Speaking of pets, I was able to pet Frank today! She’s still very nervous and was very cautious about coming to my outstretched and, but I was able to give full back pets, and even got some purrs out of her. Which means our chances of getting her to the vet one of the two slots we have on the 28th just improved dramatically.

Now, if I could just get one of the other adult ladies friendlier! They just will not let it happen. *sigh*

The kittens in the isolation shelter are too small for spays or neuters, but we might be able to get one of the bigger kittens in the sun room. A couple of tabbies are getting okay with being pet and handled, though I think the bigger one is male and the smaller is female. If I’m right, neither are ready for spay or neuter. The smaller one is under 2 pounds, which is the minimum weight the vet will do a spay, and if the other is male, his balls haven’t dropped yet, so he can’t be done for a while yet. We do have older, bigger kittens that would be easy to grab, all male, and priority is much higher to get females done.

Well, we’ll see how it goes. We’ve got about a week to work on it.

As much as I am appreciating the mild November we are having, just to get stuff done outside, I also appreciate it for making life a lot easier on the furballs! Especially the tiniest ones.

The Re-Farmer

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