garden

Our 2025 Garden: potting up, and protective covering

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Okay, we got some useful garden things done!

First up, the transplants.

In the first image, you can see the seedlings that need potting up. They all should be much bigger than this, but it’s just not warm enough, even with using the heater and the heating pad, in the basement.

With concerns about the outside cats potentially knocking the transplants over when we moved them out, I decided to use some storage bins to hold the Red Solo cups I was going to re-use to pot up into. They’ve been stored in the sun room all winter, so they had to get a cleaning of cob webs and whatever other debris managed to get on them. Thankfully, the old basement is where the laundry used to be, so we still have the old laundry sink that I could soak them all in, then scrub the ones with drainage holes in the bottom to transplant into. I also pre-soaked the seed starting mix with hot water, so it still be at least not cold, by the time the cups were filled and the seedlings transplanted.

These bins hold only 9 cups in them, so that basically became my default for the maximum number of transplants to pot up into. Which worked out really well. With the Black Beauty tomatoes, there were only 4 large and strong enough to pot up. With the Chocolate Cherry, there was only 5 to pot up, so they got to share a bin. The Spoon tomatoes and the Sub Arctic Plenty both filled one bin each. The Sweetie Snack Mix peppers and the Turkish Orange eggplant both got one bin each, too, with almost zero “extras” that didn’t get transplanted.

In the second photo, you can see them after they were all potted up, before I topped them with vermiculite. The potted up seedlings are small enough that I could use the lids on the bins, but I had only 2 of them handy at the time. The next photo is after the vermiculite was added. Then I got more lids for the bins from the sun room and my daughter helped me get them out of the basement. Which was actually quite dangerous. We started with me taking them through the old basement and up the stairs to where my daughter was waiting at the door, one bin at a time. She would grab the bin at the door (keeping the cats from dashing downstairs) and take it to the old kitchen, while I went to get the next bin.

The old basement stairs are narrow; each step is about half the width of a typical step. It is also steep than most stairs are, and there is very little space at the door. Which means I could only go to the third step from the top before I ran out of space. Even going sideways and carrying the bin on one arm, I couldn’t reach the door knob, so having my daughter open the door was an essential. Once she had the bin, I could go higher and close the door, but just going up and down these stairs is simply not good. I go down them backwards, like on board ship or using a ladder.

After a few bins, my daughter kicked me out of the basement and we traded places. Apparently, I sounded like I was in a lot of pain. Which I was, but I wasn’t going to say anything, since I know it’s not any better for her!

In the last picture, you can see all the bins and trays now set up on the freezer in the old kitchen. I was so tempted to put them into the portable greenhouse. The thermostat in there was reading more than 40C/104F! Pretty impressive, considering we never got above 4 or 5C today (39 or 41F). And that wind!! Yikes! The problem is that we’d just have to take them back inside after a couple of hours, and I didn’t want to do that today. We’re still forecast to have -6C/21F tonight, though we’re not expected to reach those temperatures until 6am tomorrow, and I know it will drop below freezing inside the greenhouse, even with the heat sink. They will go into the greenhouse tomorrow, after I get back from running around.

Once that was done, I grabbed a late lunch, then headed to the post office to pick up a parcel. On the way back, my cell phone started ringing. I don’t have hands free, so I couldn’t answer it. When I got home, I found a message from the home care coordinator asking about something strange my mother had told the morning home care aid about her puffer, and having already taken it in the hospital.

???

I called back and left a message telling her as much as I knew, then called my mother. I hadn’t gotten through to her this morning about her telephone doctor’s appointment tomorrow morning, so I told her about that, first. She wasn’t impressed that it was in the morning, but it’s at about the time she gets her morning meds, so she’ll be up, anyhow – and I intend to be there, too. I then asked her about the puffer. She told me a completely different thing from what the apparently told the home care aid. She also seems confused about the type of puffer they used with her while she was in the hospital, and the original type she was using before then – which she has started using now. She had an unopened refill from before she went to the hospital, and the other type was done, so she started taking it on her own. I have no idea where she had it stashed away. Then I found out she’d already taken it three times today. I told her, she’s only supposed to take it once in the morning, then again before bed. Not several times throughout the day. Plus, we already talked to her doctor about it. This was an experiment to see if it would help with her breathing at night. It didn’t, and she turned out to be developing pulmonary edema, which she no longer has after being in the hospital for a couple of weeks.

Things were still confused, but we agreed we would talk about it when I’m there tomorrow, and she could show me what she had. I then called the home care coordinator back and got her right away. We talked for a while and confirmed my mother told different things to them than what she told me. I then found out they were giving her two puffs in the morning, but not in the evening (with the disc type of puffer, a dose is one puff, while the other puffer, a dose is two puffs, which is why the pharmacist and I decided to fill the prescription for the disc type). So there’s a mix up right there, too. Not that the puffer has been helping her in any way, but a neighbour of hers has asthma, so she decided she needed a puffer, too, and the doctor was willing to test it out with her rather than go through the years it would take to refer her to a specialist and get all the respiratory testing done.

Hopefully, we will get that straightened out tomorrow.

After I was done on the phone, it was time to get out and see what I could do to protect the winter sown raised bed.

I have a cover for the bed, but it needed some maintenance work first, so I brought it closer to the garage, where my tools where. One of the things that needed to be done was secure two sections of the mesh. The jute twine it had been tied together with before had degraded and broken apart. I’d already had to replace the twin in the other join and used paracord for that, so I did the same thing again.

The hoops supporting the mesh are sections of pipe that turned out to be rather too strong. They are held in place with strips of metal strapping, but would get pushed downwards – usually because of a cat jumping on it! So I wanted to get those nice and snug, then screw them into place.

I had helpers.

Syndol and Judgement decided the mesh was a night place to sit!

After the hoops were secured, I brought the cover over to the raised bed, but had to get a daughter to help with the rest, because of the wind. We got the cover on the bed, then opened one of the 8’x12′ plastic I’d picked up to cover it.

It was a lot thinner than I expected. Definitely not 7mm, which is what the guy looking up the information for me said it was. I suspect he didn’t quite understand what I was asking for.

Still, it will work for now.

We made sure to water the bed before putting the cover on (and I had to fix yet another hole dug into it). I noticed there are more sprouts coming up, so getting it covered to protect it from tonight’s cold will be a good thing!

After unfolding the plastic, we rolled and tucked the excess under the frame as best we could, but that wind was still threatening to blow it off. After looking around, I found a couple of sticked I’d joined with twine threaded through sections of a hula hoop to create a support for ground cherries flattened by the wind, a couple of years ago. That did well to drape across the top of the cover. We also found some lighter old boards to set on top as well; you can see the end result in the last photo above. Hopefully, it will be enough, but with how strong the winds are, I’m not entirely sure!

If it does hold out, it will protect the sprouts from tonight’s cold – and I plan to leave it on to also protect the bed from the cats! When it’s less windy, I’ll see if I can find a better way to secure the plastic, too. It’s meant to be temporary, though, so we’ll see. When the plastic is no longer needed, I have to find a way to close up the ends of the cover, so it can still be used to keep the cats out.

Since the coldest time of the night will be around the time I’ll be feeding the outside cats before heading to my mother’s, and then I’ll have to hit our own pharmacy in a different town when I’m done there, I’ll have to get my daughters to keep an eye on things and, when it starts warming up, move the transplants into the portable greenhouse. We’ll probably need to leave the door tied at least partly open so it doesn’t get too hot in there. Tomorrow’s high is supposed to be only 9C/48F, but if it could get as hot as it did in there at our current temperatures, it’ll get even warmer tomorrow. By the weekend, we’re expected to get highs above 20C/68F. Hopefully, before then, we’ll be able to get more progress on the trellis build. We’ll also have our Costco stock up trip in a couple of days.

Things are going to be busy over the next while!

The Re-Farmer

Our 2025 Garden: potting up and wind damage

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Well, our plans to set netting over the beds I prepared yesterday got kiboshed. It was just too windy!

We did get some other stuff done, though.

Today, my daughter was available to help pot up some more pre-germinated seeds.

We got 4 of the 5 Cream of Saskatchewan watermelon seeds potted up, as well as a couple of Honeydew. There were still 2 Honeydew seeds, and the Kaho melon seeds, that were not germinated, so we ended up combining them into one tray. I’d gotten rid of the one Cream of Saskatchewan watermelon seed that didn’t germinate, as it seemed like it was not viable, but the remaining Honeydew seeds look like they might still germinate. I’m not sure about the Kaho seeds, though. They may simply be too old.

With the pre-germinated seeds potted up, there wasn’t room in the tray for the container with the remaining seeds, plus the container with the Zucca melon seeds, so they got stacked. The large Zucca melon seeds would need longer to germinated, but it does seem like it’s taking too long. I’m not sure we’ll get any at all this year. We shall see.

My daughter and I then went through some of my herb seeds to figure out what else we could be starting inside. In the end, I decided that I will buy transplants, instead, for the ones we want. I also seem to be missing some seed packets! I’ve no idea what happened to them.

We also talked about some of the flower seeds. I’d picked up some Baby’s Breath for my daughters, as my older daughter in particular really likes them. They looked them up and, apparently, they are considered invasive in our area. Which I find strange, since we already have some in a small flower garden where my mother had planted them, ages ago. They barely survive and are certainly not spreading! It’s part of the reason I got more seeds.

Once we were done, my daughter ended up staying in the basement for a while longer to use the exercise bike, so we could keep the heater on for longer. Later, we both headed outside to feed the cats, then go through the garden beds. I wanted to make sure she was on top of the plans I had, in case they had to take over for me for some reason.

She was very happy to see that her tulips are coming up, and we even spotted a few grape hyacinths emerging. No sign of the snow crocuses, though. We pulled back the black tarp to check out where I was thinking of planting the asparagus and strawberries, and it does look like the weeds and crab grass have been killed off well enough to use the space. The only issue will be the roots from the nearby elm trees, and I’m really hoping we can finally cut those down this year. In trying to clean the area up, I found stumps that showed others have tried to clear them away in the past, and they grew back, so I’ll have to take that into account when we finally get those taken down. It still blows me away, how much their roots have been getting into the garden beds and choking things out.

We checked on the beds that I want to cover with the netting, and had to refill more holes dug by the cats. Very frustrating, that we couldn’t cover them because of the wind.

Speaking of the wind, in the next photo of the slide show above, you can see an area in our spruce grove I was finally able to get to. I tell that we lost a few trees over the winter, and saw some that look like they came down within the past day or two. Cleaning up in there is going to be a huge job!

We checked on the netting I put over the bed at the chain link fence yesterday. Much to my surprise, one of the supports at an overlapping section had been completely pulled up and almost took a few others with it! It seems like the extra netting with the drawstring that would normally be the end of the row cover got caught somehow. Hopefully, that won’t happen again, and there was no damage.

The portable greenhouse was getting some wind damage, though.

In the last photo in the slideshow above, you can see the tear along the zipper. It has gotten bigger – big enough that cats could easily fit through, if they wanted. I’m not sure how to reattach it to the zipper. I did add some clear duct tape above the tear, in hopes it will prevent it from tearing more. We also found a tear in one corner where the tie downs are attached. The loop of fabric the cord was tied to actually tore loose from the plastic. The loop is part of a tie that is fastened to the frame itself on the inside, so it can’t go very far. The clear duct tape came in handy to cover the hole and, hopefully, prevent it from getting worse. I know the covers on these little greenhouses don’t last long, but we don’t even have any plants in it yet! High winds were why I’d hoped to set it up in a corner closer to the house, but the ground is just too uneven there.

I’ve been looking at 6mm greenhouse plastic online. What I’d really like to do is get a roll of it, but that’s well out of budget right now.

I keep looking at various notifications on my weather apps, telling me things like, light rain coming soon, or, rain will end soon. The problem is, we’ve had NO rain at all. According to the weather radar, we’ve got a system right on top of us, and we’re supposed to get rain for the next couple of hours, yet I’m not seeing a drop of rain out my window. At this rate, I’m going to have to hook up the hoses and start watering the winter sown beds! I might even have to fill the rain barrel I’ve set up with the hose, to have warmer water for the garden beds, because we sure aren’t getting any rain to fill it! Nor are we expecting any, for weeks.

Tomorrow is supposed to be a cooler day than today, though with the wind, today felt downright chilly. I’m really hoping the wind dies down, so we can get those nets set up. Given my pain levels today, it’s probably good I’ve got an enforced day of rest.

My husband, sweetheart that he is, ordered some Tai Fu lotion (not an affiliate link), that came in today. We’ve used this stuff, in balm form, in the past and it helped, but we were a lot less broken back then. I’m looking forward to trying it when I go to bed tonight. I hope it helps. Lord knows, the prescription stuff I tried a few years ago didn’t do much, and I’m hurting a lot more these days, then at that time. Between the lotion, and today’s enforced rest, I’m hoping to be able to get some work done tomorrow!

We shall see.

The Re-Farmer

Our 2025 Garden: new acquisitions, potting up and protecting the garden beds

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While I was waiting for the clinic to call about the cats, I was able to find a bunch of things for the garden.

While at the Canadian Tire, I just couldn’t resist.

I picked up some bare root strawberries, and asparagus crowns.

The asparagus that was have now, which has been drowned out for the past couple of years, is a purple variety, so I grabbed a package of Purple Passion to basically replace them. They had a couple of varieties of green asparagus, and I chose Jersey Giant. Each package has 5 crowns in it.

We already have the Albion Everbearing strawberries that did so well last year, except for when the deer kept eating the greens. I got another everbearing variety – Ozark Beauty. I also want to try the White Carolina strawberries again. We tried them a few years ago, but not one of them survived.

I am thinking of planting these in a section of the main garden area that has been covered with a black tarp for a couple of years, now. We had grown squash and pumpkins in there, previously. I want to move the tarp to cover the rest of what used to be the squash patch. Hopefully, the asparagus will do better there. I’ll probably interplant them with the strawberries, too.

But not yet.

Something else I got but didn’t get a picture of were some 12′ (I think) lengths of tubing. They’re more flexible than the 5′ lengths I tried before. I plan to use one of them, cut in half, to make a netting support over the 4′ square Albion strawberry bed, so we don’t have to worry about them getting eaten by deer again! I might work on that tomorrow.

The first thing I did when I got home, though, was pot up some pre-germinated melon seeds. The four Sarah’s Choice seeds were ready to go!

I had just enough pre-moistened seed starter mix left to fill 4 cups to plant them in. The cups have drainage holes in them, and they and the other seeds are now in a tray over the heat mat. I took the old heat mat out completely. It was cold, and no longer working.

There are a few other seeds starting to germinate. Nothing with the Zucca melon. I expect to be planting more pre-germinated seeds in a couple of days. I want to give some of the seeds more time.

With the old heat mat removed and the new one shifted over, I also moved the tray with the seedlings over. There are still a few blank spots, but enough sprouts are up that it shouldn’t be on a heat mat anymore – but I do wish that old mat was still working though, because I think they would still do better with one.

That done, I headed outside again.

I’ve noticed that the cats have really been digging around in the winter sown garden bed at the chain link fence. While I was at the Dollarama today, I picked up some row covers that I hoped would work out.

This bed is narrow, so those metal supports would be fine for it. It was the mesh that was important. It’s open enough that the wind can blow through it – the mosquito netting we’ve been using gets turned into a sail rather quickly! – and rain can get through, but it’s fine enough to keep the Chinese Elm seeds from choking everything out, once those start to drop. Plus, the ends can be closed up, which will keep the cats out.

I wasn’t sure how many I would need to cover this garden bed, so I got 5, just in case. In the second photo, you can see some of the damage the cats have been doing.

Setting them up with the wire supports was a bit of a challenge! The wire is supposed to be run through evenly spaced pockets in the mesh. That was the first problem! The wire is thin enough to pass through the mesh. It was hard just to get it through the opening of the pockets! The other end, meanwhile, kept getting caught up in, and through, other sections of mesh.

The set came with a solution for threating the wires through the pockets, though I doubt it was intended as such. Each kit has a bundle of 5 supports. They are held together by fitting the ends into a white plastic cap, one for each bundle of ends. I used one of those caps on the end of a wire support and, as long as there was enough tension to keep the cap from falling off, the wire slid through quite easily. If the cap did fall off, it could be pushed back through the pocket to the wire.

It took a while to get the hand of it, though. The wires and the mesh kept wanting to get all tangled up with each other. Plus, every stick or twig or leaf on the ground seemed to automatically get caught in it! What I eventually figured out was to first make sure the netting was bunched up in the middle of the wire, then stab one of the ends into the ground next to my leg. At least a little bit. I was sitting in the shade, so while the ice and snow was melted away, the ground was more frozen than in other places. It was enough to keep the wire upright, though, and I could just add the next ones as they were done.

I set up the first two assembled kits at each end of the bed. The kits have a drawstring at each and to close them up, but I needed to overlap several of these to ensure no gaps. Once the ends of the beds were covered, I assembled two more kits to fill in the space. Once the ends were closed with the drawstring, those got set in place with ground staples. In one area, the two kits overlapped enough that they didn’t need anything else, but another join got secured with more ground staples.

I think this will work out very well for now. I could probably remove that mosquito netting entirely and use it somewhere else. If the winter sowing survived, this netting can stay until things start getting too tall for it. The mess easily slides up and down the wire supports, so it’ll be easy to reach under to weed.

The bed was incredibly dry, though, so I used the water from the heat sink in the portable greenhouse to water it, then refilled the container. With sort of defeats the purpose of the heat sink, but there are no plants in there to protect right now.

When it was time to refill the container, I also prepped something else I found in the Dollarama.

Coconut fibre bricks! It’s been years since I’ve seen these. I’ve got one of them in a bucket of water to expand until tomorrow. I plan to incorporate it into the soil that’s in the pots I’ll be using for the luffa inside the portable greenhouse. It will be a while before the luffa can be transplanted, I’ve got time to get those ready. With the coco fibre in there, it should help keep the soil fluffier, and hold moisture more evenly. I’ll save the second brick to amend soil in one of the garden beds, later.

The garden bed at the chain link fence is not the only ones the cats are damaging. After I finished refilling the heat sink in the greenhouse, plus the watering cans, I checked out the main garden area. The garlic bed and the summer squash bed have both been dug into. Some of the garlic was almost completely dug up! We’re going to have to cover them.

Tomorrow.

For now, though, they have the supports in place.

These are the parts and pieces from a gazebo tent that was broken when a piece of tree fell on it. I had a bunch of shorter pieces – all pieces that were broken in half – that I put around the garlic bed, as it won’t need a lot of height. The tent pieces all have holes in them that had screws or pins running through them, which are prefect for holding twin in place. I ran the twin through to make Xs across the bed, as well as straight across and the sides. I did the same with taller supports I put over the bed sown with summer squash.

We have a couple of types of netting that is large enough to fit over these. We’ve got black netting that is more open, but for that, we’ll have to put something on top of the support posts, so they won’t tear through. There’s also the mosquito netting I’ll be moving off the chain link fence. We have other netting, too, but they are for trellising, so the openings are large enough for a cat to fit through.

The roll of bale twine I used on this has been sitting in the sun room all winter, and the cats have been pulling out the middle and playing with it. By the time I got things untangled while threading it through the support posts, it was starting to get quite chilly out there! As I write this, our temperatures had dropped just below freezing. According to the short range forecast, though, we’re expecting overnight lows of -6C/21F. At those temperatures, we’ll want to put some sort of protection over the winter sown beds. Something more than netting! That’s the down side of having removed the mulch, so the ground could thaw out. I will probably spread some of the mulch back lightly over the beds again. The beds are even looking like they could use a good watering, too! We didn’t get a lot of snow this winter, so things are pretty dry right now, and there is no rain in the forecast for some time. What rain and snow we’ve had lately hasn’t been enough keep these beds from drying out.

Tomorrow, we’re looking at a high of 15C/59F. That will be a wonderful temperature to get things done outside!

As long as I don’t overdo it. I got chilled enough while working the twine through the supports, I still haven’t warmed up, even after a hot meal and a hot cup of tea! My entire body is stiffening up and starting to really ache.

Time to pain killer up and get to bed. Hopefully, the painkillers will be enough to let me get some sleep!

The Re-Farmer

Our 2025 Garden: temperatures, removing mulch and solarization

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Today was my day of rest, but I did get a few things done in the garden, since I won’t be home for most of the next two days.

The first thing I made sure to do was find a plastic to cover the end of the one bed where I’d run out.

I ended up using a dollar store shower curtain I’d got to potentially use around the eggplant and pepper bed last year, but ended up using the dining table protectors instead. That should help out with warming up the soil and, hopefully, kill off any Creeping Charlie and crab grass in there. I will probably use one of these two solarized beds to plant our potatoes.

I also removed most of the mulch from the wattle weave bed and had a pleasant surprise.

In the first image, you can see the wild strawberries (or whatever they are), which I was expecting. What I was NOT expecting, but hopeful for, you can see in the next image. That is thyme! It survived the winter!

In the next photo, you can see an overview of the long part of the bed. There’s a sort of lighter colour mass about half way down; those are the self seeded Chamomile. Hopefully, it dropped seeds and will come back again this year.

The very last photo is the thermometer in the covered bed. It looks cloudy because I took the photo through the plastic cover. It looks like it was about 18C/64F in there.

Looking around, I couldn’t see much of the green seedlings I uncovered while removing most of the mulch. I likely damaged them too much. There were a lot of seeds scattered in there, though, so I expect more to be coming up soon.

The temperature inside the portable greenhouse was a fair bit higher!

40C/104F! That would definitely start warming up the water in the heat sink I set up, though when I popped the cover off to check, it still seemed cold. That would be in comparison to the very warm temperatures I was standing in!

The next image, meanwhile, is a screen cap taken right after I got a photo of the thermometer, showing what the outside temperature was at. 5C/42F A 35 degree difference (Celsius)!

It should be interesting to see what the thermometer says in the morning, after the 0C/32F we’re supposed to drop to, tonight.

Oh, I also remembered to remove most of the mulch from the strawberry bed in the main garden area – and return the chicken wire over the top. It was quite frozen under there, and there’s no sign of the Albion Everbearing strawberries we have planted there.

The next time I should have time to do anything of note in the garden will be on Wednesday, and right now, the forecast for Wednesday is for a high of 14C/57F with a mix of sun and clouds. It should be a very good day to be working outside!

Meanwhile, I moved things around with the seed trays in the basement. I had the containers with pre-germinating seeds on top of the light fixture over the heat mat, but that light turns itself off, so what little heat it produces doesn’t last long. I thought I figured out how to reprogram the timer, but it seems to have not made any difference. It’s been a while, and there has been no sign of germination. They’re just too cold. So I ended up moving the trays with the chitting potatoes to the top shelf with the winter squash, under the shop light, then set up the second heat mat under aquarium light. So now the tray with the eggplants, peppers, tomatoes and luffa seeds is on one mat, and the three containers of melon seeds are on the other.

When I checked on them before shutting things down for the night, I was already seeing hints of radicals! They will be ready to be potted up by tomorrow or the day after!

Amazing how just a little bit of warmth makes such a huge difference!

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 2025 Garden: we have light!

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Yes!

Finally, I have replacement bulbs for the aquarium light fixture that has a built in timer. The package came in today’s mail.

I was a little alarmed when I saw it, though.

In the first image of the slideshow above, you can see a very distinct bend in the packaging!

Thankfully, in the next two images, you can see that the bulbs were well protected. The angled packaging the bulbs were taped into is very solid. In fact, I will be keeping it, as it will probably come in handy for something!

In the next photo, you can see the bulbs next to the fixture laying upside down on the table.

Not that there is a cover over the bulbs.

That was my first problem.

When we got the fixture, years ago, and assembled it, we were never able to get that cover completely on, so about a quarter inch of it was sticking past the end of the fixture, which you can see in the next photo.

Not a lot to grab on to, but it shouldn’t have needed any at all.

After removing the legs at that end, I fought with that thing for at least half an hour. I ran a utility knife blade between the cover and the tracks. I used WD40. I even found an angled tool that I used to try and lever it from the far end. Nothing worked.

I figured if I had some pliers or something to grip the bit sticking out, that might help. After looking around the basement, I found our old pair of vice grips.

Perfect!

I just needed to close the jaws more and…

…

…close the jaws…

…

…turn the adjustment screw to close the jaws…

(apply WD40 liberally)

Just turn that adjustment screw…

Nothing. It would not move.

Well, I’ve got a handy vice at the table. I’ll just get the vice to hold the adjustment screw and I should be able to spin the vice grips to tighten and loosen the jaws.

Yes. I put vice grips into a vice.

I made that vice as tight as I could. Tight enough that it was actually starting to damage the grip texture on the adjustment screw. I still ended up spinning the screw in the vice instead of the screw itself moving.

Okay, that wasn’t going to happen.

Well, if I found something thick enough, I could put that with the bit of cover sticking out and grip both. It just needed to be at least thick enough for the vice grips to close onto it. Maybe some wadded up paper towel.

Nope.

I tried a piece of leftover wood that almost worked. It was thick enough, but too wide for the vice grips to reach the bit of cover I was trying to grab.

More searching around the basement.

I ended up finding a small scrap of wood in the garbage can I have just for wood, sawdust and other burnables. It was uneven on one side, but that didn’t matter as much. I was finally able to grip the edge of the cover and pull on it.

It took several tries, getting it to move, little by little, before it finally came loose, and I could pull it out without the vice grips.

Once it was clear, I wiped it down along the edges, partly to get the excess WD40 off, but also to wipe off whatever was making it stick. There really wasn’t anything, so I used a utility knife in the track it slid into, to scrap what anything that might have been in there. There were two spots, one on each side, that seems to have something stuck in the track. One spot seemed to be plastic; when we got the fixture, the cover had a protective layer of plastic on it, and not all of it seems to have come off. The spot on the other side might have had some plastic in it, too, but there may also have been some mineral build up from when this was set above the big aquarium. The hinges on the glass covered broke, which is why we got a fixture with legs at each end, in the first place. The other one sat right on top of the glass covers.

So, that was finally off and the tracks cleared up.

I did not put it back on again.

Okay! The bulbs are uncovered. I just needed to rotate the bulbs to removed them.

Just… rotate those bulbs.

Rotate.

Is there a trick to this?

They simply would not rotate, and there was very little room to work with.

Looking closely at the connectors, I could see some black plastic that appeared to be some sort of lock? But how would I move those so the bulbs could be rotated?

I never did find out.

While fiddling with them at one end, I ended up breaking off one half of the black plastic.

At which point, I was able to rotate the bulb. The other end rotated fine; the black plastic rotated with the bulb. Which didn’t happen at the end I was working on.

Okay, that’s out, time to try the second one.

Once again, it would NOT rotate – until half the black plastic piece broke off!

After that, it rotated just fine.

*sigh*

No matter. I could now install the new bulbs. They fit just fine, and even rotated fairly easily into position.

*sigh*

Then I plugged it in to test it out.

I even remembered to flip the fixture onto its side, so I wouldn’t blind myself.

It worked!!! Yay!

It only took me almost an hour to do something that should only have taken a few minutes!

That finally done, I got it set up. I decided to take the other fixture out completely, and that’s now stored under the work table. The light with the new bulbs was set up, with bricks removed to make it lower. The shelve section I’d brought out earlier was set up over the whole thing. The tray with the winter squash was moved off the heat mat and is now under the shop light. That allowed me to remove one of the heat mats and center the tray with the eggplant, peppers, luffa and pre-germinating tomato seeds onto the other heat mat.

You can sort of see the new set up in the last photo. Instagram wouldn’t show the whole image, so the new light fixture looks like another surface over the seed pots.

This light fixture does put off some heat. When we were still allowing the cats in the living room while we had seeds started, we would sometimes see Fenrir, in particular, sitting on the light fixture, keeping warm. It isn’t much, but that will provide at least a bit of warmth to the winter squash tray above.

I had the heater running the entire time I was working on this, and it didn’t seem to make much difference to the room at all.

So that turned out to be a much bigger job than expected, but we now have more light for the seedlings.

If it weren’t for the temperature down there, the basement would actually be an excellent place to set up a plant room. Ah, well. We make do with what we can!

Meanwhile, I peaked at the tomato seeds, and I think I could actually see radical emerging on a couple of them! I’ll check again tonight, before I shut the lights down. If I really was seeing radicals, that would sure have been fast – they were set out to germinate only yesterday!

Not too shabby, that’s for sure!

The Re-Farmer

Our 2025 Garden: they’re aliiiivvvveeee!!!

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With the pre-germinated seeds potted up and the tray on top of a heat mat, I have been eager to see how long it would take for the seed leaves to break through.

Not long at all! It’s been only a week since the seeds were set up to pre-germinate, and here we are…

The Baked Potato squash have the most leaves emerged. There are some Mashed Potato squash pushing their way, or just visible, though the vermiculite. Even the Arikara squash is just visible through the vermiculate. Nothing visible on the Sunshine squash, yet. Nothing visible in the luffa, eggplant or peppers in the other tray, either.

Oh, and I checked the last luffa seed still in the pre-germination container. I gave it a squeeze, and it was hollow; just the shell left. So it’s 3 out of 4 seeds that successfully pre-germinated.

After taking the above picture, I pulled the winter squash tray out and rotated it on the heat mat, in case there were some warm and cold spots. The silver insulating material I put under it seems to be working; I could feel more warmth than when it was just the cardboard.

I have more of this insulating stuff left and was thinking of putting it around the drain pipe I was trying to clean out yesterday, in the general area where I think the gunk might be freezing. I know the bottleneck starts at about 6′ from the access point.

The problem is, for most of that area, access to the drain pipe is blocked by a heat duct and the frame built around the window on the inside, with a platform to hold a fan. It could be done, but I would definitely need someone else to give me a hand.

I’d also want to clean away the many years of dust, dirt and cobwebs first, too!

Though, now that I’ve looked at it, I am now doubting that ice could be the issue. There is that heat duct in the way. I would think any heat lost through the metal of the duct would be enough to keep things from freezing.

It wouldn’t hurt to have the pipe insulated in that section, though. I haven’t unrolled it, but there’s at least 6 feet of the insulating material left.

This stuff is turning out to be handy for all sorts of things, but insulating pipes is what the dimensions of this particular size of roll was designed for.

It seems to be doing well for keeping seed trays warm in a cold basement, too!

The Re-Farmer

Our 2025 Garden: pre-germination and preparing to pot up

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Well, it has stopped snowing – for now. We’re supposed to get a brief snowfall again later this evening.

I am so glad we got our first stock up shopping trip done yesterday. I got a call from home care saying there wasn’t anyone to do my mother’s med assist in the evening, due to unsafe road conditions. !!! The problem is, if the road conditions are too unsafe for the home care worker to drive to my mother’s town, it would be equally unsafe for me or my siblings to do it. After explaining the situation to the shift supervisor that called me, she said she would look into things can call me back. Thankfully, they were able to find a home care worker that didn’t have to drive into my mother’s town, and could juggle schedules so she could do my mother’s two evening med assists.

While waiting for her to call me back, I checked the road conditions, just to be sure. Our provincial government website for road conditions is notorious for not being up to date, so when I saw it listing our highway was “partially snow packed”, I checked a local highways group on FB. Some people had made the drive on the highway I’d be taking and things were certainly not very safe. Our gravel roads, of course, have not been plowed yet, but I did see cars driving past our place. The danger isn’t so much the snow, but that it’s snow on top of ice from our recent warm weather melting things all over.

So I was very, very happy and thankful when I got the call back saying they’d found a way to get my mother’s med assist done!

What better way to spend my time when it’s too snowy to do anything outside, besides shovel?

Work on garden stuff, of course.

With the basement being as cold as it is, I headed down to get the heater going and seeing what I could do to prepare for potting up the pre-germinated seeds. Premoistening the seed starter mix works great, but it has resulted in the mix being far colder than if it were dry. I set things up so that the heater was blowing right over my giant metal mixing bowl to help warm it up, along with the rest of the room. Then I checked on the seeds.

They are looking great! We have a near 100% germination rate!

In the first photo, we have the Sunshine squash. It’s hard to see on a couple of them, but yes, all four of them have radicals emerging. The other, with six seeds, are the Mashed Potato squash. It’s hard to see with some of them, but they have all germinated.

In the second photo, you can see that all three Arikara squash have germinated. The five seeds are the Baked Potato squash, also all germinated.

Next are the luffa, and so far, two of four have germinated. I would not be surprised if the last two also germinated by tomorrow.

In the last photo, I have a large-celled tray prepared and set up in front of the heater to pot all but the luffa into. That will leave three empty cells.

I might have to invest in another heat mat, though. That little heater can only do so much in such a big room! We don’t have any bigger heaters. The basements are not heated. The old basement is where the furnace is and it actually does get warmer. I considered setting up in there, but it doesn’t have enough outlets available to plug in a heat mat or grow lights.

For now, in the tray I’m using to hold the seed starts now, I made sure to add warm water to the base for the eggplants and peppers in peat cells. With the heat mat, the peat was drying out, which would draw moisture out of the seed starter mix, so I have to made sure those stay damp. The heat mat would also keep the water in the tray warm, which helps. The luffa will be potted up into individual peat pots, since they will be transplanted into large pots in the little portable greenhouse we got, while the winter squash will go into various garden beds. The luffa pots can go back to the tray the eggplant and peppers are in and will stay warm, but the second tray with the winter squash is going to need to be warmed up as well.

I should be able to get a second heat mat in town, but there’s no going anywhere today. Possibly tomorrow, if road conditions are improved. Otherwise, Sunday would be the earliest.

The seeds should be okay in their damp paper towels for now. Even if the first leaves start to emerge, they can be potted up. I just don’t want them to pot them up, only to get killed off by cold!

Well, we’ll see how it works out over the next couple of days.

The Re-Farmer

Our 2025… 2026? garden: Heritage Harvest seed order placed

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Okay, I did say, months ago, that we did not need to order seeds this year.

I also said that I knew I probably would order more, anyhow! 😄

I’ve placed two orders so far. One was with MI Gardener, and I just got the email notification that they have been shipped. I explain what I chose, and why, in this post. Most are “back up” seeds, in case our winter sowing experiment fails.

I also placed an order with Veseys, but this was more for the food forest. The seeds ordered were so that I could take advantage of a promo code to get free shipping. I explain what I ordered there, and why, in this post.

So, why am I ordering even more seeds?

I mean, besides the fact that I just want to… 😄

Well, this order is with Heritage Harvest Seeds. It’s actually been a couple of years since I’ve ordered from them. They are a small heirloom seed company that is even further north than we are, so as far as climate and growing season goes, I know anything I order from there should grow here.

Another reason is, more back up seeds!

This is what I ordered today. (all links should open in new tabs)

At the top of the list is Cream of Saskatchewan Watermelon. We tried growing these last year, and one one tiny little watermelon out of the only surviving transplant. I want to try them again, but this time give them more dedicated space, rather than having it share a bed with a whole bunch of melons. I do still have seeds left, but they are a couple of years old, so I want to have some fresh seed.

Next is the Arikara squash. This is a variety of winter squash I have been eye balling for years. I chose is specifically due to its rarity, with the goal of saving seeds. From the website description:

Originally grown by the Arikara Indians of North Dakota, This squash is oblong with pinkish orange skin and a green star on the blossom end. The Arikara Indians picked the blossoms and dried them for winter use. A very good storage squash that can be used for soup. (90 days to maturity) Extremely rare.

I may not grow these this year, as I have other winter squash we want to grow, and if I’m looking to save seeds, I don’t want to risk cross pollination. We shall see how things work out.

I also ordered more White Scallop Squash. We had issues growing them in containers last year – they simply did not germinate – but did finally get some in one of the garden beds. By then, it was so late in the season, I’m amazed we had any to harvest at all. The last of the seed went into the winter sown bed with all summer squash. These are back up seeds, in case none survived the winter.

In my MI Gardener order, I did order sugar snap peas. This time, however, I ordered Super sugar snap peas! 😄 From the website:

One of the sweetest and crunchiest snap peas available! The 3 inch pods are delicious eaten raw or cooked and are very productive. A favorite of all who try them! Tall vines to 6’ in height.

If we have the space, I’d like to try both varieties of sugar snap peas we’ll have this year. If we end up with space for only one variety, I’d like to try this one, first.

Last of all, I ordered two packets of Yukon Chief corn. Last year, we had two short season varieties to choose from. Yukon Chief and Orchard Baby. We did Yukon Chief first, due to it’s super short growing season. This year, we will be trying the Orchard Baby. Hopefully, if we can keep the racoons from eating them first, we’ll be able to save seed. We did really like the Yukon Chief, though, so I ordered two packets this time, for next year, and plan to save seed again.

One of the changes at Heritage Harvest is that they now have a $20 minimum order. We’ve never had problems with having our seeds shipped with regular mail, but apparently, others have. Solving the problem meant to have expedited mail with a tracking number, but the extra cost of that only makes sense with orders of at least $20. That brought our final cost to Cdn$36.50

Except it didn’t cost us anything. At least, not anything out of budget.

One of the payment methods is PayPal. This year, we actually got payment for ads on this blog (it took 3 years!), which was sent by PayPal in US dollars. It went into my personal PayPal account, and I left it there, so I used that to pay for this order. Which got converted to US$26.45 at the current exchange rate.

Which worked out quite well, I think.

So that’s what I got today; a combination of things to plant this year, and next year, and back up seeds, if the winter sowing didn’t work.

I have to admit, I had to mightily resist ordering more. They have the Tropeana Lunga onions that grew so well for us when we tried them a few years ago. I was also tempted by the Amish Bottle Onion, simply because of its rarity (and the shape, which I find easier to cut when cooking). I even seriously considered the Yellow of Parma onion, for its excellent storage and up to 1 pound size. We have so many of our own onions seeds, though – as well as seed producing onions – that we may never need to buy onion seeds again. I also want to try the Red Mangel, though that would for a time when we have animals, to grow as feed. There are just so many things I want to try!

This will do for now, though. We have more than enough seeds for this year, and years to come!

We just need to keep expanding the garden beds for now, and grow what we can in the beds we have available now.

We’re slowly getting there!

The Re-Farmer

Our 2025 Garden: Vesey’s order for the food forest

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Okay, after going through their website more, I made some decisions and placed an order at Vesey’s. It was mostly for our future food forest, but I did order a couple of seed packets so I could take advantage of a promo code for free shipping.

As I was preparing to write this post, however, I got a phone call.

From home care.

Guess who has to go to my mother’s again this evening, to do her med assist?

Two nights in a row. Apparently, someone just called in sick.

My mom is going to be furious.

*sigh*

I will just have to deal with that, later.

Meanwhile, here is what I ordered today. (Links will open in new tabs)

These were the one thing we absolutely wanted to get this year. The Opal Plum tree. The description from the website:

Prunus spp. Opal stands alone as the hardiest European type Plum available on the market. It is vigorous, productive and self-fertile. Even in short summer seasons, the fruit will reliably ripen. The plums are round, red-purple with a golden flesh and have a complex and sweet flavour, fresh or dried. Hardy to zone 3. We ship 18″ trees

The key points were that it is self fertile, so we don’t have to plant it next to our dying wild-type plums, but can plant it in the section we’ve designated for a food forest. It’s hardy to our zone, so we don’t have to do like we did with our zone 4 Liberty apple, and tuck it into a sheltered area. (Hopefully, it survived the polar vortexes we got this winter!)

I decided to also order some more haskaps. We already have three, but they have not been doing well at all. While I should probably transplant them, I’ve decided to get a couple more that will be planted in the food forest area, this time.

This first one is the Aurora Pollinator variety.

The second is Boreal Blizzard, an early producing and largest fruit variety.

We currently have “Mr” and “Mrs” haskap varieties, where are sold as cross-pollinating varieties. The “Mr” is an Aurora, and seems to bloom too early to pollinate the “Mrs.” variety, so I am hoping that the early Boreal Blizzard variety will work out better.

If these haskap do well, that will confirm that the ones we have now are not producing because they are in a bad location. Which I am 99% sure of, but it really is a good location – for us!

To use the free shipping promo code, I needed to have at least one packet of seeds.

I had been looking at these last night, while planning my order, but they were listed as sold out. This morning, they were back in stock! So I snagged them.

This is the Sweetie Snack Mix of small sized peppers. They have a short growing season, too, so they should work out. I think my family might like them better than the larger bell peppers we’ve been trying so far.

Last of all, I got some flowers for the girls. 😄 The Jet Black Hollyhock. These are pollinator attracting biannuals and should be self seeding, so we will plan out where to sow them with that in mind!

There we have it. Another order in for our 2025 garden, and our food forest.

The grand total for this, after tax, came to $137.08, however we will only be billed for the seeds when they get shipped in the next day or two. The sapling and haskap plugs will be shipped closer to our last frost date of June 2, and we will be billed for those, then.

The flower seeds were not that expensive, but that packet of mini peppers cost $8.75, with only about 20 seeds in the pack. That’s almost 44¢ per seed!

Still cheaper than buying them at the grocery store, but what a huge leap in prices for vegetable seeds! During the illegal lockdowns, with people panic buying and prices going up and up and up, so many people decided to try growing their own food, a lot of seed suppliers were completely sold out. They are still recovering from that. I know some smaller Canadian seed growers had to back out of the consumer market completely and only sell commercially in bulk. Add to this, in the years since, more people are trying to grow their own food because the grocery prices have gotten so high. That increased demand puts a major stress on supplies, too. Which is why I’m seeing the cost of vegetable seeds skyrocketing, while the number of seeds in the packets are going down, but not with flower seeds. I haven’t been looking at herb seeds lately, so I don’t know how they are doing for pricing.

With this order in, the next thing we’ll need to decide on is what variety of potatoes we want to grow and where. Anything beyond that is just gravy.

Or back ups if the winter sowing fails!

The Re-Farmer