Reality Check

I was congratulating myself for a job well done this weekend.  I felt that there were many things to be crossed off the to-do lists.  And then I found myself reading back to this post, made only a few weeks ago.  Thus far, I have done none of the things on the indoor list.  Not one.  None.  And the outdoor list, which I fully expected to feel well and truly chuffed about ... not even half.  Well, there's the wind gone out of my sails.   

I'm off on a long trip soon and so there is some urgency to the gardening.  Cold weather will come soon and it will be too late for many of the autumn tasks (like dealing with the raspberry).  Let's hope the evenings this week can be as effective as the weekend was.

Eyes front

The front yard got some of its much, much needed work done today.  Only some, but frankly, more than I thought would be possible, so I'm feeling very happy about it.  

After lunch, I started by digging a trench along the sidewalk.  The corner that people walk over is badly compacted and so it was very hard going at that point, but in the end, a trench was made all around. 

In order to make a rectangle, I had to dig up one of the white-edged-leaf shrubs by the steps, but a) it wasn't flourishing, anyway (I think it suffers from salting in the wintertime, not to mention being too close to the compacted soil by the sidewalk) and b) I did transplant it later.

I conscientiously wrapped up the other (better) white-edged-leaf shrub so I wouldn't hack at its branches as I dug.  I gave it the shirt off my back, actually.  I was so hot and sweaty by about the third time I put the spade into the dirt that the sweatshirt was way too much for me, anyway.  No matter that it's nearly October.

The only other harsh damage I had to do was to a tree root.

It was preventing the plank from sitting level, so I cut it.  I don't want bad things to happen to the tree, but I also don't want roots attacking my foundations.  

We started to put the planks into the trench.  The corner had a big blob of sidewalk concrete jutting into the place we wanted the planks to be, so the sweary one sawed out a little corner to make it fit.  

There isn't much holding the boards in place or together.  There are a few inadequate nails of the type we had hanging around the house (ie inappropriate for outdoors and too short) but I am hopeful that the weight of the soil will do all the hard work, anyway.  

There isn't anything at the side yard end.  It just peters out.  I don't know how I feel about that.  I thought I would put a bit of plank there, too, just to keep the front and side separate, but it's really not necessary and I like the idea of bringing the side plantings all the way up to the corner.  There is so much sunlight in that patch!  If only we could use it as flowerbed instead of walkway.  

After digging the trenches and laying the planks in place, I started the arduous task of sifting through the dirt we removed from the trenches because it was terribly, terribly stone-laden.  But after a few tens of litres of sifted soil, I decided that I was too tired to do the whole job and it was going to rain shortly so I shouldn't muck about with perfectionism.  

Instead, I dumped some of the compost and manure we got yesterday on to the top of the bad, compacted soil we have and scrabbled half-heartedly with the claw.  The end result is not even-looking and is obviously not the garden of anyone's dreams but it is infinitely better than what was there before. 

There are a few trials for the new set-up.  The first trial is: Does it survive a hurricane? (Because apparently we're having one tonight).  The second trial is: Do people stop walking on that patch?  The third and probably make-or-break trial is: Does the murderous and ineffective snow plough smash it up over the winter?

Now that is done, I can realistically plan where all the bulbs will go and plant them over the week.  That's assuming, of course, that my back, arm & thigh muscles aren't so sore tomorrow that they spontaneously rebel, leave my body, and find a new more worthy host.  Let's just say that it has been some time since I slaved continuously for four hours or so.  They're not going to be happy about it, that's for sure.  Who cares?  I am happy about it.  Happy, indeed.

iris

I got more of the bulb irises.  It's confirmation that the things I couldn't remember  really are irises grown from bulbs.  I must have put them in and completely forgotten about them.  This time, I have a record.  They're called joyce and they're blue.  I hope they're a blue that works well with the house.  I know from the yellow ones that they look really, really silly laid out in a grid, so I'll do something else this time.  

daffodils

The daffodils are quite expensive and I'm not really sure what kinds I would like best.  So, I only (hah! "only") got two dozen. 

I chose the white, impressive Mount Hood, which I have one of already and it stands out beautifully in the garden.

I got Birma daffodils, which have yellow petals and white trumpets.  Many of the birma bulbs were split.  I am hoping that will translate to more daffodils.  

The bulbs are mighty and impressive.  They look like something you'd use to kill a science fiction creature, possibly the science fiction creature itself.

tulips

Not too many different kinds of tulips and not too many tulip bulbs.  They're pretty and bright and intense, but people take them and they're more expensive than crocuses, which are also pretty and people don't take them.  

I tried to match them to the house.  This is probably stupid, but I did it.  I got a deep bronzy-golden kind called cairo, and a blue one called aimiable blue.  

fritillaries

Fritillaries are a new thing for us.  I think they're quite pretty, with their little delicate op-art petals.  We'll see if they fit in with the rest of the flowers.  There are only a dozen in this year's batch.

They have interestingly different bulbs.  They're not as onion-like as the others, nor as very string-papery as the crocuses.  

garlic

We are not at all certain that there is any real difference between the garlic bulbs that we get at the store to cook with and the garlic bulbs that we get at the seed store for planting.  Who cares?  We will plant these.  There are three bulbs because the garlic did so well in the shade at the plot that I thought it might be worth trying it in the shade in the back of the house.  I am quite in love with the idea of growing edible things at home, too.  

crocus

The crocus situation is as follows:  I love crocuses.  I love their sweet little blooms so early in the spring.  I love the brave way they pop out of the still-icy earth.  They win every prize.

This summer, my prized pickwicks seem to have given up the ghost.  At least, I doubt that the bulbs that gave me such lovely flowers this year, followed by seed pods, will have much left in them to make new flowers again next year.  I am pretty sure that seed pods are a bad sign.  So I went out and got plenty of crocus bulbs.  They're also deliciously cheap.  On the order of $4 per dozen.  I can get behind mass plantings under those circumstances.

There are Golden Yellow crocuses in the bundle.  They're hopefully going to come out a nice deep yellow. 

There are Peter Pan crocuses, which are white and only white.

There are Blue Pearl crocuses, which look white to me, but apparently count as blue because they have a sort of blue tinting at the base of the petals.  

allium

They say that they are purple, but they looked pink to me.  They're not spectacular and huge, but for a first try with allium, I thought this would do.  They were so cheap, I nearly went for 50 but then I noticed that they needed to be 3 inches apart and I don't have room for 50 ANYTHINGS that are 3 inches apart so that settled that.

Allium is latin for garlic in my world.  There is a (quite lovely) polyphonic song called "Spem in Alum" (I think).  In my family, it's called "Spam in Garlic".  We do have our fun, don't we.

Busy day

Actual gardening-type activity occurred today!  Not actual gardening, mind you.  But ... there was lots and lots of gardening shopping.

We went out to a big box store and got soil and planks to turn the front yard into something with more nutrients and fewer people walking through it. 

We went to our local seed store and got lots and lots and lots of bulbs.  I mean, lots.  It was a good haul.

Many posts to follow, all about the different types of bulbs.

Pumpkins

One of the things we picked up last weekend was a pumpkin.  Not a pie pumpkin, just a regular great big ol' pumpkin.  I thought I might as well give it a go, and no one had pie pumpkins for sale.  I love a good pumpkin pie, and I absolutely adore fresh roasted pumpkin seeds.  

I cooked up the pumpkin, which was so big I had to do it in two batches because I couldn't fit it all in the oven at once, and discovered that regular pumpkins are quite different from pie pumpkins.  Or at least, this one was.  It gave up oodles and oodles of water.  I had a huge bowl of pumpkin pulp (still do, actually) which was brimming with liquid.  I poured off the water, but more keeps seeping out.  I've pureed the meat, and it's still separating into pumpkin juice and pumpkin pulp.  I have never had that problem before.  So, yesterday when we were at Pete's and there were pie pumpkins for $2 a throw, I grabbed a couple.  I don't know where in the freezer I think the pulp will fit, but I do know that I don't trust the stuff we have now to make a pie with.

Instead, last night I made pumpkin muffins.  They're basically bran muffins with pumpkin moisturizer and also fabulous.  I used the recipe from Smart Cooking (such a good cookbook!) and was very worried when I poured liquid batter, barely any hint of solidity, into the muffin cups.  They cooked up nicely, though, and were still good this morning.  I am looking forward to using the pumpkin pulp for this purpose again.  I have also found a recipe for pumpkin cookies in The Joy of Cooking.  I might try that on Saturday.  

In other pumpkin news, one of our neighbours at the plot had their pumpkin stolen!!  That really does suck.  It's been growing ever more beautiful all season.  I do feel for their loss.  Plus, who steals a pumpkin?  It's not like you can't get a better one at the store for $2.  You can't use a pumpkin unless you've got an oven, so obviously, you have $2 as well.  So depressing.  It's a downside of growing in a public place.  The public is sometimes dishearteningly un-public-spirited.  

Cherry tomatoes for breakfast

We had a chore downtown this morning which allowed us to walk by our plot on the way in to work.  There is a stark contrast between our plot and everyone else's now.  I guess that we were early clearing it out (but really, we could stand no more zucchinis).  We scooped up a couple of little yellow plum tomatoes and chomped them down.   There really is nothing like a tomato straight off the vine.  Not a bad way to start the day, really.

We ate some more potatoes last night.  They're strangely dry.  They're not like the ones we grew last year (not surprisingly, since they're a different species).  I think that next year, if we have a choice, we will plant yukon golds again.  These ones will probably make great mashed potatoes and they'll definitely be delicious for french potato salad (if I ever get around to it) but they're not great for straight-up eating and if we're going to grow our own, I think straight-up eating should be a priority.  We can get good bakers at the shops.  

Plot Emptier

We did (almost as soon as I stopped mucking about on the internet, actually) make it to the plot yesterday.  I ruthlessly pulled out the still blooming and productive zucchini.  I think, given the ratio of tiny babies to largish fruit, that they had started a new bloom when the sunshine reappeared last week.  At any rate, they're all gone now.  We pulled up the egyptian walking onions, which we've been told are mostly for use like chives (i.e. the fruit isn't very good) and is not good use of our limited space.  We swore that next year we wouldn't plant anything that took over wholesale like the zukes and then immediately agreed that what we should really grow is pie pumpkins.  We harvested about 10 lbs of potatoes, including those from the two plants which were completely subsumed by the monster zucchini.  

What remains is one sad tomato plant, mostly destroyed by zukes; one happy tomato plant, still producing pretty little yellow plums; a few increasingly mis-named spring onions; and a row of newly-sprouting beets.  I thinned the new beets a bit yesterday, but given that we're already into frost warnings, I don't think I'll hold much hope for this second harvest.  Too big for my breeches, I guess.

Plans

Today is a beautiful, chilly autumn day.  Yesterday we went apple picking in brisk clear sunlight.  It was marvellous.  

Unfortunately, the months of rain did take their toll on the apple crop and we found more than a few two-inch long earwigs gracing the apples.  We also picked up a pumpkin which was later revealed to be much, much watery-er than any pumpkin I have ever cooked before.  Ah, well. It was a beautiful day, nonetheless.

We are planning to finally dig up the potatoes and clear up the plot this morning.  In fact, what am I doing internetting when I should be real-worlding?

Lists and whinging

This is going to be a post about what needs doing.  I doubt it will even be of interest to me any time, but I have been neglecting the site because I haven't been up to much (except dealing with the endless streams of zucchini, and frankly that's just depressing to even dream of writing about).  Also, I changed my computer photo program and that's been making me less likely to take photographs.

Indoors:

• plant new basil
• plant new mint
• plant new chives
• transplant christmas cactus 
• make christmas cactus offspring
• transplant philodendrons
• make philodendron offspring
• repot dragon tree

Outdoors:

• prune raspberry
• move raspberry
• put in better earth all around
• make a raised bed for the front
• put in new bulbs 
• prepare a bed in the "lawn"
• put seaweed in at the plot
• take the zucchini away
• harvest the potatoes
• harvest the rest of the spring onions
• get rid of the weeds in the front side yard
• plant garlic
• hostas
• get rid of barrel
• thin new beets
• weed plot

Hm.  I wonder how many of these things will actually get done.  Not more than 50%, I am betting.  It's a long list, and I have lots to do before the winter comes, and many places to go as well.  Too bad about the poor, suffering garden.

In happier news, I have been taking the long way in and out of work lately and have been therefore passing a wonderful garden.  It's bursting with bright orange and yellow happy, not showy flowers.  I love it.  It's bushy and profuse and all around joyous.  

coriander up

The coriander seeds I planted have started to sprout.  As of today, there are only 3 sprouts (and I planted many more than 3 seeds, let me tell you) but we are not yet at the far end of the sprouting schedule listed on the packet.  

Harvest happenings

Since I've become so spotty with the updating, I want to put a couple of things down even though they don't have much to do with each other.  They fall under the general category of what happens to the veg we bring home.  

1) YEY! Something to do with overgrown zukes!

The zucchinis grew a lot over labour day weekend and we had a couple of behemoths on Tuesday last.  One of them, we managed to offload on a vegetarian student (they really need their vitamins) and the other we took home and stuffed. We sauted onions and garlic and the meat of the hollowed-out zucchini and put in some red kidney beans and tomato and a few olives for good measure.  Then we grated parmasan all over it and sprinkled parsley over top.  It was wonderful.  Served on a bed of brown rice, it gave us lunches all week.  YUM

2) Killer attack on tomatoes

Chutney doesn't like the little yellow plum cherry tomatoes (must find out their real name).  Or maybe she likes them too much.  At any rate, I came downstairs to find tomato-flavoured gore spread around and the poor little tomato corpse all burst and bleeding.

Gladioli

I did carry out my threat to cut the gladioli as they became available.  As of this morning, I am up to 3 stems in the vase.  

They're pretty.  I'm sorry that there won't be many more (I count 2 on the way).

The fungus among us

I found another mushroom in the side yard.  I don't know what type it is.  

However, after a blowy, wet weekend (thx Hanna) the weather is showing a marked improvement.  Like, there is blue sky.  And it lasts for more than 30 seconds.  And it covers more than 5% of the available space.  I am hoping that the departure of constant rainy grey skies will make some of the mushies go away.

The Beets Go On

At least, I am trying to have more beets on the way.  On Tuesday I planted a row of beets in the hopes that we can have autumn beets.  I put them on the far side of the zukes where the potato, beans and garlic had been before.  

Who would have guessed

It turns out that our plum-shaped tomatoes are cherry and yellow!  

I've already set one aside for seed-gathering.  

Very local

We ate our first tomato tonight.  It was sweet and juicy and wonderful. 

We didn't have it alone, though.  We ground up our own garlic and some of our own basil and put it on some homemade bread.  

Admittedly, we put some not-local salt in to make the grinding run well and some very not local olive oil to carry all the flavours. (Plus, we don't grow our own wheat, or keep our own yeast colony.)

Once it was all together, we broiled it and gobbled it down.  DELICIOUS!!

Juice

This afternoon I spent some time wringing out grated zucchini in preparation for freezing it.  I wish I could say it wasn't the first time this summer I'd spent lots of time squishing grated zucchini, but in fact we now have something like 20 zucchini grated and stored in our fridge.  

I have carefully set it into 2 cup bunches, which seems to be what the recipe books all call for.  I even salted one bunch; boy did that ever produce a large quantity of liquid.  

I don't know what I'm going to do with all this zucchini juice.  I have watered the plants a bit with it.  I put the rest into a jar, for the next watering.  It's such an exquisite colour.  What a magnificent green!  It must be good, right?

I am looking forward to the delicious mid-winter zucchini bread.  Earlier this month, I made the bread from James Beard's book and it was fantastic.  It was so good I'm going to have a hard time moving on and trying someone else's.  I made a zucchini chocolate cake (not the one I showed the recipe for earlier; for some reason I can't get cocoa at the moment) and it, too, was wonderful.  Plus, it had zucchini, so it was healthy, right?