chocolate cherry tomatoes

Our 2026 Garden: a surprise harvest – and I got him!

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I was feeling good when I headed out to do the evening cat feeding, so of course, I stayed out longer.

As I was feeding the cats, Colby actually wanted attention. So much so that I got him, and was finally able to dose his ear. Just one. The one with the wound behind it from being scratched so much. Not ideal, but better than nothing! The medication says to dose once ever 24 hours, so hopefully we’ll get it done tomorrow again, before we head out to my brother’s for the night.

Colby is such a handsome boy!

Depending on what weather app I check, we’re looking at going below freezing tonight. Cold enough that the frost cloth over the self seeded tomatoes won’t be enough to protect them anymore.

So I harvested them, to let them finish ripening indoors, leaving the tomatoes on their vines.

The vines themselves were remarkably strong and healthy, so I chopped them up quite a bit before dropping them on the bed for now. Some of them were even still blooming! The frost cover alone is not enough to explain how well they were doing. This section of the bed seems to be very well sheltered from the cold. Something to keep in mind, when deciding what to plant there next year.

I have been very curious about the nearby chicory. They never did bloom, and I could see no sign of flower stalks anywhere. Where there any roots? I decided to dig one up to find out. I used the handle-less garden for to do it.

It took a lot of wrestling and loosening of soil all around a single plant before I could finally pull it up.

So this is what chicory root looks like.

All of the tips seem to have torn off in the soil as I pulled it, even with all the loosening of soil I’d done first.

I need to look up how to process it so we can try it as a drink. I only harvested the one for now.

Okay, this is what I’ve found. After a thorough cleaning, they get cut into uniform pieces and completely dehydrated. Then they are roasted. After roasting, they can be processed into powder or granules for use. One site I found, though, skips the dehydration and the roots are just roasted at low temperatures until crispy.

Looking at photos, it seems they can have very different root shapes. I’m guessing different varieties? Most images show them looking a lot like parsnips; a single large root. Fewer images show them with multiple thin roots like ours has.

After rinsing it off with the hose, I broke off the greens and set them in the compost ring. The greens are supposed to be edible – at least while young – but we have no interest in them that way.

Since I was by the compost ring anyhow, I decided to clear the tomato plants from the bed next to it. I didn’t dig them up, but cut their stems at the bases, and tossed them all onto the compost ring. The next step will be to get all the protective collars out and give them a cleaning for the winter, then pull up all the elms that have been trying to grow in there.

I really, really want to get rid of those Chinese elm, and their billions of seeds.

I was just finishing up when my older daughter came out, looking for me. She had been quite worried about me, given my condition earlier in the day. The pain has gone away completely, and I was feeling like it was never there. I still made sure not to act like I normally would, though, because I can be really stupid that way and easily end up causing more problems for myself!

In talking about what I was doing, I mentioned the tomatoes and chicory, which my daughter had noticed before seeing where I was. As we went back to the old kitchen garden, I started talking about the HUGE beet greens in one of the beds, and how curious I was to see what they were. With some of the – much smaller – beets, we could see some of the roots, and they did not look very large. These, however, had no visible roots.

We were both curious enough to dig up the largest beet plants, and boy did we get a surprise!

Would you look at these giants! (and the three largest red beets, too) I kept my food in the picture for perspective.

These beets are from a package of mixed varieties, with nothing to say what those varieties are. So I have no clue, but these white beets look like sugar beets! We’ve never grown sugar beets before, and only ever seen photos.

What’s curious is how they have all spiraled like that. Even the little one.

From what we can see of what’s still in the bed, there are no other larger red beets, and maybe one more white beet like these.

My daughter helped me with rinsing them off and bringing them inside. The beets went into the kitchen to use right away, while the tomatoes went into the cat free zone. We’ve suddenly had issues with fruit flies and, unfortunately, hat to throw away a lot of the ripening tomatoes. Of the ones that didn’t end up in the compost, they got set in the bin with the newly harvested tomatoes, with paper towel below, and a lid.

Some of the chocolate stripe tomatoes, and the California Wonder bell peppers, however, were quite ready.

Those got put into produce bags and brought to the kitchen for the family to enjoy. I can’t eat tomatoes or peppers, so I’ll have to rely on them for feedback. I’ve already been told that the California Wonder bell peppers are worth growing again. We’ll see if it’s the same for the Chocolate Stripe tomatoes. They are awfully pretty.

So here we have a lovely surprise harvest.

It’s remarkable that I had tomatoes still on the vine in the middle of October!

The Re-Farmer

Our 2026 Garden: survivors and a little October harvest

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Today turned out to be a rather nice day, that none of us really got to take advantage of.

I found myself awake at 4am and wasn’t able to get back to sleep, so I did the morning cat feeding. Which turned out to be greatly appreciated, as both my daughters were feeling quite sick with colds.

They stayed well away from my and my husband!

I did wake with a sore throat, which could also have been from sleeping with my mouth open, but I’m going to be proactive to try and avoid getting a cold. The last thing I need is for the cancer clinic to call me with a date and time for my surgery, then having to cancel it because of a cold!

The outside cats were quite happy this morning, as I made their cat soup with a couple of little cans of donated wet cat food as well as some cat milk and soaked kibble. We have so many bags of donated cat treats, I ended up scatting three (small) bags of treats all over.

I only saw 11 cats. I did not see Sprout (Sprig?) at all. Hopefully, she came by later. I did get to pet the shrine kitten, though, who no longer eats at the shrine feeding station at all anymore. There is a particular tray she prefers to eat from. The problem with that, though, is that there’s usually four other older cats insisting on eating from that tray, too, even though there are so many others around, scarfing down the food, and she doesn’t get as much. She doesn’t seem to want to eat out of any of the other trays for some reason.

After taking care of the kitties, I stayed out to enjoy the morning and do some light work in the old kitchen garden. I uncovered the self seeded Chocolate Cherry tomatoes and had a chance to give them a good look.

They are doing remarkably well.

Hidden in the thickest greenery, there are tomatoes ripening on the vine!

The frost cloth isn’t long enough to completely cover one end, so the branches there were more frost damaged. I broke off the most damage branches, and found a number of little green tomatoes that had fallen off. So I picked them, which you can see in the second image, and brought them inside to ripen. Between the frost cloth and the more sheltered position in this bed, these tomato plants are protected enough from the colder nights that they’re not being killed off. I’m quite impressed!

After that, I finally removed the cover over the beets and parsnips, and the herb bed. The herb bed was more difficult to remove, as the oregano on one side had grown through the chicken wire quite thickly. I managed to get it off without uprooting anything.

Then I started working on the summer squash, removing all the wire garden ties securing the stalks to their vertical bamboo stake supports, then the ones holding the ends of the woven horizontal supports together, before finally pulling them all up. I was able to make a couple of bundles of 10 stakes all the same length, with the garden wire to secure them. Then I did my usual morning rounds, checking on the other garden beds and the haskaps. With the high winds we had, a lot of the smaller ones in the trays were blown right out, so those got fixed, then watered. I made sure to water the spruce saplings, too. Those little pots will dry out fast.

I didn’t try to take down other covers and rods on other beds yet. The netting and clear vinyl sheets are something I will wait to have a second person help with. With the winds we’ve been having, it’s rather difficult to fold and roll them up for winter storage with just one person.

That done, I headed back in and tried to go back to sleep.

It didn’t work.

I did send a bit of a list to the girls of what I’d gotten done, and what needed to be done with them, mentioning that all the transplanted haskaps would need a deep watering.

I also found an email update on my FIL’s condition. He is, unfortunately, deteriorating and it’s looking like he is not going to be around much longer. His dementia is failing particularly fast, and he has been “sundowning” by the end of the day, talking about things like going to see his parents. They passed away decades ago. It’s been particularly hard on my husband, as he physically can’t make the trip to see his father, and now it seems he won’t even be able to talk to him on the phone. His father is unlikely to even know who he is.

It does make me appreciate just how well my mother is doing.

My SIL messaged to check on me and how I was doing, and we chatted for a fair bit before I finally gave up on lying down. I had intended to go back outside again in the afternoon, but the pain levels suddenly kicked in and I ended up having to lie down again. My daughters, sick as they were, headed outside and deep watered the haskap.

It’s a good thing I wasn’t trying to sleep, because I kept getting notifications! I got some texts from my sister, letting me know she had visited my mother. She was updating me when the phone rang – and it was my mother! She wanted to know how things had gone yesterday. It was a mostly good call, though she did try to go on about how my brother should be doing stuff around here, not us, because he’s a man and we women shouldn’t be doing things like planting trees. Which is bizarre, since she planted many, many trees over the years! (Mostly in terrible places! 😄) She did start talking about how my brother has many important responsibilities, both at work and at home, and how he goes out of province to visit the grandsons, etc. Then, much to my shock, she switched to Polish and said a blessing on him for good health and a long life. My mother rather hates my brother and he can never do anything good enough for her, so when she does stuff like this, it makes me suspicious. She seemed to be genuine, though.

By then, a few hours had gone by and my pain levels finally eased and I did finally make it outside. I meant to just walk around and check on things but, of course, I found small things that I could do.

Including getting a small harvest.

In the East garden bed where I’d planted the Uzbek Golden Carrots, I was able to dig up these.

A couple of them were self seeded, while the others were the only ones that germinated from the older seed tape I’d made with them a couple of years ago.

While checking things out in the main garden area, I tried digging up some of the Daikon radish that all bolted. There were no radish roots at all in the ones I dug up. Just the woody material that happens when they bolt, instead.

I did, however, dig up a few Red Bearded bunching onions.

Just enough for today.

As I write this, I’ve got a pork stew going in the Instant Pot, with all these carrots and onions, plus the last of the summer squash I’d picked before the frost got them, along with our own potatoes and our own garlic. The liquid is gelled meat juices from the last of the big brisket I got a while back, cut into individual size roasts that my daughter seasoned well and slow roasted, low and slow, for something like three hours.

I am quite looking forward to it! We don’t have a lot from the garden this year, but we at least have enough for a few meals. Which is better than nothing!

I’m just really appreciating the fact that I was able to harvest anything at all, in October. Looking ahead on the 10 day forecast, we’ve got some mild weather for the next while, and even another day with an expected high of 20C/68F! Things are supposed to be cooler after that, but still relatively mild. The ground isn’t going to freeze for a while, yet. Right now, my time limit is not the weather anymore, but my surgery date. After the surgery, I’m out of commission for 6 weeks, so the more I can get done before the surgery the better, though my daughters will be taking over a lot of things as they are able.

Oh! What is that beeping I hear?

’tis the Instant Pot, finished cooking the stew and now depressurizing.

This is going to be good!

The Re-Farmer

Why couldn’t we have gotten this in the summer?

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The predicted rain actually reached us for a change. Our weird climate bubble didn’t push it away. It’s been raining all night and, at past 2pm as I write this, is still sort of raining.

We really could have used rain like this, over the summer!

Unfortunately, I’m finding my window leaks.

It’s the only original window left in the house. Before we moved out here, my brother convinced my mother to have the windows replaced, since sheets of Lexan on the inside just wasn’t cutting it. New windows probably reduced the winter heat bill in this place by a couple hundred dollars a month! She balked, however, at doing the north facing window in what used to be her own bedroom. Too expensive, she said, and refused to pay for it (the living room window, meanwhile, probably cost at least twice as much, just on its own!).

This is actually a pair of windows, side by side, creating a long, wide rectangle together. One half has a screen and we used to be able to open it. At some point, Lexan sheets were installed on this inside. While the turning handle to open the window is still clear, the window itself can no longer be opened – and there’s no point to opening it, since there’s a sheet of Lexan on the inside.

During a driving rain some time ago, I discovered there was a drip between the Lexan and the window on the side that didn’t open. I was supposed to seal it on the outside, but completely forgot. It seems it leaks only if there’s a driving rain in just the right direction, and it didn’t leak again after that one rainfall.

Until today.

The first thing I noticed is that the window on that side is fogged up on the inside. Eventually, I could see the drip.

Some hours later, I sat at my computer, when I realized I was seeing wet all over the top of my printer and the various other things on there. The printer is directly under the window that we used to be able to open.

My first thought is that a cat had gone into the cat bed on top of my drinks fridge, then sprayed over the printer. Because we have cats that are dicks and would do that. Then I saw the drip! I don’t know exactly where the water is getting in, but it seems to be flooding on top of the molding framing the window (this window is in a log wall, so it’s quite deep) enough to travel across and drip on the inside side of the Lexan panel, rather than in between the glass window and the Lexan panel.

*sigh*

Unless we can fine some way to remove the Lexan panels, it’s going to take days for things to dry out once the rain stops. Then I have to get out and put sealant around the window on the outside.

I’m not sure how the Lexan was installed. A frame for the Lexan is screwed directly to the wood framing the two windows. The Lexan sheets, however, are on the inside, against the window frames themselves. Basically, it’s a spacer between the Lexan and the window frames, which means the panels were add after that inner frame was screwed in place. The only alternative would have been removing the windows and putting them back again which, of course, didn’t happen. The panels themselves have their own plastic frames around the edges, and I can’t tell what’s holding them in place against the screwed in spacer frame.

If these can actually just be popped out somehow, that would be helpful. We could then set a fan facing the window to dry things out, and we wouldn’t have to wait for days before sealing up the outside.

We’ll figure it out.

For now, I’ve had to set a towel up on the edge of the window that’s dripping on the inside. It does seem to have finally stopped raining, more or less. It’s supposed to continue until past 4pm, but still potentially have sporadic rain off and on until midnight or so.

We’re actually under two weather advisories right now. One for heavy rain, the other for high winds.

Which is what we definitely had while I was doing my morning rounds!

The cats really appreciated having shelters to go into to eat. The ones that normally like to eat on the cat house roof were willing to use the kibble house, for a change! 😄

Once the bellies were full, the tiniest kittens were back in their new favourite cat bed.

Except for the one that came over to me and was snuggling against my boot!

The tinies might be more than eager for human attention. Blot is now a constant presence in the sun room and the tinies love to cuddle him (her?), but so far I’ve only managed to sneak the odd pet.

The white and grey adult cat on the right of the photo is one of the trio we used to have; Magda, Frank and this one that never got named. Madga, who got spayed, and this one both disappeared, while Frank stayed to have her babies. Then this one came back, looking more grown up and burly, but still quite small. At first, we thought he had an injury beside one ear but, over time, I’m starting to think he’s got really severe ear mites in that ear.

This morning I dug out an umbrella to do my rounds, but I probably should have just worn a hoodie. The winds were so high, they almost yanked it out of my hands. It’s a good thing it’s one of those big golfer’s umbrellas. Anything smaller or of lesser quality would have been flipped inside out.

The weather meant an indoor day, which I suppose worked out. Today is Sunday and is supposed to be my day of rest. If it weren’t for the rain, I would have been back out, digging in the garden, or under the canopy tent, sorting through bins that need to go back into the sun room, or stored somewhere else.

I’m glad I set that taller shelf in front of the bathroom window. The cats are using it to look in, including some of the smaller kittens. It’s just a joy to see my husband coming out of the bathroom, all excited to tell me about which face he saw peeking in the window while he was in there! He’s in so much pain all the time, seeing him happy because of what was really such a little thing to do, is pure gold. If that means converting the entire sunroom over to the cats and storing my tools and supplies elsewhere, it’s more than worth it.

Rainy, cloudy weather like this always makes me sleepy, so once the morning rounds were done, I did end up crashing for a couple of hours.

I had to fight for bed space, though.

Leyendecker, alone, takes up a lot of space!

As I write this, there are twelve cats scattered all over my bed.

This afternoon, I did get one “extra” thing done. I brought out the little bins of green tomatoes we harvested before a frost in early September. Almost all the Chocolate Cherry tomatoes ripened beautifully.

In the second picture, you can see the ones that are still green or under ripe. I’m really impressed with how these turned out! Chocolate Cherry tomatoes seem to do quite well in our area, even if they get harvested really early and really green.

The other bin had the Black Beauty and Sub Arctic Plenty tomatoes in it. The larger Black Beauties had ripened, but the smaller ones just sort of started to dry out, instead. The Sub Arctic Plenty tomatoes did ripen… sort of. The larger ones ripened but started going bad at the same time. Some of the smaller ones got to orange before they started drying out. Others didn’t change at all. They just got wizened. So there weren’t many of those to set aside for eating or cooking, and the rest went into the compost bucket.

Well, it does look like the rain has actually stopped for now. I should take advantage of that and head outside for my evening rounds, feed the ferals and see if we lost any more trees or branches.

The Re-Farmer

Our 2025 Garden: some final harvests, and we do still have a “hot house”!

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Today was definitely on the chilly side. Even overnight; apparently, we dropped to 3C/37F last night, which is colder than was forecast. I’m glad we got that plastic over the winter squash!

We’re supposed to drop to 4C/39F tonight, which means we can expect it to get colder. I never removed the plastic cover on the winter squash, though. We got rain last night, which means the squash didn’t get any natural watering, but I do have the soaker hose still set up with them. I rarely used it, as filling their collars with water several times was more efficient. Today, however, I lifted one corner of the cover, hooked up the hose, then covered it again, letting the soaker hose run for an hour.

We did reach our expected high of 12C/54F this afternoon, so the girls and I took advantage of it to get some final harvests done on some things.

I started off in the East garden beds, pulling most of the corn (I left some stalks just to have a bit of protection for the bush beans). There were very few cobs to harvest and, as you can see, they were very small. I did find some yellow bush beans to harvest, though, then later found a few of the Royal Burgundy in the main garden area.

The chocolate cherry had the most to pick green. There were a few Black Beauties and Sub Arctic Plenty to pick. These are now sitting near the window in the cat free zone (aka, the living room) to ripen.

I also picked as many dried super sugar snap pea pods as I could find, as well as the dried radish seed pods. The girls, meanwhile, pulled all the spoon tomatoes, then sat with the plants to pick up the ripest ones. That took long enough that I finished first, then joined them. We made sure to not have any little stems on them before adding them to the bowl. It’s a lot more difficult to get those off if they’re left for later! With the Spoon tomatoes, we did NOT harvest the green ones. They’re so tiny, it really wasn’t worth doing it. So those went into the compost with the vines.

I suspect we’re going to have another year of compost tomatoes next year, and that most of them will be Spoon tomatoes!

Later on, before covering the eggplant and peppers for the night, I harvested a couple of kohl rabi and Turkish Orange eggplant. I have no idea if the eggplant is right, but at this point, it’s unlikely the greener ones will finish ripening, even with protective covers. The plants were already drooping from last night’s cold, in spite of the cover and bottles of hot water to help keep them a bit warmer. I chose the two that looked the most orange, but the rest still have green on them. I don’t think eggplant is something you can pick and will ripen indoors, like tomatoes and peppers can.

The kohl rabi I picked are pretty small, and there are just a few left, but I wanted to snack on them. That bed is almost done.

While the day was chilly, it was quite warm in the portable greenhouse! We have kept the “door” rolled up for quite some time but, yesterday, my daughter unrolled it half way and pulled the zippers down.

The thermometer in there was reading over 30C/86F, late this afternoon!

I’d moved our succulents and coffee plant into there yesterday evening. I’m glad I remembered to, as they likely would not have survived the night, but they would be very happy with the heat they got today! I’m hoping to keep those outdoors as long as possible, as they seem to be doing much better than in our living room.

In the next photo, you can see our first male luffa flower starting to bloom. They fell off when I moved a leaf to get the picture, but there were ants climbing around the stem and base of the flower. Which means, pollinators are still getting into the greenhouse. I still plan to hand pollinate, should the opportunity arise.

My daughter and I were checking on it when we spotted our first female flower buds starting to form. No visible baby luffa yet, they were were too small, but we knew they were female flowers, and those form in singles, while the male flowers form in clusters.

As of now, we no longer have any tomatoes in the garden. There are still bush beans, which will probably be killed off by the cold tonight. I’m debating when to just pick the green peppers and bring them in. I’m really surprised by how well the summer squash is holding out. I don’t expect things like the pumpkins, melons, bush beans, the stalled pole beans or sunflowers to survive tonight’s cold, but you never know. Things like the remaining radish plants that still have greener pods on them, the root vegetables, kohl rabi, chard, and even the tiny onions we’ve got growing in the old kitchen garden, can handle frost. We harvested some herbs at the last minute but I haven’t covered that bed with anything. The basil probably won’t make it, but I think the other herds might. We shall see in the morning.

Meanwhile, I’m now going to find some suitable containers, set up something to watch, then start opening up those dried pods and collect their seeds!

The Re-Farmer

Our 2025 Garden: still blooming, ripe yet? and tiny harvest

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After the hot days we had recently, the 14C/57F we had when I headed out this morning felt cold! We were supposed to reach a high of 16C/61F, but that changed to 15C/59F, which is what we’re at right now, as I write this in the late afternoon.

We are supposed to drop to 7C/45F tonight, then down to 5C/41C tomorrow night. Which means we will want to cover the more cold intolerant plants.

Which are still blooming. In fact, some are blooming more than ever right now!

The pumpkin blossoms are huge!

All male. No female flower blooming.

Unlike the Arikara squash. We finally have a couple of female flowers blooming, but the male flowers that had bloomed have died off a while ago, so there is nothing to hand pollinate with.

The winter squash are also blooming. Male flowers again, as the female flowers are done, though I was (hopefully) able to use male flowers that had bloomed the day before to hand pollinate them. There was even some zucchini to hand pollinate, too. The White Scallop squash finally has a single flower blooming, but there’s no sign of any female flowers.

I think I have figured out how I can cover the winter squash bed. There are a surprising number of developing squash right now, considering this year’s growing conditions, and I want to give them the best chance of surviving. This bed was made narrower than the 4′ that was marked for when it gets a permanent frame around it, but I think the Pexx pipe I used to make hoops is flexible enough to be used. I’m thinking of covering them with the mosquito netting we have. It wouldn’t be enough to protect from an actual frost, but it should be enough to keep them insulated. Especially if we add a few jugs of hot water around the plants before putting the netting on.

That’s a project for this evening.

Both the eggplant and the peppers are still blooming, though I don’t think they are setting any more fruit. The Turkish Orange eggplant looks really intersting!

There are two photos in the slide show above. I’m not sure how to tell when they are ripe, but in the back of the second photo, there is one eggplant that is a very deep orange, so I’m thinking they need to be at least that dark. The cover we have for the eggplant isn’t long enough to cover the ends well, but I plan to include bottles of hot water at each end to give the most exposed plants at least some extra protection. The peppers will be fine.

I also picked a few Chocolate Cherry and Sub Arctic Plenty tomatoes this morning.

We will probably have to pick the remaining unripe ones tonight, or maybe tomorrow, as we have no way to cover this bed. It already has netting around it. We just don’t have anything that will protect from cold that’s large enough to cover them.

Looking at the 10 day forecast, it looks like we’ll need to cover the beds every night for the next week, before overnight temperatures start warming up again. Enough time for little squash to mature? No. But who knows what the weather will actually do over the next while! The old average last frost day, which I’m still going by, is Sept. 10, but we might get cold enough to get frost on the 6th.

Well, whatever happens, happens. We’ll deal!

The Re-Farmer

Our 2025 Garden: getting bigger, some firsts in the harvest, and peeking!

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First, the cuteness. I got this picture last night.

The littles are happily discovering the perks of being close to the house. They’ve been sleeping on various cat beds all over the place, enjoying reliable access to food and water, and the creche mothers are taking good care of them. Some are still super shy, but even they are getting brave enough to go into the sun room.

I was on the late side getting out this morning. I had a rough night. What little lawn mowing a managed with the push more did more than remind me I hadn’t fully recovered from suddenly getting sick.

It reinjured me.

My left arm, that I injured in a fall more than a month ago, had been feeling fine for awhile. Well enough that I wondered just what we’d be talking about when I see my doctor at the end of the month, to go over the X-rays.

Last night, all the joints were hurting enough that I got my older daughter to come over and rub them down with Voltaren. Only after that could I finally get some sleep. By then it was around 3am.

My left hip has also increasingly an issue. Not so much with pain, but stability. The lack of it! It’s gotten so that I have to sit down to put on my pants, because I can’t stand on my left leg. When taking the two steps from the original part of the house to the addition, I can only step up on my right leg. If I try to step up using my left leg, my hip just gives out.

Something else to talk about when I see my doctor!

With that in mind, I got one of my daughters to help me in the garden at the end of my morning rounds.

When I first got into the old kitchen to start preparing the wet and dry cat food mixture I feed them in the mornings, I spotted one of the white and grey littles, right at the window! This window used to be an exterior window, before the sun room was added on, so the sill on the outside is angled down for any moisture to drain away from the window. It makes it a challenge, but the smaller cats and kittens are still able to get onto it and not slide right off. To see the littles up there – I think the one I saw traded off with a second one while I was filling the kibble bowl – is good progress. They have figured out where the food comes from, and are comfortable with that.

Now if only the garage kittens would come out! They are SO hungry by the time I arrive to feed them, because they don’t come to the house where there is more food, after their bowl is empty. I’m seriously considering moving the isolation shelter closer to the garage, and use it to slowly get them closer to the house. The problem with that it, the littles and the outside yard kittens are already using it regularly.

Maybe the catio would work, instead.

After the cats were fed, I continued my rounds and checking on the garden.

I’m quite happy with what’s happening in the trellis bed. The noodle beans are still stunted, but the sunflowers and pumpkins are looking great!

One pumpkin plant – the one with the pumpkin in a sling – is the biggest of the five, and opened up a couple of massive flowers this morning. There’s just male flowers, though. I’ve been seeing tiny female flowers start to form but, so far, they’ve all shriveled up and fallen off, long before they opened up. So it looks like we’ll get a single pumpkin this year.

In the second image of the slideshow above, you can see the tallest of the Hopi Black Dye sunflowers. it has almost reached the height of the top horizontal support for the temporary trellis netting, which is at least 6 1/2 feet from the ground, so about 6 feet from the inside of the bed.

I’m surprised by all those little tomatoes I found when doing a major weeding, some time ago, and transplanted. I’ve since found three more that got missed, but I won’t bother moving those. Some of the transplants are getting surprisingly bed. The largest one is hidden under the leaves of the biggest pumpkin plant! One even has blossoms on it. I suspect that some of them, at least, might be Spoon tomatoes.

Speaking of Spoon tomatoes…

My younger daughter came out to help me pick them. With the instability of my hip, I can only pick from one side, where I can lean against the log wall. My daughter can actually get right into the bed, standing on the mulch in between the melons (which are not really growing, even if some are blooming) and pick the tomatoes on that side of the plants.

This is our morning’s harvest.

Yes, those are grapes! My daughter found the ripest looking clusters. There are lots more, but they are still more on the green side. If my guess is correct, these are Valiant grapes and they should get much bigger, not be the same size as the Spoon tomatoes. Once we figure out a place to transplant them, hopefully they will do better. The vines themselves are doing great where they are, but the fruit is not what it should be.

This is the first time in a couple of years we’ve been able to harvest some grapes before the raccoons ate them all.

Under the colander is a selection of fresh herbs; two types of oregano, two types of thyme, sage, basil, lemon balm and even some dill weed from the self seeded dill that came up among the herbs. I also gathers some walking onion bulbils; we don’t want them to spread beyond where they are now, so the bulbils are for eating, not growing! There’s a small amount of bush beans, some Sub Arctic Plenty tomatoes and some Chocolate Cherry tomatoes.

At the bottom are some nasturtium seeds. My daughter was admiring the flower bed (the Cosmos are getting so tall!) and asked about the nasturtiums, which are winding down right now. While checking them out, we noticed some of the seeds had started to dry up and fall off the plants. Rather than leave them there to likely rot, we gathered them up. They are now in the cat free zone (the living room) where we are keeping gathered seeds and seed pods to stay cool and dry before they get stored away.

As for the rest of today, I’m not sure what I’ll manage to get done outside. I’ll give myself a chance to rest, but I most likely will just pain killer up and head out later and do as much as I can. We shall see.

The Re-Farmer

Our 2025 Garden: some firsts in the harvest, and weird corn

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Just a quick garden post to start with today.

While doing my rounds and checking in the garden, I found this strange thing in the corn.

I’ve never seen anything like it before. I was looking at it with my daughter later on and we were wondering about those yellow things near the tassels. As I was handling it, that widened yellow section snapped right off. The inside was like a sponge. Very odd!

I wasn’t expecting to harvest anything this morning, but I did end up gathering a few things.

There was one ripe Sub Arctic Plenty tomato, plus I saw some Chocolate Cherry tomatoes through the greenery that I went ahead and grabbed. Turned out only one of them was really ripe, but the others will ripen indoors. I could only find a couple of yellow bush beans to harvest.

I went ahead and harvested the largest of the kohlrabi, which all turned out to be purple Vienna. I was smart this time and used the loppers to cut them free, rather than a knife. One of them looks like a giant pine cone or something! I suspect that one will be more woody in texture.

After harvesting the kohlrabi, I decided to weed out the invading mint by harvesting it, too. I’m not sure what I want to do with it yet. I might just make a big pot of fresh mint tea.

Good for the digestion.

We had another rather cold night last night, with the low dropping below 10C/50F. Today’s high is expected to reach only 18C/64F – which is the perfect temperature, to me! It would be good for the garden, too, if it weren’t for the lows.

Over the next few days, things will get warmer, and possibly even reaching above 30C/86F, with lows above 20C/68F. Which will hopefully give the garden a chance to make up for the occasional cold night.

Looking at the long range forecast into September, the lows in the first couple of weeks look like we might be getting frost around the expected average of September 10. If not frost, then some things will at least need to be covered for the night.

I am beginning to suspect we will not only not have the long, mild fall this year I was hoping for, but possibly an early winter. For the past week or so, I’ve started to see more garter snakes on the roads.

They would normally start returning to their dens in September, not August.

Well, if things done get a chance to fully mature this year, I hope to at least be able to do the planned winter sowing, just before the ground freezes, so we can get a head start on next year. If how things worked out this year is any example, this may be the best way to ensure reliable harvests from year to year. We’ll also need to really focus on the raised bed covers, as they get built, so that we can use them to extend our growing season as much as possible.

It’s definitely been a mixed bag with how things are in the garden this year! I’m rather looking forward to after it’s all done, and I start doing my annual garden analysis posts.

The Re-Farmer

Our 2025 Garden: transplanting tomatoes, peppers and eggplant, and creating supports

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I am very happy to say that, as of today, ALL the transplants are in! There is just the final direct sowing to do, now.

The first transplants to get in where the tomatoes, and they all fit into one garden bed.

This bed had already been prepped, then covered with plastic, except for one end, where there had been onions gone to seed. They did not survive another winter, though.

The plastic didn’t solarize the weeds to death, but at least it kept most of the elm seeds off! The challenge was to get the plastic off again, without dumping them all onto the soil.

For a bed that had already been weeded before the plastic was laid down, there were a LOT of weeds to clear out. As I worked around the bed, I suddenly realized that I was pulling out baby carrots! Last year, we had a couple of Uzbek Golden Carrots bolt and go to seed, so I left them to it, so I could collect the seeds in the fall. When I went to gather them, though, the seed heads were shriveled and messed up looking, and there were no seeds to collect.

Looks like one of them did have seeds, after all!

There was no way they could be transplanted or anything like that, so away they went.

Once the bed was clear of weeds and roots, I finished off our last bag of manure into it, and worked that into the soil.

Then it was time to figure out where the tomatoes would go.

I used the collars (I found an extra “stash” of the water bottles I make the collars from in the basement, so I had plenty for the tomatoes) to figure out the spacing. There were four Black Beauty, four Chocolate Cherry and nine Sub Arctic Plenty.

We’ve grown the Black Beauty and Chocolate Cherry before, so I know what to expect with those. They both get quite tall, while the Black Beauty became really heavy. They had trellis supports, and I ended up having to add supports to the supports, to keep the whole thing from tipping over in the wind!

With that in mind, I made sure that these were on the north side of the bed, so they wouldn’t shade out other plants. So I set out eight collars on that side, with a space in the middle.

If I remember correctly, the Sub Arctic Plenty are a bush type tomato, so I don’t expect them to get tall. I’m thinking they will be more like the Forme de Couer tomatoes we grew last year. Each tomato plant had a pair of bamboo stakes to support it, and I’d used twine around the plants to secure them. The plants got so heavy with tomatoes, the supports started falling over, and some of the bamboo stakes even broke from the weight.

With that in mind, I planted the Sub Arctic Plenty tomatoes along the south side of the bed, where they would get the most sunlight.

As with everything else, this bed was dry, dry, dry, so it got repeated waterings at every stage. I’d taken the cover off the other bed and every time I watered the tomato bed, I gave the other bed a gentle watering, too.

Once the tomatoes were in, it was time to give them support. For the verticals, I used 6′ plastic coated metal stakes. I’m glad I got more of these! Every collar got one of these tucked against one side. I used up all the stakes from last year, and used a couple of the new ones, to make one for every tomato plant.

Once those were in place, I used bamboo stakes to weave through the verticals. I did three horizontal rows on each side, and more can be added later, if need be. I then added some sticks to connect the two sides. There’s just a couple at the ends of one level, and a couple more further in, at another level. We may not need any more than that. We’ll see how things progress over time.

I did not have any clean grass clippings left for mulch, so I made use of the stove pellets we use for cat litter. I scattered them around, and even inside, the collars before giving the whole thing one final watering, to get the pellets to break up into sawdust.

I think it worked out rather well, and should be able to hold the weight of the tomatoes we can expect from these varieties,

Once this was done and cleaned up, and I took a break for lunch, it was time to work in the old kitchen garden. I decided it was time to remove the cover and netting from the greens bed, so the first thing to do was roll up the two sheets of netting, then take the cover off.

The kittens are going to miss their little mosquito netting hammocks!

The greens bed was really dry, so I spent time time watering it from the rain barrel – the rain we had was almost enough to refill it – and weeding. The spinach is bolting and we’ve decided to let them go to seed. I also found a second tiny bok choi that is staring to bloom.

That done, the herb bed got a watering, too, and then I did the pruning and clearing I mentioned in my earlier post, before I could even start on the wattle weave bed.

I decided that the Sweetie Snack Mix mini bell peppers would go in the short part of the L shaped bed, and the eggplant in the long section, among the strawberries.

The short side of the bed didn’t need a lot of weeding, and I was careful to work around the garlic that got missed and started growing this year. The old mulch got pushed up against the wattle weave sides, and the hard packed soil was broken up and fluffified. It was surprisingly hard packed. So I added some of the remaining rehydrated coconut coir over the area and worked that into the soil.

I laid the transplants out, in their cups, to figure out the bed way to space them. After that, it was the usual routine of wetting everything down, then again and again, in between every stage of transplanting. When the peppers were finally planted, I made sure to press down around each one, to create a shallow “bowl” to collect water and drain it towards the plant. Then each pepper plant got its own wire tomato cage to grow up into.

That done, it was time to work on the other side. It was a bit more challenging, working around the strawberries and onion survivors that are there. There was no sign of any of the chamomile self seeding, and the thyme that almost survived the winter was long dead, so that gave a bit of extra space. The mulch was moved aside, the compacted soil broken up, and the last of the coconut coir worked into the soil.

The transplants in their cups were laid out to figure out the spacing, along with the mystery flower. I decided to plant that at the very end of the bed, where it could stay permanently. If it survives! The flower did get a plastic collar, more to keep the cats from rolling on it.

Once the eggplant were in, each with their shallow “bowl” around them, they got their wire tomato cages set in place, and they were done!

Almost.

The mulch I’d moved aside was mostly old wood chips. I didn’t want to push that back. I did, however, have some leaf mulch that had been pulled off and set along the inside of the L shape, by the double lilac. It was old and dry, so I was able to crush handfuls of it, and shake it out over the transplants, to give the soil a light protection. More mulch can be added as the plants get bigger.

I forgot to take an “after” picture when I was done, so I went back out later, and got a picture of the entire finished bed, which is the last image in the above slide show.

That done, I went on to water the new trees in the fruit forest area, and the walnuts in the outer year. Still no sign of anything emerging where the seeds are planted, but the year old sapling is starting to get some bigger leaves on it.

I headed outside shortly after 7am to go my morning rounds and start on the garden. By the time I was done and heading back inside, it was past 8am. Taking into account stopping for breakfast and lunch, I got about 10 hours in the garden today!

Which is great, because all the transplants are IN!!!

Tomorrow, my main goal of the day is to get the third low raised bed near the compost rind cleaned up and planted with short season corn and yellow beans. After that, I want to work on the permanent trellis bed where I want to plant red noodle beans. That will make sure the trellis gets finished off, because they’re going to need something to climb!

Last of all, I will be clearing the bed at the chain like fence, salvage what I can find, replant with what I can manage, then cover it up again. Somehow. I like the netting that’s over it, but it really need something better than the wire to support it. I’m not even sure I can salvage the ones that cats have bent up!

I’ll figure it out.

Just another day or two, and the garden will be officially in!

Almost there!

On a completely different note, while I was working outside, my daughter let me know that the shop I took our push mower to had called and left a message. As expected they can’t find the part that’s needed. It’s simply not available, anywhere.

I was expecting this and had been thinking about it. I’d told them not to worry if they couldn’t find it; I’d just come pick it up. However, it would just end up as more junk here. So when I called them back and talked about it, I suggested they could keep the mower and use it for parts. If I ever buy a push mower again, it won’t be that brand, so it would be of no use to me. They, however, might be able to scavenge it if some other poor soul has the same brand of mower and needs a part that’s hard to find. They happily accepted the offer. Win, win!

Thankfully, my brother has provided us with mowers we can use! I was going to take my mother’s old mower in, but my brother thinks he can fix it himself, so we don’t even need to bring that in.

Oh, my goodness. It’s past midnight as I finish this! I need to get my butt into bed!

Have a good night!

The Re-Farmer

Our 2025 Garden: tomato seeds potted up, melon seeds pre-germinating

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Okay, so working on that pipe is not going to happen today. Pain levels are on the upswing and I know if I try to work on it now, I’ll mess myself up for days.

So, instead, I worked on garden stuff!

The tomato seeds were all showing radicals, with some even starting to show seed leaves. It was time to get them into the seed starting mix.

The first image has the Black Beauty on the left, Spoon tomatoes on the right. Those Spoon tomatoes were really doing well! It’s hard to see, but all the Black Beauty seeds had radicals showing.

The next image has the Sub Arctic Plenty on the right. As a short season variety, it’s no surprise that they germinated so quickly. On the left are the Chocolate Cherry. I was a bit surprised that these were the slowest to germinate. I would have expected the Black Beauty to take the longest, considering they have the longest growing season needed.

I had to moisten more seed starter mix for this job, and I made sure to use hot water for that. By the time the cells were filled and the seeds were being transferred out of their trays, the damp mix was still warm. Warmer than the damp paper towels the seeds were on. Now they’re in the tray along with the Turkish Orange eggplant (there’s 6 visible seedlings there), the luffa (all three have finally emerged) and sweet bell pepper mix (no sign of any of those, yet). The bottom of the tray got warm water, too – I wanted to make sure those square peat pots had plenty of moisture to absorb, so they don’t try out the seed starting mix.

That done, I went through my next batch of seeds and decided to go for it with the melons. The White Scallop seeds were set aside for now, as they can wait until May to be done. I got the containers all prepped and labeled ahead of time, and even got some markers labeled for when it’s time to put them into seed starting mix.

For the watermelon, I used my older Cream of Saskatchewan and Kaho seeds. The Sarah’s Choice melon seeds are also older, but the Green Flesh Honeydew packet is new seeds.

Then there are the Zucca melons. Which are the giants. These seeds, which I made a point of scarifying by scraping their edges with a utility knife, are also older seeds, so I made a point of choosing the plumpest, most solid feeling seeds. Which could have been any of them, really. They were in quite good shape. I started 4 seeds. These are the ones that started out so well last year, only to be decimated by slugs, so any transplants we get out of these are going to require extra protection.

Four seeds each was what I was shooting for; we over did it with melons last year, and I want to cut back. With the Cream of Saskatchewan, there were only 5 seeds left in the pack, so I set them all out. With the Kaho watermelon, there were only 3 seeds left in the pack, so I guess that balances things out!

They all got covered with dampened paper towel, and are now set up on top of the aquarium light fixture. At this stage, they don’t really need light, but they do need warmth. I didn’t want to set up the other heat mat yet, and the light fixture is ever so slightly warm. Not as warm as a heat mat, but warm enough. Once they germinate and get transferred into trays, they’ll get a heat mat. It should be interesting to see how many germinate. Especially with the older seeds.

After this, the next things we might start indoors are some herbs and a few back-up White Scallop squash. Those can be started towards the end of April or beginning of May. I’m hoping we’ll be able to start using the portable greenhouse at around the same time. It really depends on those overnight temperatures inside the greenhouse, as we have no way to heat it. We won’t have the option to use the sun room this year, as the space is pretty much all set up for the cats now!

Ah, well. We’ll figure it out.

It felt good to be able to do some garden related stuff on such a dreary day.

The Re-Farmer

Our 2024 Garden: a morning of peppers

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Things definitely not chilly last night, though not – thankfully – frost chilly. We dropped to 6C/43F. Our expected high today is only 17C/63F, with tomorrow about the same. Then we’re supposed to warm up again over the next week, and even reach temperatures as high as 25C/77F before they start to drop again. Even the long range forecast into October has changed to warmer predictions, though we are still looking at potential frost. What gets me are the days we’re supposed to hit 25C/77F again, but have overnight lows of 3C/37F! Talk about temperature whiplash!

The garden seems to be okay with this, for the most part. The tomatoes, of course, aren’t ripening very quickly. The beans seem to be loving it, though. The Crespo squash is a surprise. While all the other squash and pumpkins are dying off, the Crespo squash is just thriving, growing and blooming. I’m not seeing any end of season die off at all!

This is what I was able to harvest this morning.

There are a few San Marzano tomatoes, all from the main garden area, none from the retaining wall blocks in the old kitchen garden. Hidden on the bottom of the colander is a single green zucchini. It’s small, but I picked it anyway, as it’s not going to get any bigger. There’s a whole three Chocolate Cherry tomatoes under there, too.

There’s all three types of beans in there. With the Crespo squash growing so enthusiastically, it’s hard to see the green Seychelle beans that are sharing the bed. Like the squash, the bean plants are thriving and blooming, as if it were the start of the season for them, instead of well past. There were more of the Royal Burgundy and Carminat beans than I expected, and they are still blooming, too. Even the one surviving Seychelle plant with the Carminat has a few beans on it, and is blooming.

I had a bit of a surprise while digging around to find the beans. I spotted a Carminat vine that didn’t make it onto the trellis netting, and was instead going under some winter squash vines. I gently pulled it out to see if I could get it on the trellis – and found a several huge pods! So we have more pods that might give us seeds, if the weather holds long enough for them to dry out.

With the peppers, I decided to go ahead and pick most of the Dragonfly peppers, as well as quite a few Purple Beauties. There’s a couple of Sweet Chocolates in there, too, though one of them turned out to be mostly green on the side I couldn’t see very well.

There were several peppers that are getting very yellow, but still not quite ready to pick. As for the variety that is supposed to be more or an orangey-yellow, they are all completely green, still.

Later today, when things are warmer and drier, I will head back to the garden and harvest yellow onions. Almost all of them had their necks bent down quite a while ago – most by cats, but some by the weight of the tomato vines they were planted around. No sense in leaving them to get mushy in the ground. I’m not entirely sure where I will lay them out to cure in the sun, though, since our picnic table is no longer useable, and the old market tent’s frame is broken.

I think I’m going to have to pick up another Walmart cheapie canopy tent. We’ll just have to make sure not to set it up where any trees can fall on it!

With the chill of the night, there were no Forme de Couer or Black Cherry tomatoes to pick today. I’m really hoping the upcoming warm weather stays for a while. We don’t have a lot of cat free space we can use to lay out green tomatoes to ripen! Another reason why getting another canopy tent would be useful.

And another picnic table. Probably a basic kit we can assemble ourselves, then paint.

When we get to building the outdoor kitchen we’re planning, that would be a good place to include areas where we can set out or hang produce to cure before they go to the root cellar. With the cooking surfaces we have in mind, we could even do large batch canning if we wanted.

All in good time!

For now, I’m just happy with a colander full of peppers and a handful of beans!

The Re-Farmer

[addendum: you know, if I followed the feedback suggestions on WP’s AI Assistant, my blog posts would be insanely long and even more verbose than I normally am! 😂😂]