We went berry picking at a friend’s place in Mundare on sunday and got a 4L pail of Nanking Cherries and 6L of Saskatoon Berries….the plan is to make some cherry jelly, Saskatoon Pemmican, Saskatoon Chutney, and maybe a Saskatoon pie!
Interestingly enough there is a nice and unused space there in Mundare that we’re being let use for a veggie patch next season! So we’ll be able to experiment with many varieties again next year!
Reports on the gardens:
Front Yard:
Flowers are all over the tomato plants and the cucumbers, with little tomatoes on most of the plants. The vine tomatoes have yet to set fruit, but the Beefsteaks and Tiny Tims have started setting fruit. There are flowers on the cucumbers I started in the house, which is amazing since they recovered from being dumped on in a storm. The white cucumbers I planted from seed have not put out flowers yet, but the buds are there so they are close. The Sage and Thyme box is doing well and are about 2-3 inches high with those seedlings. The gourd plant is doing really well and attaching itself to its cage. I’ll be getting it to climb the mesh trellis I put next to it as well. The White cucumbers have tomato cages crammed into their box now as well since they were trying to escape. Now they are climbing up the cage and hopefully the trellis behind their box too.
Millwoods Garden:
It’s all doing very well. I planted a new zucchini seedling the other day for a late season harvest. The pumpkins are climbing everywhere and have set some fruit. The 4 tomato plants next to them are getting shaded and so are dwarfing, but still setting fruit themselves. The tomato plants on the east and west corners of the garden are all setting fruit now too. The Holy Mole pepper is hanging on on producing more peppers. I have tied it’s main branches to the cage to give them more support and take off the stress from the branches.
The Zucchini plant…or was it vegetable marrow…has 4 zucchinis on it! the cucumbers are coming along as well as all have flowers and some fruit has started to set. Peas and Beans are coming along with pods developing now. The pepper plants are flowering and starting to set fruit too. The beets look yellow still through the middle of the patch, I think they need thinning and more water at this point. The beets in Davin’s row are looking fabulous as are his carrots. Still no lettuce in Davin’s row so it’ll get replanted with something else. The tiny tim tomatoes are setting fruit now, and the carrots and onions and garlic are all doing well too.
Camrose Garden:
Pumpkins: Escaping! they have found the pepper trellising! I’m finding them so quick to grow it can be hard to keep ahead of them with the training to the trellis. they have set fruit as have all the squash except the zucchini. the other zucchini seeds still haven’t come up. I don’t think the top layer of soil is moist enough to germinate them. So lesson learned: Germinate all cucurbits in the house!
Peppers: Many tiny hot-hot-hot! peppers! some sweet red bell peppers, sweet banana and hot banana peppers have set.
Carrots: tall and green!
Beets: lots of them and the greens look great.
Beans: starting to set pods
Peas: setting pods
Cucumbers: Flowering! soon to be setting fruit!
Corn: Really liking the manure mulch. The leaves are prolific and a nice dark green
Sunflowers: Getting very tall. No sign of flower heads yet.
Parsnips: Looking good!
Strawberries: sending out lots of runners. Next season we hope they will have grown to 3ft wide x the length of the bed and we’ll extend the bed out another foot and let them take over. The parsnips can go elsewhere!
Tomatoes: They all have some amount of fruit set, and many more flower buds still. Looks like we could have a great harvest if all those flowers set.
Plants in the Garden room in the house:
The tomatoes are getting pretty tall in there and putting out flower buds – Yay! The peppers are doing fantastically and grwoing more leaves and thicker steams, the Elephant garlic is coming up now, and the lettuce has sprouted…or is it the spinach…
That all being said, we had rain finally last night, since it’s been dry for almost 2 weeks. I’ll check the moisture levels tonight and top them off. I’m also going to give all the plants some fertiliser too. Pictures to come still since I forgot to bring the camera!
