The Seeds Are Here!

Seeds for the 2014 Garden

So that must mean that spring is fast approaching.  At least I'll tell myself that.  It's the end of January and there's still a lot of winter left.

I ordered seeds from T & T Seeds this year as they carry Health Kick Tomatoes.  I ordered 2 packages of them in case they're hard to find next year.  In addition, I'm trying out another paste tomato, Classica.  Just to finish off, I ordered a package of Pink Swirl Impatiens from the Super Elfin series.  Every garden needs some flowers and these will be great in pots around the pond.

The West Coast Seeds order is, of course, the big one and they had everything I asked for:

Beets - Cylindra
Carrots - Royal Cantenay and Scarlet Nantes
Corn - Bodacious
Kale - Improved Siberian & Redbor
Leeks - Bandit
Lettuce - Drunken Woman (!), Red Sails and Simpson Elite
Onions - Copra
Peas - Oregon Sugar Pod 2
Squash - Waltham Butternut
Swiss Chard - Silverado and Bright Lights
Tomato - Principe Borghese and Sweet Million

So now the planning begins!  Today I turned over another bed and mulched the garlic which is well up.  We checked out the Three Sisters bed which is on its last legs.  We'll be able to get one more year out of it and next year it will be replaced with one long bed which will be at least 4' wide.  I also checked out the bed that has cedar roots creeping in through a crack and sure enough, there are lots!  That bed will have to be dealt with next.  Then I need to sit down and decide what will go where.  Crop rotation is important and root crops need to be followed by non-root crops.  One of the new 4x4 beds will be for potatoes - just enough to satisfy the craving for those delicious new baby potatoes!

Plans!  The bed which is growing garlic will also host some early spring planting and I'm going to try getting some lettuce going now.  I'll start it in the house and once it's up, transplant it to pots in the potting shed.  When they're strong enough, they'll be planted in the garlic bed and protected with hot caps.

In February - that's next week! - I'll start kale, leeks and onions.  Near the end of the month, I'll get the tomatoes started.  I won't grow as many as last year, but concentrate on cherries and romas.  This year I'm determined to get several batches of salsa to go with the pasta sauces.  I also want to grow some on the deck and bought some really big pots from Lee Valley last fall along with special grids to go under them to protect the deck.  They'll grow cherries tomatoes and basil.

This is the really exciting time for gardeners - planning!  Soon enough will come the hard work.

It's Spring in January

Today my mind is finally turning to the garden.  I've been studiously ignoring it all winter even though I know there are so many unfinished projects out there waiting for me.  We have had a little winter cold this year, but all in all, it's been pretty mild.  Only one snowfall which quickly disappeared.  There will be more - it's only January!  But this is what we come to expect on the West Coast - and in particular in the Gulf Islands.

Today I ordered my seeds from West Coast Seeds and T & T Seeds.  The latter was on my list because it was where I finally located Health Kick Tomato seeds.  My plea to West Coast Seeds went unrewarded!  That done, it was time to hit the garden.

I finally got the raspberries pruned and in shape.  They look very vigorous and this year I cut them about 5' tall.  Hopefully this will help to keep them in bounds.  As I headed up to the garden to dispose of the old canes I noticed that Abraham Darby (rose) is looking very fine!  He obviously is flourishing in his new home.  This rose has lost no leaves during the winter and there are even a few buds in evidence.  Then I saw how the King Edward Currant is breaking bud.  It was time to take a "spring signs tour"!

King Edward Currant buds getting ready to open

There are some plants I expect flowers from during the winter, so I grabbed my camera to take the census.

Viburnum flowers for the Anna's Hummingbirds we see in winter.

One of our viburnums (we have several varieties) starts blooming in November.  By January, it's starting to really show off its pink blossoms.

Purple Helebore

Then there's the purple hellebore that a neighbour gave me many years ago.  I planted it down below the house at the edge of the woods where it often gets forgotten.  It certainly never gets watered - or even weeded - but it seems to thrive down there and thrusts up its blossoms every year.  At this time of January, it's just getting going.

Hazelnut Catkins

We have 4 hazelnut bushes and the 2 older ones are dripping with catkins.  The 2 small ones are too young to have catkins yet, but they have a delicious secret hidden in their roots.  They've been inoculated with perigord truffle spores!  We can expect truffles in a couple of years.  When I edited the picture of the catkins (above) I notice you could make out the tiny dark pink flowers.  Look really hard - they're not easy to see!  Click on the picture to make it bigger, look where the catkin joins the branch and you'll see the flower.

Oriental Poppy

Oriental poppies are also sending up leaves at this time of the year.  This particular poppy is a pale pink one - name unknown.

Flat-leafed Italian Parsley Seedling

I've been picking herbs throughout the winter and the Italian parsley I planted a number of years ago freely sends its seeds out to create new plants.  It casts so many that I'm always pulling up plants but there are always more to help out the kitchen.

Bright Lights Swiss Chard

Tour finished, I picked a bouquet of Bright Lights Swiss Chard for tonight's dinner and headed in for a cup of tea.