2023 garden

Our 2023 garden: spinach and alternative lawn mix

/ Re-Farmer / 3 Comments

My daughters were out early, taking care of some planting for me, so here are some “after” pictures. 😊

The first area they worked on were the bald patches in the maple grove.

These are where the branch pile we got chipped last summer had been sitting for about four years. The first thing they did was use the thatching rake to break up and loosen the soil, then raked it smooth. For the patch in the foreground, they made sure not to get too close to where we’ll be digging a trench to replace the water line from the house to the garden tap. I ordered two packets of alternative lawn mix, which they sowed and watered and tamped down. From the website:

This mix contains annuals and perennials of daisies, poppies, sweet alyssum, soapwort, nemophila, viola, thyme, chamomile, clover and fine fescue. 

Hopefully, they will not only fill in the bald patches, but will also naturally spread themselves in the maple grove, and maybe choke out the bell flowers that have been so invasive here!

In the time it took me to finish feeding the outside cats and switching out the trail cam memory cards, not only had they finished this area, but they finished planting the spinach, too!

The only thing left to do by the time I came out was to add the floating row cover. I bought a couple of these from a dollar store to try out. I’m not sure we’ll get more. It seems very fragile. At some point, I should buy a whole lot of tulle fabric. For the spinach, however, it’s more about keeping the critters from eating them than for insects. I just hope the cats will stay off of it. Otherwise, we’ll have to add hoops. I’m still shooting to build proper covers for these beds soon, but I don’t know when I’ll be able to pick up the lumber I need, so this will do until then!

The next cool weather crop I need to get in is at least one variety of bread seed poppies. I keep forgetting about them! I’ve decided to clean the vine off the chain link fence and put them in the bed we unsuccessfully tried to grow white strawberries in, last year. That can be the permanent spot for one variety. The other cool weather crop we can get in this early are peas, which will be planted along the chain link fence where we had tomatoes last year.

After that, things will need to wait until closer to our last frost date, so we’ll have time to prepare and finish more beds.

It feels so good to be able to get stuff into the ground!

Oh, and I got my first shipping confirmation from Veseys, for the smaller order that got processed a couple of days ago. It is our 3 pack of raspberries!

Royalty raspberries; image belongs to Veseys.

The expected delivery date is May 8, but I wouldn’t be surprised if they arrived earlier. I look forward to getting shipping notices for the apple, mulberry and potatoes!

The Re-Farmer

Our 2023 Garden: planting carrots! (video)

/ Re-Farmer / Leave a comment

Okay, this is a first. Planting something in April!

We had a bed prepared and covered with plastic over hoops for the soil to warm up more, so that is where I started. All of the carrot seed tape we made fit into the bed, with even a bit of room to spare. After that, another bed was finally prepared and covered with more plastic, and in a couple of days, it will get spinach planted in it.

I tried an experiment this time, setting up an old phone to take a time lapse video of both jobs.

Plus some random cat appearances.

The time lapse made for a short video. I hope you enjoy it!

The Re-Farmer

Our 2023 garden: garlic and crocuses!

/ Re-Farmer / Leave a comment

When doing my evening rounds today, I decided to do a walkabout, which I will post about separately. I was just finishing up when I got a message from one of my daughters, who had gone out while I was going in, with a picture of purple snow crocuses! She said there was garlic up, too.

They were not there when I did my morning rounds!

So I went back outside and checked it out.

While trying to find the purple crocuses she took a picture of, I found a couple of white ones. They’re so small, it was hard to get a good photo while zooming in, so this is the only one good enough to post.

I’m so thrilled to see them!

As for the garlic, I had been thinking about whether it was time to move the winter mulch aside, or to wait a bit longer.

Well, now’s the time!

I found the one garlic that had pushed its way through the mulch and began clearing.

Marking each end of the rows with sticks when we planted helped a lot!

In the process, I found quite a few more garlic sprouting. They will do much better, now that they will be getting more light and air circulation.

I am just so happy!!!

The Re-Farmer

Our 2023 garden: potting up tomatoes is DONE!

/ Re-Farmer / 1 Comment

Finally!!!

I was able to pick up more potting soil after helping my mother with errands yesterday, which means that today I got to finish potting up our tomato seedlings.

I actually was able to “pot up” the Black Beauty and Indigo Blue Chocolate tomatoes by topping the cups up with soil, first. Then I potted up the last 18 Roma VF tomatoes, which used up my last two plastic bins. I had to move things around, and move the onions right out, to fit everything. The taller seedlings hat to go either to the top of the mini greenhouse frame, or to the shelf, where the onions were. The rest are still short enough to fit in the mini greenhouse frame, though I’ve run out of space in there.

Next was the Spoon tomatoes.

I planted two seeds per pellet, and I made sure to do the ones that had pairs of seedlings first – though one of them had three! For each one, I removed the outer covering on the Jiffy pellets, then separated the seedlings. They’re still quite small, so the cups got filled only about half way.

I noticed the outer covering on the Jiffy Pellets is different this year. It’s more paper like. I remember it being more net-like, before. Those didn’t really break down, and I would find them in the garden while cleaning up at the end of the year. I’m guessing that has sometime to do with the change. With one pair of seedlings, a tomato had actually grown through the outer covering. As I was trying to gently remove it, I ended up breaking the tomato stem clean through! It’s a tomato, though, so I went ahead and planted the tomato top, anyhow. Changes are pretty good it’ll send out new roots and survive.

These are all 35 Spoon tomatoes (I’d mistakenly counted 36, before). I was able to fit 19 onto an oven liner tray, which will allow for bottom watering. The tray the Roma tomatoes had been in, which now had only the spearmint and oregano in it, could fit another dozen. That left only 4 that needed to be double cupped. I’ve run out of both trays and bins.

Those done, I did some more rearranging and removed off the watering can and extra cups, which allowed me to bring the onions back closer to the light. With all those, plus the bin with the Zucca melon and African Drum gourds in it, this surface is now completely full. I don’t even have my work space anymore! The light isn’t as good during the day on here but, early in the morning, it does actually get direct sunlight for a few hours.

The peppers in the large aquarium greenhouse still have new seeds germinating, so I won’t be potting those up for a while. Not that I have the space for it anymore!

I will need to monitor the overnight temperatures in the sun room over the next while. We’re supposed to warm up, but the overnight temperatures are still dipping below freezing. If the sun room can manage to stay at 6C/43F or warmer during the night, I should be able to at least move the onions over. They are about the only thing we’ve started indoors that can handle cooler temperatures. I’d love to be able to move the biggest plants out, which is mostly the gourds and Zucca melon, but they are the most cold sensitive plants we’ve got right now. Daytime temperatures in the sun room have been reaching as high as 20C/68F, which would be great as long as it didn’t drop too far. The times I’ve checked it through the bathroom window at night, I’ve seen the thermometer at around 10C/50F, which would be acceptable, I think. Plus, we’d be closing the doors overnight to keep the yard cats out of the plants, which means it would stay warmer overnight, too.

The cats are not going to be happy, losing their favourite bed on the swing bench, and private dining areas! I’ll be happy to not have skunks and racoons going in there anymore!

All in good time, though. It’s still only April, and a lot of these can’t get transplanted until the middle of June!

The Re-Farmer

Our 2023 garden: herbs are sprouting!

/ Re-Farmer / Leave a comment

I planted chamomile and the second variety of thyme just a few days ago.

Two mornings later, when turning the aquarium lights, I spotted sprouting chamomile! By the afternoon, some thyme was coming up, too!

They were so tiny, though, I didn’t even try to get a picture until this morning.

They are still quite miniscule, but I can see more thyme coming up, while every single peat pellet has chamomile coming up.

I’ve never seen anything germinate this quickly! Meanwhile, I still have just a single oregano (I’m thinking of reseeding those) and just a few spearmint, that were started near the beginning of the month, and they are still barely any bigger than the chamomile sprouts are now! It seems the peat pellet trays are doing much better than using seed starter mix in toilet paper tube pots.

This afternoon, I will be heading out to help my mother with grocery shopping. Depending on the timing of things, I hope to pick up some more potting soil before coming home, so I can finish potting up the tomatoes.

I’m still just blown away by how quickly these germinated!

The Re-Farmer

Our 2023 garden: thyme, chamomile and seedling statuses

/ Re-Farmer / 3 Comments

Today, I started a planted a small tray with herb seeds. After this, no other seeds need to be started for another 2 weeks or so, though I may want to start some of the larger squash or gourds a bit earlier. We shall see.

This is the state of things in the big aquarium greenhouse. The little one is now empty, as things don’t seem to do well in there. I have my theories, but I don’t know why, for sure.

At the top is the tray seeded half with chamomile, half with thyme. Neither packet specified what variety they were. The chamomile is from Heritage Harvest, which grows their seed in a location further North than we are, so I know they can grow there. The other is from McKenzie Seeds. The variety we started a few weeks ago is German Winter Thyme. We’ll see how they differ later.

Those chamomile seeds, though. Wow, are they ever tiny! Almost like dust. That’s where using the point of a bamboo skewer to plant them comes in very handy!

So those are now in the heat mat. The tray that was there before, with the tomatoes I potted up, and its remaining tomatoes and herbs, has been left out on the “table” we made with the saw horses. The oregano and spearmint are still just barely germinating, but I think they’ll be okay there.

In the middle of the above image is the one surviving luffa, now in a plastic pot because the peat pot was starting to fall apart. I didn’t have the soil to pot it up to something larger. I’ve given up on the other three pots I’d seeded. This one doesn’t seem to be doing well, so I thought it might benefit from being back on the warming mat. We did set up a heater in the living room, but we can’t leave it running all the time, and I think it’s just too cold in there for something like luffa.

At the bottom is the tray of Spoon tomatoes and four varieties of peppers that are still in the large aquarium greenhouse. I’m happy to see so many more peppers finally germinating. Some of them really took a long time! Once we have more potting soil, I want to get those Spoon tomatoes divided and potted up. There’s about 20-25 36 seedlings. They’re so tiny compared to the other tomato varieties! They seem to be doing well, though, and should be fine in here for a bit longer. That will give the peppers more time to grow before they get potted up, too. We don’t need a lot of each variety, since we’re in the process of discovering what we actually like. It would be nice if we had extras to share – though the last time I tried to do that, everyone turned down the offers, because they enough of their own stuff growing!

Well, we’ll see how it works out, once we start planting all these outside!

About two months from now. 🤨

The Re-Farmer

Our 2023 garden: potting up Indigo Blue, and progress

/ Re-Farmer / 4 Comments

It’s a chilly, damp and dreary day today. You know what that means?

Gotta do something gardening related!

Today, I potted up the Indigo Blue Chocolate tomatoes.

I’d started them in a peat tray with two rows of four square cells. One row for the tomatoes, one for the Little Finger Eggplant. I planted 4 seeds per cell, which got me 11 plants, which is quite a good germination rate.

I wish I could say the same for the eggplant! Only three germinated, so I replanted. As of today, I have finally seen one tiny, barely visible seedling, germinating. Hopefully, that means we’ll see more, soon.

In other things, yesterday I finally saw the tiniest, microscopic oregano seedling, and this afternoon, there was an equally tiny spearmint. The Roma tomatoes sharing the tray, however, are doing great. I’ll have to get more soil for potting up. Quite a bit more. The Roma and Spoon tomatoes will need to be potted up, and eventually the peppers sharing the tray with the Spoon tomatoes will need potting up, too – there are finally more and more of the peppers germinating!

I’m going to start running out of shelf space for the plant trays! It will be good when things warm up enough to start moving trays into the sun room – and start keeping the yard cats out! Last year, we set up a surface using a couple of saw horses and an old closet door I found when cleaning the outhouse over the swing bench, which worked out really well. We’ll have to work out something better to support the lights, though. We’ve got a few weeks to figure things out.

We’ll also have to figure out what to use to protect the plants when it’s time to harden them off. Last year, we used the frame of my daughter’s market tent, with an unused, home made bed frame made out of plywood on it. This kept the plants high enough that none of the cats went after them. The market tent is being use now, though, and the bed frame got painted and is now in the basement, keeping litter boxes raised off the concrete floor – just in case things get wet again. I think I saw a folding table in one of the sheds – it’ll take some doing to access it to confirm, and see if it’s big enough. The problem will be how to keep the cats off, since it would be about half the height of the frame we used before.

We’ll come up with something!

It just felt good to do at least a little big garden related, today!

The Re-Farmer

Our 2023 garden: early outdoor prep, and making seed tape

/ Re-Farmer / Leave a comment

Yesterday, we made some seed tape, and – best of all! – were able to do some outdoor garden prep. While the main garden area is still buried in snow, the south yard’s garden beds are almost completely clear of snow, and even thawing out a bit.

Here is our progress, so far.

Hope you like it!

The Re-Farmer

Our 2023 garden: Oops! and getting ready to direct sow

/ Re-Farmer / 2 Comments

Today, I went through my bin of seeds for direct sowing, pulling out the ones that can be sown “as soon as the ground can be worked” or before last frost.

I also made sure the back ordered bean seeds I picked up in the mail yesterday went in with the other beans.

Which is when I discovered something.

I already had some.

The Red Swan beans were not the back ordered beans I was waiting for! I checked my order confirmation emails and saw that I was supposed to get these.

These are the Improved Purple Queen that had been back ordered. From the website:

Spectacular colour! Purple Queen produces high yields and has amazing flavour. While also resistant to cool conditions, Purple Queen matures early and holds its colour in cool conditions making it the perfect bean for home gardeners. Be sure to watch the bean turn from royal purple to luscious dark green as it is being cooked. Resistant to Mosaic Virus. Maturity 52 days.

https://www.veseys.com/ca/purplequeenimprovedbean.html

The Royal Burgundy bush bean we’d grown two years ago was no longer available, so we got this one instead. I wanted a purple bean. So we now have yellow, green and red beans, with a purple on the way. Once I realized a mistake had been made, I emailed Veseys about it, and I already got an order confirmation for the right seeds! Veseys is great for responding to emails. We’ve had an error like this only once before, and they are very fast about fixing things. I’m quite happy with them, that’s for sure.

Interestingly, I just looked at their bush bean collection and found it says the Red Swan bean in the collection is a substitute for the Purple Queen, which is not available for 2023. Looks like they now have Improved Purple Queen, instead.

So that is taken area of.

Meanwhile, these are the seeds I have that can be planted before last frost.

Of these, the Mountain Morado corn can be planted 1-2 weeks before last frost. The peas can be planted in mid-April or May. Everything else can be planted as soon as the ground can be worked.

I won’t be doing the kohlrabi. Every year we’ve tried them, we’ve had nothing, and I don’t know why. I do want to grow them. Just not this year. The radishes probably won’t be planted, but if I do plant some, it will be just a few seeds for plants that will be grown for their pods. I’m still curious to try them. We are not big fans of radishes, but I want to see if we like the pods.

The rest, we shall see when and where we will be able to plant things. I still don’t know where to plant the two types of poppies or the strawberry spinach. They will be treated as perennials and allowed to self seed, so they need permanent locations, and the two types of poppies need to be well away from each other to avoid cross pollination. I’ll figure it out.

The main thing I want to plant as soon as possible are the Naval carrots. The Uzbek Golden carrots are described as a cool weather carrot, but there is nothing about planting before last frost, so I will wait on those. I still have the pelleted Napoli carrots, from two years ago. That summer, they were repeatedly eaten by groundhogs and I finally gave up on the bed, only to discover they still managed to produce. They were quite good. If I have the space, I do want to try them again. As for the Naval carrots, I decided to make seed tape with them. I’ll include that in a video I will be making tonight, along with how prepping the low raised beds went. Hopefully, I’ll have a relatively short video ready for tomorrow.

Things are supposed to cool down for the next little while, and we may actually get rain tomorrow or the day after! So I’m not in any rush to get seeds in the ground, but I do want to get as much space ready for them as I can.

It felt so good to be digging in the dirt again!

The Re-Farmer