Second round of peas

As predicted, I haven't been keeping up with the blog. Since my last post back in June the garden has been growing nicely and I have harvested quite a bit. Radishes and lettuce mostly, with a fair amount of zucchini.

We have harvested all of the peas located in the first raised garden, and today I sowed a second round in the same position. I am hoping that it doesn't exhaust the soil too much, but I did put in some more compost and some fertilizer (organic, naturally). I wonder what the outcome will be.

I will be putting a second round of lettuce and mesclun mix in soon, but I fear that the weather is still a little too warm, as it is in the high twenties.

Harvest!

Today I am very excited as I have harvested my first crop. I pulled approximately 10 radishes from the ground, leaving a couple in to grow for a bit longer. This is pretty early (for me) and I am very excited as it means that the earlier hard work appears to be paying off. They tasted very good, but I feel that I probably left them in the ground a bit too long. Never mind.

Radishes are a very easy crop to grow, which tempers my excitement slightly, but everything else in the garden is looking pretty darn good, with peas beginning to grow, as well as apples and pears. Can't wait to start harvesting the lettuces and the mesclun mix, which looks to be next.

Showers in May

May so far has been pretty rainy, which is a good thing, I suppose, as April was fairly dry and keeping the new seedlings moist was pretty tedious work. Anyway, the garden now looks a little bit like this:

The netting is mainly there in order to keep the cats out otherwise they think that I have provided them with the biggest cat litter tray in the world.

The individual beds are as follows with the plants embedded in them described:

This bed contains a zucchini (there are two in the middle but one will be thinned), lettuce to the left-hand side which will grow in the space to be taken over by the zucchini, leeks in the two bottom right-hand squares, lettuce in the two squares above that, onions in the top middle right square (to the right of the lettuce) and mesclun mix in the two remaining squares.


Moving left to right and top to bottom, in column one we have spinach, turnips (just planted when this was taken), beets and turnips; in column two we have eggplant (under cloche for protection); column three is beans, and column four is peas.


This bed looks a bit messy, but that is due to the green manure currently rotting on the top. Anyway, this bed consists of corn and I have planted peas around the corn to wind up it as they grow, and also two pumpkin plants which will smother weeds with their leaves when they grow. Well, that's the plan.


Ok, this bed consists of basil in the bottom left-hand corner, with onions, scallions and swiss chard completing that row. Above the swiss chard we have (in ascending order) kale (just planted), lettuce and carrots, and on the top row we have two squares of radishes. These are a temporary planting to use the space that the zucchini (in the middle) will eventually grow in to.


This bed is a bit of a jumble at the moment as it will eventually be one of my tomato beds (when the plants are ready to move out). In the meantime there is garlic on the left-hand side and an assortment of other spare plants in the middle. I will pot these out over the coming days.

Garden Update

This week the weather has been beautiful in the evenings and so I have had the opportunity to do some more gardening, especially with the long evenings stretching out before us. On Monday (April 13th) I transplanted my garlic from the pots in the plastic greenhouse to one of the newly-created raised beds. The bed was intended to have tomatoes in, but they are suffering quite badly at the moment, so I am sure that I can utilize the space for garlic. So far only one of the eight that I transplanted appears to be suffering from the move but I will keep an eye on them.

On Wednesday I put a fence around the garlic bed to ensure that the cats stay out as far as possible, and I planted a lot more seeds. This included a mild mesclun mix, a spicy mesclun mix, bedfordshire champion onions (the early planted seeds are not really working), two squares of leeks (one Scottish Leek and the other Durabel), and two squares of lettuce (both Marvel of Four Seasons I believe).

So far all of the seeds that I have sown in the garden are making an appearance with the exception of the spinach that I planted some time ago. I have, therefore, made another sowing of Bloomsdale spinach in the pre-existing square, and today I transplanted my beans to one of the beds. Having not quite enough transplants to fill the required space, I planted about 6 more Maxibel Filet beans to make up the difference.

I have also moved the sweetcorn that I planted a couple of weeks ago into the plastic greenhouse as we are having some good weather at the moment, and I think that the earlier I get them out there then the easier they will be able to handle the variations in the weather. We'll see.

Garlic

Today I planted, or rather transplanted, garlic into one of the beds, notably one of the beds for tomatoes. I am not too sure about the success of this as I have heard that garlic is not agreeable to being transplanted. I guess I will just have to cross my fingers and hope.

In other news, the corn that I planted appears to have shot up very well, and the pumpkin sprung up very quickly indeed. I have moved it into the plastic greeenhouse as I am not expecting any frosts over the next couple of weeks. Tomorrow I will plant some beans and peas.

Some More Beds Finished

Today I finally managed to finish off two more beds, meaning that I now have four raised beds finished. I have now got two beds left to finish but, unfortunately, that consists of completely building the beds, including the digging and the sifting of stones which is the most tedious.

We are coming up to the last frost date, which is pretty exciting. On April 1st it snowed, although it didn't really settle. This week has been pretty hot, and I think that I killed off a lot of my seedlings, which is unfortunate. I have discovered that I am extremely impatient, which is something that I need to start working on. Having said that, a lot of my plants are happily staying in the plastic greenhouse overnight and have done for nearly a week, meaning that they should be hardy. I will start to plant some of the seedings out, especially the garlic and the beans.

Today, I planted some more onions as the other onions have really been massacred. On top of this I planted some sweetcorn and a couple of pumpkins seeds hoping to get them off to a good start. Last year I planted the sweetcorn in June and they didn't really have enough time to mature, but this year I am going to get them in the ground earlier and see what happens.

Outside sowings begin

After working on a couple of my new raised beds I decided to do some outdoor sowings. The peas that I had previously sowed outside have all germinated and started to grow and so I felt it was time to do some more, especially since it is now only two weeks to go until the last frost date (April 15th). I sowed a square of Lutz Beets (16 plants), Champion of England Peas (8 plants), bunching onions (16 plants), Lucullus Swiss Chard (4 plants), Marvel of Four Seasons lettuce (4 plants), and two squares of radishes (32 plants).

I have become very despondent over my previosu sowings and now feel that everything is too leggy to be worthwhile, and the onions seem to be doing poorly. I haven't got proper grow lights and I guess you really do need the right equipment to do this properly. Lesson learnt for next year, although I will keep on tending to the seedlings to see how they progress.

The weather looks like it is going to be pretty miserable for the upcoming week with the chance of snow mid-week. After that it will still be pretty miserable but with the temperatures heading north it looks like the last frost date will be exactly that.

Seedling Update

Today I sowed some Dwarf Blue Curled Scotch kale seeds and some zucchini seeds.



Above is an image on some of the seeds that I have previously sown. The left-hand side shows some basil and thyme, as well as garlic that I planted to replace the bulbs that rotted during the Winter. The middle tray is tray number three with the back up sowings, and the right-hand side is mainly beans that I replanted after killing the earlier plantings by leaving them out overnight in sub-zero temperatures.

It should also be noted that it has been raining and cold all week. Last week I managed to get the plants outside in my plastic mini-greenhouse, but I haven't risked it this week as I am erring on the side of caution. It's supposed to be sunny again this weekend, in which case I shall continue putting up my raised beds.

Back-up sowings

Today's update is about making back-up sowings. Basically I have been a bit disappointed with the progress of some of my previous sowings and so today I made some back-ups just in case. Therefore today I made some more sowings of lettuce, swiss chard and spinach, as well as replanting beans.

Essentially the seedlings of those previous sowings got a bit too leggy before I put them under a light, and so now they are very droopy. At first I assumed I am under-watering, which may still be the case, but I think legginess might be a bigger problem, hence the new seedlings. Also, I rushed the season with the beans and put them in my mobile greenhouse. All was well for about a day before a frost finished them off.

Since I am feeling a bit down on the progress of my seeds I also planted some radishes (English Breakfast). This time, as soon as a shoot appears the entire tray is going under a light to see if I can solve this problem. On the plus side, since these vegetables are relatively speedy growers I haven't lost too much time and, who knows, maybe the first batch will work out fine.

Grow

Picture is of my bean seedlings which are sitting on top of my washing machine.

March has to be the Christmas eve of gardening. Every weekend I am out in the garden, frantically preparing and planning. Whenever I get a chance I review my seed collection wondering what I will plant this year and in what order I should start my seedlings. Those seedlings that I have already planted are sprouting up and growing towards the ceiling in what seems like amazing speed.

I check the seedlings and wonder what the year will bring each evening before I go to sleep. The anticipation of beautifully red tomatoes hanging over bushy basil plants or the carrot tops mixed in with a collection of tasty lettuces feels just like it did when I was a kid on Christmas eve. The only difference is now the anticipation is spread over a few months.

Now I am a grown up (most days), I know Santa clause doesn't circle the globe in one night but I still like the feeling that wondrous evening brought. I'm glad there is a grown up version of the same joy.

Happy gardening everyone!

Sunday sowing.

Just a quick post about a bunch of sowing that I did today. Today's sowing is more to do with sowing a bunch of seed with the intention of moving it outdoors into my unheated mini-greenhouse as soon as they have germinated (I currently have garlic growing in it). We shall see how this approach works.

Anyway, I sowed some more Black Beauty Eggplants, Maxibel Filet Beans, Dragon Tongue Beans, 1000 Year Tobacco, Thyme, Parsley, Basil, and Chervil. I have never grown herbs before so this should be interesting.

From my last planting the peas have come out (although I wanted to plant beans - d'oh!), as have the Swiss Chard and the lettuce. I have now moved them under lights that I added today.

First raised bed - Done!

This weekend I finally finished the first of three raised beds I had planned to make for the garden this summer. I had started off just wanting a square frame to hold the new dirt but it sort of became a project before I knew it.

I used untreated pine for the frame. Ensure you don't get the green treated wood as it will leach the chemicals into the dirt. While the new treatment is less poisonous than before, to me poison is poison. I could have treated the pine with linseed oil but I figure this will last a few years without it. Cedar would likely be my first choice as it has a natural preservative but the cost is much more than pine.

I bought some cheap one by ones that were broken and repaired and then sold in bundles. The pvc corrugated cover was fifteen dollars a sheet (used three) and you can pay a lot more if you buy the more fancy stuff. I am not sure what the difference is other than shade.

I sloped the roof so the rain runs away from the house. I plan to place a small gutter on the one side so the rain will run into a rain barrel for summer watering.

I have about 75$ of special garden dirt which is about 20% manure and composted materials. See the details of this in my previous post.

This afternoon I saw a couple cats looking at this so I am now a bit concerned. I think I will need to cover it with chicken wire until I get some veg going otherwise I have just created the biggest kitty litter in the neighborhood, complete with raid guard...

Seedling Update

Just a quick update with some pictures. Firstly, the majority of the second bath of onions and leeks seem to be doing ok.



Although there are some exceptions. They are slouched down and I am not too sure what they are sulking about. I will have to do a bit of reading up on the matter.



And lastly we have some tomatoes from a couple of weeks back!



On the minus side it snowed today! My plastic tunnel, not that anything appears to be growing in it, was definitely closed up. All in all, a good start I feel, although the onions give me some concern. I might plant some more for back up.

Deciding what to grow

This year being my second season as a urban farmer I have decided to be quite selective on what I grow. Last year I was in awe of all the exotics I would grow and then eat only to be disappointed by the vast array of failures I had.

This year I am going to be a practical West Coast gardener. I will grow what worked and what should work in this climate with just a little bit of what I really hope will work (inverted from last year).

So... What to start with? Beans! I just potted the following: Empress Beans(For my wife's stir fry), Kidney Beans (I love Chili), Boston Favorite (for soups) and Lima Cisco's Bird Egg Bean (for salads). All of which were from the US company, Seed Savers Exchange. I have recently become more of a fan of the West Coast Seeds company as it allows me to buy items like Potatoes without border issues.

The picture you see here is my furnace room. I located my pot of seeds between the furnace and the hot water tank for warmth. I water them every day and will install lights in there this weekend for once they sprout.

Next round of seeds will be for some tomato plants. I did the beans first as they can go outside earlier.

Next Batch of Seeds

Today I planted another tray of seeds (the second full tray), this time using soil for seed starting that I purchased from Triple Tree Nursery as I felt that the bedding soil that I was previously using wasn't doing that good a job, so we'll see what the difference is.

This time the planting consisted of some more Black Beauty eggplants (8 seeds), Marvel of Four Seasons lettuce (8 seeds), Lucullus Swiss Chard (8 seeds), Champion of England peas (16 seeds), Canterbury Bells (16 modules) and Bloomsdale spinach (12 seeds).

At the moment, the tomatoes that I planted back on the weekend and placed on a heating mat have started to germinate, but not the others just yet. I re-potted the onions that I planted back in January and the leeks and onions that I planted a couple of weeks back are going gangbusters. Pictures soon.

Tomato seeds are in!

Today I sowed a pot of Black Zebra tomatoes (3 seeds), a pot of Nepal tomatoes (3 seeds), two pots of Golden Cherry tomatoes (6 seeds), five pots of parsley (2 pre-soaked seeds per pot), a pot of Black Beauty eggplant (3 seeds in the pot) and two pots of King of the North Sweet Pepper (3 seeds per pot). I am being a little cautious about the quantities as it all needs to fit into the square foot garden I have going. I might have to change some of the positions that I have planned as I go, but I am only doing four tomato plants this year. Hopefully I will actually get to eat some this year as most of my crop was wiped out by blight last year. I have put them on the heating mat that I bought from Lee Valley recently, so let's hope that it does some good, especially with the heat-loving seeds.

Below are a couple of images showing the progress of the onion and leeks that were planted earlier.

I have finally managed to finish one of the raised beds (only five to go!). I filled the bed with a medium bale of peat moss (approx. 4.4 cubic feet), half a bag of vermiculite, 8 bags of mushroom compost (at 10 litres a bag) and a whole bunch of lime. I am hoping that this combination will suffice, but it will have to do for the moment.

I was a little eager in getting this bed ready as I thought that I had some major planting to do, but when I checked again I realised that I got my dates all wrong and that I was several weeks ahead of myself. Not to worry, I planted a square of Champion of England peas (8) and a square of spinach (9 seeds). As it is a little early I covered the bed with the plastic tunnel that I bought from Lee Valley last year. I will plant more peas in about two weeks time, but since the bed was ready I wanted to see how early I can start. I guess I'll know in a few days.

Seedlings are go!

The image above is of one of my onion seedlings that I planted back in January. There are two more seedlings from this batch on the way, but this one is the most advanced out of the three.

In the meantime a couple of the leeks have sprouted as well as early indications that the chamomile is going to go well. I have shifted all of my seedlings under some fluorescent lights to ensure that they get enough light in their emerging days.

First Batch of Seeds Sown

Today I filtered another one of the beds that I am creating for the vegetable garden. I am trying to create 6 raise beds and have so far managed to filter the stones out of two of them. I have a very stony garden and so this is a very necessary first step. Today I only went down approximately 6 inches, and the raised bed will add a further 12 inches, meaning that there should be a good 18 inches of relatively stone-free soil, which should be enough for most of the vegetables.

Today I sowed 9 pots of Bedfordshire Championship Onions, as I did last month. On a positive note (well not THAT positive), one of the onions that I planted last time has come through, which I was surprised about as I thought that I had soaked the seeds too much. I also planted 9 pots of Durabel leeks, 5 pots of Scotland Leeks and 9 pots of chamomile.

I am using these deep-root seed starters that I recently purchased from Lee Valley tools.

Seed Update

Well, there has been no movement with the onion seeds I planted earlier. I even used my wife's heating pad as a make-shift seed heating mat, but to no avail. I am currently blaming the peat discs and hoping that the seeds aren't too old (I only bought them last year). Never mind, I have some more planting action later on this week, and we shall see how it goes.

On the plus side, the 2009 Lee Valley Tools brochure arrived today.

Gardening Supplies

In lieu of having anything up-to-date to write I just wanted to mention my gardening supplier of choice, that being Lee Valley Tools.

Lee Valley Tools carries a wide variety of tools and gardening equipment that I haven't found anywhere else. Of course this means that I end up spending more money than I intend, but that's also part of the fun.

Unfortunately, I went in there the other day for a heating mat, but alas they are currently out of stock. I was *this* close to buying some seed starting equipment but ran out before I felt the pull of the power of Lee Valley.

2009 Planting has begun

The planting year has officially begun, albeit a little late. This year I am following the Square Foot Gardening technique. I am in the process of building the raised beds; one of the beds has been built but the soil hasn't been put in yet as the ground is still frozen from a very cold Winter and snow is still on the ground.

Anyway, as I was saying the official planting has begun. I have planted eight seeds of Bedfordshire Champion onions to start with. The seeds have been sown early, about ten weeks before the last frost date (approximately April 15th in Port Coquitlam). According to the spacing of the Square Foot technique, there should be approximately twelve onions per square-foot and I am not incredibly sure how many I am going to grow, but I will do one square foot at least. The next four seeds will be sown at a later date to ensure a staggered harvest.