Saskatoons, ground cover and apple blossoms

Things were fairly subdued in the garden this week. I did a lot of weeding and tackled some of the problem areas after a big rain (three inches!) loosened the soil. The garlic and onions have really jumped up.

The Saskatoon bushes are in blossom, and it looks like a good crop this year! The yellow ground cover out front is always starting to flower.

While our apple trees are still not quite in bloom, the rest of the neighbourhood is trees certainly are. Out front, our carrots are germinating and I'v started to thin the beets. I'm hoping for an early harvest of spinach next week.

I picked up the last few flowers plus some basil and cilantro today. I hope to get them out into the yard tonight or tomorrow. Ot looks like the weather is warming up appreciably, with a high of 27 predicted on Saturday.

Tulips, tomatoes and potatoes

We spent part of the long weekend planting out the more tender plants, including a bunch of tomatoes.

Given that we've lost a lot of our gardening space to the garage build for this year, we only planted about 20 tomato plants: some in the box at below the back deck and some in a garden bed that I've recovered from the hedge.

Jess got pretty into it, based on the dirt on her face when it was done.

While she was planting, I was busy with the weeding in the side and front beds. A bit of heat has brought on the weeds. But it has also brought out the blooms on the saskatoon bushes. Assuming the bees get busy, it should be a good harvest!

The heat has also meant some of the potatoes we planted have pushed through to the surface. These are caribe blue that overwintered in the basement.

I still have a few plants to put in (two celery plants we've regrown from the butt plus a pair of leeks). There is also a bit of room for more flowers. And I see that the carrots have finally germinated out front. Let the thinning commence!

Daffodils, raspberry and peas

Nothing really inspirational in the garden this week. We put in the last of the onions, some bush bean seeds, and I planted some lettuce. I hope to get some flowers this week from the local garden shop.

The daffodils out front are very pretty and there was a huge bee on them while I was weeding. I spent a lot of time this week weeding, cleaning up some neglected areas of the yard, and weeding some more.

The raspberries are also leafing out, which is nice to see. I have been working around back, doing further hedge surgery and also starting to reclaim the garden bed that the hedge has grown into. When garage construction is done, this bed will form part of the new "in-ground" garden".

The first of the peas are also up this week, which is nice to see. We've sown two crops so hopefully we can spread the harvest out a bit longer than usual.

Trellis, peas, potatoes and radishes

We put in a lot of time this week, as the weather was very nice. Saturday we moved almost the last of the backyard dirt to the front and then I dropped in another 25+ potatoes. This puts us at 80ish plants this year. I'm hopeful for a good harvest. A bit heavy on russets but what can you do?

The rhubarb we transplanted last year has come up out front, which is a relief. Everyone likes strawberry-rhubarb pies and we use a lot of rhubarb.

We took apart the pea and bean trellises last year as the mesh had deteriorated (and they are way easier to store in pieces). I bought some new mesh this year and we re-assembled them Saturday night (a nice, sit-down task).

We then put these on the north side of the front garden. Jess planted peas there Sunday morning. I might plant some beans, depending on how the peas do. Jess also finished the carrots and the beets germinated Sunday afternoon!

The garlic we planted is also up and looking good. I think we planted 80ish bulbs last fall. Should be a good crop.

Less excitingly, I trimmed two feet of the left side of this alpine currant hedge. It was just too wide for me to trim the top any more. I'd like to trim the inside by about the same amount. But this was a huge amount of work.

Out front the bulbs are coming up, with the daffodils being the first.

And the radishes that I planted in a pot have come up too.

Overall, were in good shape. We just have some tomato and lettuce starts and some bush beans to plant and everything is in. We also almost have the back yard stripped for garage construction.

Potatoes, carrots and a retaining wall

It was a busy week in the garden as spring is turning to summer. We finished planting the north bed with carrots and beets. Just waiting for some trellis to come in to put the beans in (also for things to get a bit warmer).

Around the side, the spinach is up! No sign of the lettuce yet.

The chives we transplanted are also doing well.

A trip into the under-stair storage area suggested the potatoes were ready to go into the ground!

Jess is always keen on potato day. Such a tiny amount of work for such a big return in the autumn. This is (I think) the fourth year we've been able to provide most of our own seed stock (Caribe blue),

We put in about 40 plants in the front yard. A few russets were also dropped in from a bag that went leggy in the kitchen.

Jess is never happier than when she's in charge of the potatoes.

Around the side, we also finished rehabbing these beds. We used some old bricks to create a retaining wall (veggies above, flowers below). This connected to the stone walls Jess and Jenn built a last fall.

I did the basic planning of the wall and laid the first row. I then left it to Jess while I went to get some dirt. I figure it would take her 40 minutes to build the wall. But it was done in the time it took me to land one wheelbarrow. Some more onions were also planted.

I'v also been radically paring back an alpine currant hedge that has sprawled out of control. This has meant lots of burning before the fire pit and the garage come down.

Baking and early seeding

After a flame out last year (blogging, not gardening), I'm back with renewed conviction this year.

We've been baking quite a bit more since we're indoors so much. This week, I used up several jars of pie filling we canned last summer.

I've also gotten back into bread making (bridging us between grocery runs, mostly). This week, I plan to try some buns.

Spring has been late so we've been pining for the yard. About two weeks ago, we planted spinach seeds on the new beds we made on the south side of the house. The old garage is coming down this spring, so we moved the backyard soil last fall.

We've also been growing some veggies from the butts. I've always known celery and leeks would re-grow but never had the time or interest to try. So far, we have one celery plant and two leeks doing well. I have a second celery plant in water to develop some roots.

As the snow has receded (rapidly in the past few days), the south beds have become much easier to work. Some chives that survived the move have some up.

We were also able to smooth out the dirt we dumped last fall and plant some onion sets. I have a bit of retaining wall to build here this week from some bricks we recovered from the back.

We had a huge garlic harvest last year. We've been eating as much as we can and we supply out own see last fall. But we still have 30 heads left. We tried roasting (meh?) so I'll be looking at incorporating it into some buns, I think.

The front garden is almost melted out this week and it looks like summer is here. It is too earlier for potatoes (soil still frozen) bit we could likely get some lettuce and some peas in the ground and the remaining lawn cleaned up.

Fruit and potatoes

The last few weeks have been busy but rainy. The good news is that the blackberry bush has flowered with all the moisture and I think we'll get a good harvest this year. Blackberry jam is one of my favourites and blackberries don't seem to like our climate (they were basically weeds in Ireland).

I've been busy preserving what we've been picking. I did a quick batch of raspberry jam as I was running out of room in the freezer.

We also blanched and froze a bunch of asparagus. I didn't dry the stalks for soup flavouring this year as there is still lots left from last year.

I spent some time converting the strawberries we picked into strawberry-rhubarb pie filling.

I also mixed a bunch of strawberries in with Saskatoons picked from a neighbour's bush and made some pie filling (which is also lovely over ice-cream).

The flowers have been disappointing this year but the poppies came back.

Last night, we harvested the first of the potatoes, as the plants died down last weekend. These are blue caribe that we planted from last year's harvest after they went leggy in storage.

I think we harvested about a third of the potatoes (rest are later variety) and got about 40lbs. These are sitting the garage firming up a bit.

We also harvested the onions from the front. It was a terrible year for the onions, with most being small or just failing to do anything. The garlic harvest was better and they are still curing in the garage.

I'm busy splitting irises out front and making room to move the rhubarb and some soil around as we prepare for construction of a new garage.

We have a lot of traditional dallies in bright orange. These are a darker variety and I have to say I'm surprised how they bloomed. They're pretty but obviously some different stock.