In Transition

I haven't written in a while - partly because life has kept us busy - but mostly because we have decided that it was time to move.  After dealing with my Father's estate my husband and I realized we didn't want to leave our children with the problems associated with sorting out and selling a property that required ferry trips.  We would also like to downsize the amount of land we have to upkeep.  Moving seemed like the obvious answer.  And we wanted to make the move while we were still healthy and strong enough to organize our own move.

Coral bark maple and King Edward currant

This has not been an easy decision.  We are very happy here.  It's a private, secure oasis in a busy world that is increasingly unsafe.  We put our property on the market with the thought that it might take some time to sell - and that would be fine with us.  Therefore, the garden must go on.

Our priorities for a move will sound strange to many people.  My husband needs somewhere for his woodworking tools - somewhere big!  I need a level, sun-filled yard for my vegetables with no near-by cedar trees.  Oh, yes!  And a house!

I have already started a number of seeds under lights in the house - Copra onions and Bandit leeks - and they have been moved out to the unheated potting shed to join lettuce - Black Seeded Simpson, Drunken Woman and Red Sails, Kale - Improved Siberian and Lacinato, and Santee sprouting broccoli.  I also started my tomato and pepper seeds.

In the tomato line this year I'm growing my Health Kick plus a variety of cherry tomatoes - Yellow Pear is new at my house but comes with high recommendations,  Principe Borghese, Sweet Millions and Gold Nugget.  Unfortunately, in my haste to get the tomatoes planted, I double planted the Sweet Millions and Gold Nugget seeds!  However, once they get growing I know I won't have any trouble telling them apart.

Starting transplanting

Today the tomato seedlings were getting leggy enough that it was time to get them out to the potting shed.  Tomato seeds need heat to germinate, but once they're up, they can take cooler environments.

Plant tomato seedlings deep - almost up to the seed leaves

As always, when transplanting tomatoes, I plant them deep.  That gets rid of the legginess and provides more rooting area which makes for a stronger plant.  I put a small amount of potting mixture in the bottom of the containers and then insert the seedling as far into it as I can so that just a small length of stem is above the soil.

Transplanting finished the seedlings can enjoy a sunny spring day

Transplants finished, everyone gets a good watering with 20-20-20 dissolved in the water.  Later this afternoon when the potting shed is no longer in the sun, I'll put a plastic cap over the tomato seedlings.  This year, with a possible move in mind, I've put all my seedlings in 6-pack planters.  This takes up less space and I can easily transplant again into larger pots if necessary.  Spring gets going into high gear once again!

Confetti Cole Slaw and Garden Update

I make a mean cole slaw - even if I do say so myself!  I apply the "kitchen sink" method - I put in whatever I have on hand, and the more ingredients the better.  Tonight my husband is grilling a steak and baking a couple of our Pacific Russet Potatoes.  A cole slaw is a great addition to the menu.

Ingredients for Confetti Cole Slaw

Tonight's batch will have purchased red and green cabbage, Cripps Pink apple, kohl rabi from jollityFarms and from our garden onion, 3 kinds of kale and carrot.

Veggies prepared

All of the vegetable ingredients  are chopped into pieces except the carrots, which I grate.

Confetti Cole Slaw

The dressing is simple and the amounts vary with the size of the coleslaw.  To salad dressing I add a squirt of liquid honey and drizzle apple cider vinegar to thin the dressing down.  It's all tossed together and put in the fridge until dinner time.  A great addition would be toasted sunflower seeds, but today I didn't have any on hand.

While out in the garden gathering the ingredients, I snapped some pictures to show progress.

Corn, bean arbour, 2 pots of basil and leeks behind them

The corn is growing by leaps and bounds.  In hot weather, you can practically see it grow.  It's now taller than the bean arbor, which has vines snaking all over its top.

Corn silks

The tassels crown the plants now and silks are bursting from the stems where the cobs are forming.  It's hard to believe that the corn was just planted out 7 weeks ago!

Health Kick Tomatoes

We've already had a couple of Gold Nugget and the Health Kick tomatoes are just about big enough to start colouring up.

Yellow onions curing in the sun

Today I pulled up the yellow onions and left them on the surface of the bed to start the curing process.

Butternut squash

In the compost bin, Butternut Squash vines are spilling over the edge.  I placed planks to help them to the ground, but they're ignoring them, choosing instead their own path.

April 2015 - Unseasonably Warm!

In all the stores selling vegetable plants you can see tomatoes, peppers and basil for sale.  With the wonderfully warm weather we've been getting this year, it's very tempting for a novice gardener to put these plants outdoors - after all, if they're selling them, it must be okay to put them out, right?  Not so.  These plants don't go outside until we have reliable nighttime temperatures of 10C.  And as for the basil, you don't dare plant it out until June as it's very touchy to cool weather.

My tomato and pepper plants are happily spending their time in the potting shed.  I'm not worried if the tomatoes get a little "leggy" as I can plant them right up to the bottom set of the first true leaves.  In the meantime, I'm making sure that their new homes outside will be ready for them when the time comes.  I've always known that tomatoes and potatoes are from the same family, but I recently learned that peppers come from this family as well.  This totally blows my garden plan right out the window as you shouldn't really plant these in the same bed in successive years.  Crop rotation means that you should wait until at least one year before planting in the same bed as a family member again.  So it's back to the drawing board!

The onions and leeks have now been planted and as I don't think I'll have enough Copra Onions from what I seeded, I picked up a package of yellow onion sets to fill up the bed.  This year I've planted Chinook Leeks in addition to Bandit.  Chinook are a summer harvest leek while Bandit is good in the cold weather.  Both are protected by pieces of fencing in case cats decide to try out the lovely loose soil!

The leeks are looking wonderful.  Last year I purchased 3 bulbs from Salt Spring Seeds to go with those I've saved from last year's harvest.  Leningrad, Czech and Spanish Roja are at the right of the garlic bed.  Leningrad has enormous cloves - there were only 4 on the bulb!

This year we took out one bed of asparagus and replaced it with new rootstock.  The older bed that remains is starting to show the first new spears and I've already helped myself to one delicious snack of raw asparagus!  The tiny seedlings at the left bottom of the picture are dill seedlings.  I finally have dill volunteers established in my asparagus after years of trying.  They are good companion plants and the dill keeps away the asparagus beetle.

In the snow pea bed, the young plants are just starting to climb their zig zag fence.  Black Seeded Simpson Lettuce plants have been nestled in the gaps.

When I turned over last year's Pacific Russet Potato bed, I discovered that one plant hadn't been dug up!  I found at least 9 lovely potatoes which had already started to sprout and moved them to a new home.  7 of the 9 plants are above the ground now and doing well.  We were very impressed with this potato last year and are delighted at the jump we've gotten on the potato season.  Another bed has Seiglinde Potatoes planted from purchased seed potatoes.

All in all, the garden is doing well.  It's very tempting to push the season and set out plants early, but I'm trying my best to avoid the urge.  And May isn't that far away after all!

February - and the garden gets going

It's been an eventful past 6 months.  What with family emergencies, urgent business and some illness thrown into the mix, the garden has gotten short shrift.  However, hopefully now things are going to get a little more manageable!

Today I set aside some time to start seeding for this year's garden.  Four 6" pots were seeded with leeks and onions.  This year, I'm trying another leek in addition to my trusty Bandit which holds through the winter so well and is just now finally getting past its prime.  Chinook F1 is the variety I selected especially for summer, fall harvesting and there were only 25 seeds in the package!  I only found it on West Coast Seeds' website - not even in this year's catalogue.  Since I'm growing 2 varieties, I only seeded half the amount of Bandits I usually do.

A full package of Copra onions were seeded in 2 pots.  Last year's onions were outstanding, the biggest I've ever grown and I only lost 2 plants.  Copra is the only onion I grow as it's an excellent keeper and stores extremely well in addition to having great flavour.  Last year I just had to buy about half a dozen when I ran out of my own.

Pots of onion and leek seeds in the house under lights

I brought the pots back into the house and settled them in my lighted tray under a window.  Once they've sprouted, they'll be moved out to the unheated potting shed.

Siberia Kale doing well in the garden

This winter has been quite mild.  We've only had one decent snowfall and one good cold snap.  This doesn't augur well for bugs!  And things are budding very early.

Crocuses peeking out of dead iris foliage

Crocuses are up and wide open when the sun shines (it wasn't today) and narcissi are almost open.  The King Edward currant bush has flowers starting to extend from the buds so we could have an early influx of hummingbirds.

Fuchsia coming back to life

By the pond I found a forgotten planter with a fuchsia plant in it.  I'd assumed it was an annual, but there is green growth on it, so I whisked it into the potting shed to protect it from the cold - it is only February after all!

In a couple of weeks it will be the turn of the tomatoes to get seeded.  The garden never waits!

End of May - Things Are Flourishing!

This post will be mostly pictures so that I can compare end of May progress from year to year.

In one week, the Totem strawberries are plumping out rapidly and a few are starting to take on a bit of colour.  It won't be long now!

In my Tulameen raspberry jungle, flowers are forming.  Raspberries are always later than strawberries and mine aren't in total sun, so they're probably a bit later than most peoples'.

I have moved the cherry tomatoes from the deck.  They weren't getting as much sun as I'd thought they would.  The pots have been positioned in front of the tomato bed.  I bought a small pot of basil and split it into 3 clumps.  They've been planted at the front of the tomato bed as tomatoes and basil go very well together.

Flowers on Health Kick

Flowers are open on the tomatoes in the raised bed and so far all plants are looking very healthy.

The raised bed with the beans planted at the end is progressing well.  This bed houses beans and zucchini at the far end.  Multiplier onions and shallots are at the front.  In between, I've seeded second crops of carrots, beets and parsnips.  The half barrel in the front has a Sweet Million growing in it.  To the right is a bed of leeks with swiss chard at the back of it.  You can see the grapevine scrambling over the fence at the back of the garden.

I have 2 plantings of Italian heritage beans.  Both have been placed where they can get the maximum support.  In the raised bed, they are starting to climb up the bamboo poles which were placed inside their water bottle collars.  By the time they reach the end of the bamboo supports, they'll be well able to withstand the predation of wood bugs and earwigs.

We've been eating asparagus and the dill I planted in with the asparagus has provided new plants this year.  Dill and asparagus are a good pairing as the dill protects the asparagus from beetles - not that I've had a problem with beetles, but a little prevention could be a good thing.

May is such a wonderful month for flowers!  Irises, peonies, perennial geraniums are thriving in the central bed.

A ceanothus shrub in the garden is loud with bees.  Unfortunately they are all wild bees as it's been a few years since I've seen a domestic honeybee in my garden.

Repotting Tomato Seedlings

Today is a mizzly (that's a word, right?) overcast day and while it's cool, it's not cold.  Perfect weather for repotting tomato seedlings.

Health Kick tomato seedlings ready to be repotted.

I seeded them 2 months ago and nearly all the seeds have come up.  They're a little on the leggy side but that's just fine.  Tomato seedlings should be replanted to just below the first seed leaves.  They'll develop roots on all the reburied stem sections, making the plant stronger in the long run.

Tools assembled

My potting shed is a bit of a mess after a winter of neglect, so the first order of the day was to tidy up the bench and assemble all the things I'd need for the job.  The repotting tray is one of a pair I picked up on sale at Lee Valley for $5 each.  The labels were cut from a milk carton and will be marked with a grease marker.  I fill recycled pots with a purchased potting mix and wet thoroughly with a 20-20-20 solution.

tomato seedling ready to put in the pot

With the invaluable plastic knife, I make a good-sized hole in the pot and slip a seedling in, firming gently in place.

Firmed in - ready for backfill

Then I carefully add more potting mixture around the seedling covering the stem to just below the seed leaves and tuck in a label.

Repotting complete

Finally, all the seedlings are repotted and the bench is tidied up.  There are still onion, leek, kale and lettuce seedlings, but they'll all be replanted outside in April.

Seedlings waiting for the sun to come out

Now we just wait for the weather to warm up.  There'll be lots of plants for me and leftovers for friends.  I hope I can remember everyone I promised plants to!

It must be spring!

The aftermath of our snow storm which knocked out power twice.

I don't care what the weather is outside or the fact that the ground is covered with snow from our recent snow storms.  It simply has to be spring because today I started seeding! I have a small amount of seeding mix left but not enough for all the seeding I had to do.  I filled the bottoms of the pots with potting mixture and the tops with the fine seeding soil mixture.  Make do!

Leeks, onions, kale and lettuce will all germinate in the potting shed

Today I started the following:

Kale - Improved Siberian and Redbor
Lettuce - Black Seeded Simpson, Red Sails and Drunken Woman
Onions - Copra
Leeks - Bandit

These pots will stay in the potting shed as they don't need the heat to germinate.  They will be protected, however, with a plastic dome.

Seeding done

Tomatoes - lots of these!
Cherry - Gold Nugget, Sweet Million, Sweet Baby Girl and Principe Borghese
Plum - Health Kick and Classica

These pots are now under lights in the house.  Tomatoes need the heat to germinate but can take cool once they're up.  I've seeded 11 of the Health Kick as I've promised plants to friends and family but I plan on keeping at least 4 for myself.  Classica is a new hybrid variety that I thought I'd try.  Both are from T&T Seeds.  Not sure how many Classica I'll have as the pot tipped over and I lost some of the soil!  If I just have a couple, I'll be happy.  I'll look for a plant or two for slicers.

Tomatoes under light in the living room

It'll be at least another month before anything else gets planted, but in the meantime, I need to go through all my seed packages, note on the front what gets planted when and sort them in the seed box my husband made for me.  As far as I'm concerned - it's spring!

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.

Planting Leeks

Leeks are an important part of our vegetable garden and we've been successfully growing them for years now.  I always grow a variety called Bandit.  It's a hardy leek and will last right through the winter.  I still have about 8 of last year's planting in the garden. This morning the weather was sunny and warm and I'm feeling a lot stronger, so it was time to get working in the garden.

Bandit Leeks

The first item of business was to prepare the bed.  One long bed will be devoted entirely to leeks.  Tomatoes grew in this bed last year and it had been turned over weeks ago with the addition of a couple of barrow loads of compost.  This morning I added two barrow loads of SeaSoil and turned it over again.  Since that sapped my strength, the planting was left to the afternoon.

I always plant my leeks in trenches.  I marked out rows in the soil about 9" apart across the width of the bed.  Soil was troweled out of the row to a depth of about 4" with the removed soil heaped up beside the trench.  As the leeks grow, the soil will be pulled back against the stems.  When all of the soil is level, I'll add chopped maple leaf mulch which will add another inch or two.  All of that portion of the leek that is covered by soil will be white - the section of the leek that is most prized in cooking.

Digging trenches for leek seedlings

Once the trenches are finished, it's time to plant the leeks.  Off come the gloves because the delicate seedlings need care in handling.  I planted 7 leeks per row.  I remove the seedlings from their pot and carefully break them up, taking care not to damage the roots.  A hole is punched in the trench and the seedling carefully lowered, soil pressed around it to nestle it into its new home.  It's back-breaking work doing a whole bed and I'm grateful for the raised beds at a time like this.

One tiny seedling.  The white portion at the top is where the seed cover sat

When all the seedlings have been planted, I place a tomato cage across each row to prevent cats from using the attractive loose soil for their toilet.  They will stay there until the leeks have grown enough to hold their own.  The second pot of leek seedlings remain in the potting shed so that there are seedlings to take the place of those that inevitably disappear.  Work done, I head back to clean the soil from my nails and sink gratefully into the couch with a steaming cup of tea.  One bed planted, five more to go!

Leek bed finished and protected with tomato cages

Leek and Potato Soup

Now that I'm planning a Three Sisters Garden, I have to get the leeks out of one of the beds.  The easiest way to use leeks is to make leek and potato soup, which also happens to be one of my favorites.  My recipe is pretty simple:  equal weights of leeks and potatoes, soup stock and some seasoning.

I read somewhere on the Internet about adding a bouquet garni and using a couple of blades from the leeks as the container, so I decided to give it a try.  I made my bouquet garni with a couple of sprigs of thyme, a bay leaf, some peppercorns and 2 leek leaves.  (Note to self:  get a bay tree!)

Ingredients for a bouquet garni

It was a bit fiddly putting the bouquet garni together, but with a little help from my husband, I finally mastered it.  Next was preparing the leeks.  Since leeks are grown in a trench which is gradually filled up to get long white portions, they tend to get soil trapped in the layers.  I slice my leeks down their length and rinse them out, then chop them into sections.  A proper leek and potato soup uses only the white portions of the leek, but I'm not a purist so I cheat a bit.

Cleaned leeks and the bouquet garni

The chopped leeks are now sauteed for about 5 minutes in butter until they are wilted.

Sautee the leeks until wilted

Then place the leeks, peeled and quartered potatoes and the bouquet garni in the pot of soup stock.  I use enough soup stock to cover the ingredients.  You can always add more to a soup that's too thick.  It's harder to make a thin soup thicker!

Simmering soup

Bring the soup to a boil and then simmer until the potatoes are cooked through.  Remove the bouquet garni and puree until smooth.  A couple of the peppercorns escaped, but since they floated, it was an easy matter to remove them.  Finally, reheat the soup, season with salt and pepper to taste and serve.

The finished product

I served the finished soup with a dollop of sour cream and chopped chives.  Sometimes I add plain yogurt instead of the sour cream.  It's also fine without the dairy addition.  You can garnish with fresh chopped parsley as well.  A delicious soup that's easy and inexpensive to make!