Sunday, 31 May, 2015

Weather turned amazingly cold last night. Only 10 degrees today. House is still lovely and warm from yesterday's heat though.

Planted a new Dahlia "Peaches and Cream".

Did a lot of transplanting. We now seem to have hundreds of tomato plants. Some are labelled by variety, some are not.

Also transplanted lettuce, giving us 18 to plant in the garden.

Started more seed yesterday: Broccoli, Kohlrabi, Kale, Lettuce, Dad's Pole Beans, Scarlet Runner Beans, Lots of squash and pumpkin, Spinach and Swiss Chard.

Spent some time weeding the rhubarb and the asparagus. I was very angry to discover that the triple mix that I bought contains perennial weed seeds, namely those of tufted vetch! Naturally I expect weed seeds but not these demons!

Friday, 29 May, 2015

Last of the broccoli eaten. No idea what did it.

Planted out the last 50 strawberry plants.

Monday, 25 May, 2015

It rained all day. 

Despite that fact, I managed to plant out all the June bearing strawberry plants. All 125 of them. I bought myself a rain suit from Home Hardware but I decided to wear my bug shirt because of the black flies. I was about half done and it started to bucket down. Legs stayed dry but otherwise I was soaked to the skin.

Still have 50 Day Neutral plants to get in the ground, likely on Wednesday.

Sadly, something, and we have no idea what, has eaten ALL of our kale, kohlrabi and broccoli plants except for three of them. They are eaten right off at ground level with no sign of anything left behind. There are no footprints in the soil and although I checked the soil around them, there was nothing to be found. Very discouraging after growing them from seed only to lose them like this.

Sunday, 24 May, 2015

We worked like dogs today. I was out there before 8:00 am, in the blasted bug shirt because of the black flies, and filled one of the large beds. Took 2 hours of straight shoveling and dumping triple mix.

Got the next smaller bed done fairly quickly also. Frank and I then built the remaining beds, there are 9 in total.

By the end of the day we had filled all the beds except the last one we did not finish, it needs about 3 wheelbarrows to completely fill it.

We were both utterly exhausted by the end of the day.

Watered the rhubarb and the new currant. Frank has sprinkled wood ash all around the brassicas in the hope that this will deter whatever it is that is eating them. We have lost close to half of them by now. Very frustrating as we do not know what it is that is eating them.

Saturday, 23 May, 2015

Removed all the tarps and cardboard from the entire strawberry patch and cleared the remaining weeds underneath.

Frank began cutting the hemlock 2 x 8's to make the raised beds for the strawberry patch.

We got 5 beds in place and got three of them filled with the triple mix. Frank worked very hard to help with the shoveling and hauling it wheelbarrow by wheelbarrow.

Completely exhausted by the end of the day.

Friday, 22 May, 2015

Potted up the daylilies, the clematis and the three small cherry bushes.

Weeded out the asparagus beds, again, and then planted out 48 crowns. For the most part, they look nice and healthy and really quite large.

Pulled back the tarp from area of 1st strawberry bed and cleaned up the little bit of weeds growing underneath the tarp and the cardboard. 

Unbelievably windy so were unable to get the paper and the landscape fabric in place for the strawberry bed.

The wood, hemlock, has arrived for the raised beds for the strawberries. We will start on them tomorrow.

Thursday, 21 May, 2015

Finally finished weeding the last of the strawberry patch. What a lot of work.

Moved the last box into position, filled it with triple mix and planted out the Golden Currant

Topped up Asparagus bed #1 with a thin layer of triple mix.

Plant order from Veseys has arrived. Unfortunately the wood for the raised beds has NOT yet arrived. Called and left message.

Am very angry as something has eaten 1/3 of my broccoli plants. I have placed a plastic pot over each of the remaining plants for the night to try to determine what is doing this.

Also noted that the two gooseberry plants are being eaten. I found a caterpillar nearby and removed it. There are tiny little gooseberries on both plants and I would really like to be able to use them this year.

Wednesday, 20 May, 2015

Thoroughly weeded Asparagus bed #1 again today. Will top up with triple mix later.

Continued to clear the weeds from the new strawberry patch but was finally chased from the garden by a large wasp as I did not want to be stung. Will hope to finish up tomorrow.

Tuesday, 19 May, 2015

The storm turned out to be a lot of rain but that was it.

Weather changed dramatically today. Much colder with a lot of wind.

Something has eaten all the kale plants that I had put in the garden. The broccoli and kohlrabi are still OK.

Went to garden centre in town today and purchased a "Golden Currant" bush. The helpful garden centre person told me that are much like red currants, only gold in colour. I bet they will make lovely jelly.

I should be able to get it in the ground tomorrow.

Monday, 18 May, 2015

Horrible weather today. Hot and very humid. Could only work outside for about 20 minutes at a time and had to come in to cool off.

We have all the brassicas in the garden, transplanted the remaining two rhubarb into the boxes.

I cleared by the fence from the corner to the Kiwi plant and laid down the fabric and the stone. Looks great.

We are battening down the hatches right now. Serious threat of a tornado in this area. We are hearing repeated warnings on the radio. Scary.

Saturday 16 May, 2015

Frank finished cleaning up from the wood. Got all the little bits raked up and all the sawdust cleaned up also.

Cleaned out a section of the veggie bed and planted all the broccoli, kohlrabi and the kale plants.

Frank cleared another section of the garden and we will plant that area out with leeks.

I continued to work on the strawberry patch, still clearing out couch grass and dandelions. Very slow work.

It was a very humid day today but thankfully it was not especially hot or sunny or it would have been unbearable.

Friday, 15 May, 2015

Great weather today, in my opinion. Slight breeze, a bit of sun and some clouds and not too hot at all. I am still in my bug shirt out there weeding the new strawberry patch as the Black Flies are still with us. 

I transplanted another rhubarb today into it's new home. Had to pull lots of grass roots out of it and I hope I got them all.

I have moved the last of the boxes into place and filled them with triple mix for the remaining two rhubarb plants.

Our black, red and white currants are positively hanging with fruit. On a much sadder note, this past winter has taken it's toll on our fruit trees. We have lost several more. We are going to have to re-think what we want to do now. All the apples are doing just great, several are now in bloom. The two pear trees do not look well. There is also a small bit of black knot on the plum that I will cut out tomorrow. One of the apricots looks great, the other one looks terrible.

On another note, the raspberries are growing all over the place. The original ones that we brought with us from the old house are healthy and well behaved. The new ones are just wild, sending up new shoots all over the place. I have decided to remove them and plant them outside of the kitchen garden, making a sort of hedgerow with them. Then they can grow as crazy as they want to. A lot of winter kill on all three of the blackberries. We are not sure if the crown of the plant as survived or not. We will cut back all the dead canes and wait to see if anything emerges or not.

Frank has finally finished stacking his wood. It is in piles all over the place. He is very glad to have that task over and done with.

Thursday, 14 May, 2015

Beautiful day today. Sun shining and a slight breeze. The only downside is the Black Flies. Had to work the whole day in the net bug shirt. Very hot inside one of those.

The triple mix has arrived and I had it dumped right outside the garden gate. I am continuing to weed out the area for the new strawberry patch. Got an email from Vesey's that the strawberry plants are on their way. 

I have transplanted one of the rhubarb plants into a raised bed. Had to really clean it off as there was a lot of grass roots present and I did not want any of those going into the new bed.

I have moved two more raised beds into position ready for the rhubarb plants. Lots of shoveling of triple mix and pea stone for the pathways.

Frank finished splitting all the remaining wood today, now he just has to stack it somewhere.

Tuesday, 12 May, 2015

We had lots of rain overnight and today is still a mix of sun and cloud and very windy. The garden is unbelievably still too wet for me to be kneeling in it to work so I will have to give it a pass for the day.

Frank is out raking up all the sawdust from cutting the wood. I am not sure what he plans to do with it.

11 May, 2015

I have decided to start this new blog to be a day to day record of the work we do here on the farm. I used to keep a hand written journal in which I kept track of the building process of the house and the start of the garden. 

I now think that it will just be easier to do this in blog form. It will be easier to refer back to previous years to see what I did, whether it worked or not and things that I can improve upon.

It is raining here today. We desperately needed it. It has kept me from working in the garden on the strawberry patch but there is always something else that needs to be done.

Frank installed the ceiling fan in the kitchen today. Works great with a remote as we would not be able to reach it as it is over the island in the middle of the kitchen. He is also working his way around filling holes in the crown moulding, working room by room.

I made a trip to the hardware store and bought an amazing dust mask as I plan to get started stripping the vintage doors (5 of them) so we will finally get the last of the doors installed. This mask was expensive but it will filter out both dust and fumes as I have no idea what kind of paint is on these doors but suspect some of the paint could be lead paint and I want to be sure to be safe.

Well, that is it for this first post. Cheers.