Nettles, Dock - and the Placebo Effect!

Stinging nettle - the culprit!

While pulling up the finished snow pea vines, I accidentally brushed my hand against a nettle plant.  I knew the plant was there, but forgot to remind myself!  And did it hurt!  Having been taught from an early age that the dock plant always grew near nettles and that the dock leaf rubbed on the sting would neutralize it, I immediately started hunting through the garden for some dock plants.

Young weed growing in the garden

Grabbing what I thought was a young dock plant, I rubbed it vigorously over the sting and got almost instant relief.  Thinking about it afterwards, I thought, "That wasn't a dock plant - it was plantain!"  So why did it relive the sting?

Dock plant

Run to the Internet! And there I discovered that perhaps there's nothing in the old wives' tale!  Rubbing the leaf of just about any plant will do the same thing.  The plantain leaf was cool and moist - that bed having just been watered.  The coolness and moisture from the leaf may have diluted the stinging agent in the nettles and rubbing may have spread it further.  Whatever!  It worked, which is a good thing!  Nettles and dock usually grow in moist areas and other than my raised beds, there are no moist areas in my garden these days.  I certainly wasn't going to run down to the irrigation pond to find some true dock!

Maybe next time I discover a nettle plant in my garden, I'll remove it so that I don't have to test any more old wives' tales.

Ice Pack Sleeve - A Clever Idea

Okay - this is a gardening blog and this is not a gardening post, but it's such a clever idea I had to write it up anyway!

Our local Volunteer Fire Department and First Responders sent out a call for someone with a sewing machine to stitch 2 seams on face cloths to make sleeves for ice packs.  They didn't care about thread colour, just something to hold an ice pack.  They also said that when they hand them out, they never see them again, so something quick and dirty was needed.  Having recently gotten back into sewing, of course I volunteered!

Our Fire Chief delivered 2 dozen new face cloths to my doorstep and I was set.  I'm lucky enough to have a serger and that makes sewing a pleasure, trimming the seam and binding the edges.

I folded a face cloth inside out and serged the bottom and sides together.  This gave me the sleeve inside out.

I went ahead and stitched the rest of them - assembly line style - and left them to do the finishing when I'd finished the serging.

Then I snipped off most of the tail which would be on the inside bottom of the sleeve and took the tail on the top of the sleeve back into the stitching line with a big needle.

The sleeve was then turned so the stitching seams were on the inside and the ice pack slipped in to make sure it fit.

In 2 short sessions (this was hard work for the serger if not for me!) all 24 were done and ready to be shipped out!

I wish I'd thought of this idea - it's such a simple one.  Face cloths can be picked up very cheaply at thrift stores and can also be found on sales tables in department stores.  You don't need a serger as any sewing machine can sew a simple seam.  And now that I think of it, perhaps this belongs in a gardening blog after all.  I can slap one on sore muscles next time I overdo it!

June in the Garden

It's been a very dry growing season so far.  Since the end of April we have had precisely 7.4 mm of precipitation.  As I noted in July 2013, I now water mostly by hand.  I used to have watering systems in place, but since our garden water comes from an irrigation pond, as the season rolls along, weed grows in the pond and chokes up the nozzles of the watering system.  Plus, I really enjoy watering by hand.  I know exactly which plants need water and it allows me to keep a watchful eye on the garden.  And it's relaxing!

Salvia Forkoahcei next to cattail rushes - it's tall!

Today while watering I was struck by a plant at the end of the pond.  Salvia Forkoahcei came from seed I purchased through Salt Spring Seeds a number of years ago.  It's a rare perennial that gets really large - almost shrublike - and has tall spikes of blue-purple flowers.  This particular bed has received no water other than the above-mentioned rain water and yet it's doing extremely well in very dry soil.  One reference I found mentioned that deer didn't like it.  It has sown little plants elsewhere and I can see that this might be a valuable plant to have in the garden!

Another view of the pond

The vegetables are the only plants that get watered in our yard, and because we are blessed with a big irrigation pond, they are well looked after.  And in the warm spring we've had, everything is doing well and ahead of where they usually are.

The bean arbour with corn in front of it.  Basil in pots

The beans are scrambling up their new arbour and the corn is growing by leaps and bounds.

Suyo Cucumber and Patty Pan Squash

In one of the 4x4 concrete raised beds I planted a Suyo Cucumber and a Patty Pan Squash.  I put a bit of fencing behind the cucumber for it to climb on.  You apparently get straighter cucumbers this way and the cucumber is definitely doing its part to scramble up the fence.

Gold Nugget Tomato truss

All of the tomato plants have fruit on them.  Gold Nugget is always the earliest to ripen in my garden,  and it won't be long until we can help ourselves to delicious sweet little tomatoes.

The celery is doing well.  I'm making sure it gets lots of water so that the stalks don't become hollow. I imagine lack of water would affect the flavour as well as the texture.

We could sure use more rain and none is in the forecast.  In the meantime, I'll keep watering by hand, observing the garden and thoroughly enjoying myself!

Blanching Snow Peas For Freezing

The snow peas are in full production right now.  Each day I can go out and pick, coming back with more than we can eat in a week.  It's time to start putting snow peas in the freezer!

Most vegetables being frozen must be blanched.  This stops the enzyme activity that causes vegetables to decay.  Freezing doesn't stop this process and if you don't blanch, you could get off flavours, colours or texture.  Luckily it's a really easy process and the basket of snow peas I had ready didn't even take half an hour from start to finish.

A big pot of water was boiling on the stove.  The snow peas had already been topped and tailed.  Ready to go!

Since I want to keep the water boiling, I only do a few handfuls at a time and just keep them in the boiling water until they turn bright green - it only takes a minute or two for snow peas.

Then I scoop them out into a colander under running cold water until they are no longer hot.  This stops the cooking process.

Once drained, I put meal-sized portions in zip lock snack bags.  The bags are put on a tray in a single layer and frozen.  Tomorrow I'll put the bags in one big zip lock bag - or vacuum seal them in a big bag.  Today's production provided 14 little baggies of delicious snow peas which I can steam for a minute or two for dinner, or add at the last minute to a soup or stir fry.  It's a great feeling when you see the freezer starting to fill up with homemade produce!

Bean Supports

I prefer to grow pole beans.  They take up much less room than bush beans and are so much easier to pick.  I've tried a number of support systems - single poles, tripods, etc.  A few years ago, I asked my husband to make me a portable rack that would fit across our concrete raised beds that could be moved from bed to bed each year.  It worked out very well - except for the fact that he made it 8' tall - who can pick beans that high without a ladder?

Friends have one of their vegetable beds in a big circle.  Wire fencing is formed into a spiral and they grow squash, tomatoes, garlic, onions and beans in it.  It's beautiful and functional.  The beans grow up the fencing and are encouraged to cross from fencing top to fencing top - it makes picking pretty easy!  That gave me the idea to try something similar in my garden.

Obviously I can't do the spiral gardening thing as my beds are already in place and are permanent.  But I could set up framework to make a sort of arbour which could be taken apart at the end of the season and could travel across a couple of beds.  It was worth trying!

The new bean arbour spanning 2 beds.

Yesterday, my husband made up 3 wooden rectangular frames 4' wide and 4' high.  We set them up on the south side of one bed and both sides of the bed next to it.  I had already planted beans earlier in anticipation of the plan.  Next we took the 8' frame from the portable bean rack and set it on top.  Naturally it was a lot more complicated than these few sentences make it sound!

Beans now on bamboo poles - I will guide them to the chicken wire when they get bigger.

Today I stapled chicken wire to the 3 support rectangles of the bean arbour.  As the bean plants get taller, I'll guide them to the wire so they clamber up the sides onto the top.  As the plants will be about 6' above the ground, it should be pretty easy to pick beans.  In theory, anyway!  I guess we'll see.

Tomato Experiment Update:

The plant on the left is the experimental plant.  Much bigger than the one on the right!

About a month ago now, I planted one tomato outside under a plastic cloche.  A couple of weeks later, I planted out the rest of the tomatoes.  I made sure that a plant that had been the same size as the experimental plant was situated right beside it.  My thought was that the plant kept longer in the potting shed would be healthier and more advanced.  It does have more flowers but the first tomato is much bigger and healthier looking.  I sure got that one wrong!