Herb Harvest ... Seed Saving ...

Summer Savory

I cut back my summer savory plant in summer and put it to dry in a paper bag. When it was properly dry I rubbed the stems and refilled the herb bottle. Now I am re-stocked with summer savory for another year.





Seed Saving

I remembered to leave some of the sweet pea seed pods to mature and dry on the vines this year. I collected the seed and stored them in the feezer for next year.


Herb Harvesting

I have had an unfulfilled desire since moving from the Caribbean. There is wonderful flavour pepper we grow back home which we refer to as a seasoning pepper or flavour pepper. I did a little research recently and it seems that it is only grown in that part of the world. The beauty of this pepper is it is very flavourful and mildly hot.
I have always missed having that pepper available and have tried acquiring the seeds unsuccessfully. This summer I did get some seed from my sister-in-law who lives in Florida from a plant in her garden which originally came from West Indian seed, however these peppers have reverted to being flavourful but very hot.

Traditionally, we make a special Trinidadian Christmas dish called "pastels", a cornmeal envelope of seasoned meat wrapped and steamed in banana leaf. I made my yearly pilgramige to the Caribbean store in New Westminster to buy the ingredients and discovered that they import flavour peppers and freeze them, so I stocked up. They are all gone now, incorporated into the pastels, but I saved, washed, dried and froze the seeds and will try growing them next year. I look forward to seeing what happens. My theory is that West Coast summers are neither long enough or hot enough to generate the flavour in the peppers that I so fondly remember. I hope I am wrong.

Delicato Squash

My daughter, recently introduced me to the delights of the Delicato squash! Yummy! She prepared it coated in a freshly roasted Indian spice mix, cut into small pieces, skin and all and roasted in the oven. I also saved the very generous supply of seeds from that Delicato squash as well.



However, I also discovered that the genetic purity of the squash family is easily corruped. If other varieties are growing nearby they easity cross pollinate and offspring end up as hybrids, rather than replicas of the parent. We will find out whether this particular Delicato was involved in any dalliances over summer!

Roasted Veggie season

How pretty a combination fall veggies look chopped up and ready for the roasting.

Apples ... Fall's Gift

Once again this year I stopped in to Mariposa, the very large fruit stand off Highway 3 just outside of Osooyos. I bought a very large bag of apples, large heads of garlic for planting, many varieties of peppers and the last of the sunflower heads packed with seed.



My plan was to can apple sauce and I did. I was lucky to find a wicked little gadget on sale for $12 which peels, slices and cores all in one blow and I made good use of it.







Apples reconfigured as apple sauce.

Summer Review ...

Looking back at the photos I have taken is a great way to remember the experiences this summer brought. Its amazing how quickly they pass from memory and one is on to the next thing. What a fabulous summer 2009 has been for growing tomatoes and basil! The tomato sauce I canned is all gone now but it was sure delicious while it lasted.

Some of the pleasures enjoyed this summer have been ...

Eating sugar snap peas off the vine.



Picking blueberries....



Harvesting for the home from our Urban Farming Garden....



Beautiful meals from summer delicacies....



Discovering a summer garden in full bloom growing on an empty lot along a country road....











We so enjoyed our afternoon visit in this garden on the side of the road, walking through the path ways, admiring the compositions from different angles, naming the flowers we knew, discovering new varieties we didn't, taking loverly photos and appreciating the gardener's gift. When I got back the photos, I returned and put some copies into the mailbox across the road and included a thank you note.



"Earth laughs in flowers."
Ralph Waldo Emerson

It ain't over yet! ....

Summer has been quite hectic. That little heat wave we had kept me on my toes. I was watering the small clay pots of herbs,flowers and salad greens daily and the very large pots more than the usual once a week. It is worth the effort however, because it is even more effort trying to help your garden recuperate. Even more drastic, replacing the plants entirely.

So now that is over and my hosta tells me, as its leaves die off one by one, fall is around the corner, I feel myself relaxing. However, there is more to come.
Think of fall as the flipside to spring. Remember spring vegetables? The selection of veggies that prefer cool weather? salad greens, lettuce, radishes, asian greens etc. You can have another go around with them. The conditions are not quite the same as the light and temperature are decreasing rather than building, so vitality is diminished.

Some seedlings such as things you hope to overwinter should have been started mid June/beginning July. Things like the cole family ... kales, brussel sprouts, broccoli raab. They need to be well established seedlings by now if they are to make it though the winter.




If you missed starting seedling end of June beginning of July, for fall/winter this year, never mind, make a note in your calendar for next year. While you are at it, remind yourself to buy the seeds you will need for fall plantings at the beginning of the year. Lettuces such as Continuity, Rouge d'Hiver and Winter Density also Winter Mesclun Blend. The shop may be out if you think of doing this in fall.

Perhaps you can still grab the opportunity and find a source of healthy fall seedlings to buy and you can still try your hand at fall plantings. Start some salad greens, asian greens and lettuce.

I started some scallions, kales, broccoli rab, bulbing fennel and planted some of it in yesterday. The lettuces I started a few weeks ago, seeding straight into a large clay pot as mesclun and transplanted individual plants into other pots.



I am still waiting for some of the bins to be vacated by the tomatoes, which are taking their own sweet time to ripen up. While the fall/winter plants wait their turn in the large containers I have potted up the seedlings to larger seedling containers so as to support their continued healthy growth.



Of course we are talking about overwintering on a balcony so quantity is out of the question.



I have jammed the scallions in cheek by jowl and hope for the best and have been a little more generous to the bulbing fennel. The one kale plant I planted has a bin all to itself. Kale plants survive winter and can get very large and produce lustily. I expect good returns on my investment.

So ... take a breather ... take time to chill with a friend ... enjoy the fruits of your labour ... and then get back at it ... try your hand at extending the season.

Ah! Summer ...

I was very conscientious this year. I tried hard to be committed as a garden caretaker. Between my consistent efforts and the amazing warm and mostly dry weather we have enjoyed this summer, I am very satisfied with the results.


The bounty of summer ... a gardener's pleasure and reward.

Sweet Peas from my Community Garden

I made a decision in spring that this year I would not bother with sugar snap peas in my community garden ... instead I would indulge lavishly in sweet peas! Those saturated colours and glorious fragrance. I am greedy and indulgent when it comes to bringing this natural and free beauty into my surroundings. I pick a large bunch of sweet peas for my bedside table weekly.

Beans ... Beans ... good for your heart

Bean plants are most generous. They spit out beans by the bushel full. Beans started pouring in from my community garden and the urban agricultre gardens. There is only so much beans you can eat so you begin wondering how can you put all this plenty to good use. I decided to tackle the situation in two ways: make pickles and blanch and freeze. I wanted to prepare the beans in ways that we would be sure to use them. I remebered that my girls enjoyed the pickled beans that are served in Milestone's Bloody Marys so I figured that was a safe bet.


I pickled the beans in apple cider. I figured that might be a healthier option as a vinegar. I flavoured with garlic cloves and hot chilies.





To blanch you drop the cleaned and trimmed beans into boiling water for a quick minute and fish them out and drop them into an ice bath to stop the cooking. Drain them and pack them in freezer bags and store in the freezer. Pull them out on a wet and gloomy day and make a wonderful minestrone flavoured with basil pesto.

Basil and Tomatoes

This was the year for those two buddies ... Basil and Tomato.



I picked the right year to dedicate to tomatoes. Up until this year I felt we are rather silly to try and push the boundries in this Pacific Northwest climate by growing tomatoes. Well, the act of faith paid off, all conditions aligned in favour of tomatoes and basil in 2009 summer.
The ones that did best were the large varieties that I grew in my neighbour's driveway. The bushes were not prolific but turned them out one by one and with five bushes, it has been just enough for us. My husband and myself.


At the height of production I ended up with a tray full of tomatoes (some from my community garden) and I made a litre bottle of tomato sauce and put it away.

Harvesting my Favorite Herb

I have grown quite fond of Summer Savory ... not a herb you hear of much.
It is particularly good in egg and cheese dishes.
This year I started three seedlings in a bulb pot. They grew as well as they could manage under the confined conditions and as they began to bloom I cut them off at the base and stuffed them into a brown paper bag to dry. When the leaves dry and begin to fall off I will rub off the stems, still in the bag and empty the fragrant leaves into my specially labeled dollar store bottle, which is presently empty as last year's harvest has been all used up.



Enjoying the Bounty

You know ... you don't need much to feel totally wealthy. A bowl of free cukes picked straight from your balcony vine ... we found three fat ones this weekend .. right when the girls were visiting ... and beautiful, full, ripe tomatoes plucked from your own bushes you have been tending carefully, seasoned with olive oil and fresh picked basil leaves. Sitting in the sunshine, relaxing, surrounded by folk your love, eating, enjoying and chatting! Bliss.
Ahhhhh! .... summer!

A Hearty Welcome to Summer ...

Summer Solstice Celebration
This transplanted West Indian has adopted a Pacific Northwest way to mark and
acknowledge our planet's bob and weave around the sun. Gives the neighbours something to wake up and talk about, I'm sure. For myself I feel I am giving respect where respect is due. I am acknowledging and syching my psyche with the annual plantetary transitions that impact us earth creatures fundamentally. A basic reality temporarily, lost from view in our urban, technological world.

The Summer Garden is Planted but it still feels like Spring
All the elements are in place to receive the best of summer.
With the hubby's kind help, three more Ikea metal bins have been attached to the outside of the bannister. With this new space available for growing food I now have planted three types of tomatoes - Juliet, Tumbler and Patio, companion planted with basil. A bush cucumber is cascading downwards, encouragingly full of flowers and baby cukes, cohabitating with a melon, either Minnesota Midget or Earligold, I have lost track. In the final bin I did a scattering of toy choy which I have thinned to about twelve plants. I will be enjoying them soon as they are fast growers. The extended cool weather has made it possible to grow a second crop of toy choy in this way.


Compost as Mulch
I have added a layer of three quarter done, home compost as a mulch over all the pots. I have also conscientiously been adding seaweed and fish emulsion to any hand watering. Compost tea drained from the compost bins and another batch made from comfrey have been fortifying the waterings of my backyards plantings.




Salad Ingredients
I purchased a few more clay pots which are placed along the balcony railing secured by a nail through the drainage hole. I will have more room for salad greens now. I am growing a variety of individual lettuces in two pots, which I harvest as "cut and come" again. In the the third container I am growing the lettuces as mesclun to be sheared at intervals. I have reseeded more arugula, my favourite, which is coming along very slowly.



An observation about growing Mesclun this year
I don't know what it is but I have had very poor success with growing mesclun mixes from West Coast Seed this year. I have reseeded my large clay pot, dedicated to meslun, mostly West Coast Market Mix and Provencal Mix about three times and nothing has come up other than a few mustards! I don't know what is going on. Last year mesculun mixes were the centre of my container gardening.

I notice that seedlings were sprouting only close to the wall of the pot so I am covering the pots with plastic wrap so as to retain the moisture incase the problem is that the surface of the medium is drying out as the seeds are at their most vulnerable germination stage.





This is the year for lettuce
I have successfully grown the WCS Super Gourmet Salad lettuce blend, planting more every two weeks. I don't know which of the five different lettuces in the blend are actually growing as it seems to be to be only two green types are growing: one with a straight edge and one with a fluted edge. But they are prolific and vigorous and tender eating. My cool porch has also delayed bolting and bitterness brought on in lettuce with the arrival of warmer weather.

My most recent planting of lettuce has been of warm weather tolerant varieties,
in anticipation of warmer July weather: Buttercrunch described as "not bitter in summer" and Anuenue described as "heat tolerant". We shall see ...

Herbs
Last winter seems to have dipped low enough to wipe out the population of Rosemary in may coastal gardens. I lost my little potted plant which I have now replaced. Can't do without a Rosemary plant close at hand. I have also acquired Summer Savory, which is another favourite. I love the flavour in cheese and egg dishes. I pulled out the plant at the end of last year, it is an annual, dried it and bottled it up. I am about at the end of my supply of dried herb and look forward to harvesting and drying this year's plant. Dill is another must have ... great with salmon and boiled potatoes and butter. I find it grows so slowly though on my cool balcony, there is never enough when I want to use it.

Tomatoes
Once again I have planted a variety of tomatoes in buckets and hung them from the picket fence in my shady back yard. Not the best conditions as tomatoes need lots of sun. The plants are very healthy, growing lots of foliage but not much in the way of fruit so far. I realize that I need to give them a jolt of phosporus so encourage fruit set. I read on the internet that "Urine is the most concentrated source of phosphorus," hmmm!...

Strawberries in Hanging Baskets
I had another go at growing stawberries in hanging baskets. The first fruit, nurtured on cow manure were plump, fragrant and delectable as a strawberry should be. Later berries got smaller and smaller so I will be trying for a second flush with lavish waterings of compost teas.


Coveted Tomatoes
This year I am upping the odds of growing tomatoes by negotiating with my next door neibour to use her driveway while she is away in China for the summer. I have planted large tubs of tomatoes, melons and zinnias to be exact. The driveway is west facing ... long afternoon sunshine! ... combined with a watering of urine .... hummmm .. imagine the possabilities ....



Self watering containers
Also in the back yard I have two large selfwatering containers, one with potatoes which look lusty and vigorous and one of Sugar Ann sugar snap peas which I replanted lavishly, twice, and have rewarded my efforts dismally. I believe I have harvested two peas to date.

The Belles of the Balcony
The spotlight and congratulations go the geraniums, they are pushing out the flower buds at an alarming rate, they are surely exhausting themselves and summer has only just begun!



Ever hopeful, we forge ahead.

Here we go again!

Starting Seeds Indoors
In mid March I got the urge to "jump the gun" and get something growing. I started some trays of warm weather seeds indoors. These are plants that need a longer growing period to produce fruit. As it turns out I did it more for the discipline and the practise, as I find, two months later, a whole variety of strong seedlings are available on the market. However, now I know that I can successfully start and care for healthy seedlings on my own. I also know that my seedlings are untreated - West Coast seeds - and nutured on my potting mix which contains organic fertilizers and compost and fed with fish fertilizer and liquid seaweed.

I started Tumbler tomatoes, chilli peppers from seeds of peppers I bought in the Okanagan last fall, trays of different varieties of zinnias and cosmos, bush cucumbers, flowering sweetpeas and a compact variety of edible sweetpea called "Sugar Ann" and two varieties of melons ... probably cantelopes sold by West Coast seed so hopefully they stand a chance of producing some fruit before the first frost.

My kitchen table became the dedicated seedling nursery, the sunlight from the east supplemented with full spectrum flourescent lights suspended inches from the seedlings. A poor substitute for sunshine but we do our best.


Seedlings on the 4th April

The next step was to pop the seelings from the seed trays and upgrade them to larger pots so they could continue to grow without becoming stressed as we continue to wait for the outdoor temperature to stabailize over 10 degrees C. At that point they can be put out in the ground. Now that the seedlings have a few true leaves, it is time to supplement their diet with waterings of liquid fish and seaweed fertilizers to support their continued growth. Now space really becomes an issue. Time to move trays outdoors.



Seedlings on the 26th April

From the kitchen table the seedlings graduated to the small plastic greenhouse on the balcony and when that was full to capacity, onto the balcony floor covered in clear plastic supported by bamboo skewers.





Cool Weather Veggies
Sometime at the end of March I started cool weather seedlings outdoors. Lettuce, curly cress, arugula, sui choy, mesclun mixes and radishes and they are coming along steadily.

Cress and arugula - early April







Patchoy and Lettuce today.

Edible Sweet Peas
I planted out a first pack of Sugar Ann sweetpeas, a short variety and one seed sprouted from that pack. I dug around in the soil to try and determine what went wrong and I still don't know. Perhaps a crafty crow was watching me plant the seeds! So a started a second pack in trays and did get some sprouting which I planted out. I pruned last year's branches off my potted bamboo and they will provide some support, though this variety, if the pack is to be believed does not need staking.



In the other large container I planted an early variety of seed potato purchased right here in Richmond from the grower W@A Farms - 604-278-5667.

Bought Seedlings
I hedged my bets ... whatever that means ... and bought some commercially grown tomatoe seedlings. I am like a moth drawn to a flame where tomatoes are concerned, I feel like Charlie Brown who believes, once again ... and again ... and again, that this time Lucy will allow him to follow through and kick the damn football rather than pull it away a the last minute, causing him, once again to land on his big head! However, I have an objective this year. My daughter will be getting married in September and I would like to grow and supply some of the produce hence the different varieties of tomatoes!



I have planted them into larger pots using my potting soil and been watering faithfully with liquid fertilizers and hauling the trays in an out to avoid dangerous temperature fluctuations and rain! It is a kind of madness ...

My Allotment Garden
I have been working hard on my allotment garden. Got the hubby to help me build raised beds this year. Which meant I had to fork up the entire bed which is when I understood why I had such a dismal year last year. The ground is dense clay about 8" down. So I have been forking the whole thing over.

Drove around with six bags of Boy Scout manure - I hope they are not being literal - in my car for about two weeks until I had finished forking. Collected about three bags of seaweed and have three buckets of compost from home waiting to line the bottom of each tomato hole ... it is insanity.

Now I wait for the lilacs to finish blooming because according to timeless, gardening wisdom based on experience (phenology), this is the environmental indicator that conditions are right for planting warm weather veggies ... no one, of course, is willing to offer any guarantees.

Richmond Urban Farmers
Three of us embarked on a voyage of discovery mid summer last year and acquired three neighbourhood yards and began growing food. This year we will have our first full growing season. We have plunged in with the verve of newbies and to date have prepared and planted up two of the gardens with all the cool weather veggies, are completing the newest garden today and look forward to putting in the warm weather crop at the end of May.

This last garden, Seema's garden, is interesting because it was a full lawn at the end of last year and we have composted straight over the lawn with layers of cardboard, seaweed, bags of fall leaves and a load of City compost. The grass will take another year to properly breakdown before it can be rototilled so this year we are digging individual holes, ammending with soy mash and planting vines and warm weather crops. This experience is detailed in a dedicated blog - www.richmondurbanfarms.blogspot.com

I lurch forward, with hope burning eternal, into another growing season.
Let's see if Lucy really allows Charlie Brown kick the ball ... this time ...



Here we go again!