Victoria Day in the Square Foot Garden

It's Victoria day so it's a rule all Canadian Gardeners must work in the garden. What a day it has been we had a little fog early this morning but then it cleared and has been sunny and hot all day. I didn't get around to checking the temperature but it must have been close to 30 it is almost 25 right now at 8 PM.

I worked all day in the square foot gardens. I'm trying to get the last of the seedlings from the light garden transplanted so today I did tomatoes, chili peppers, ground cherries, parsley and some more lettuce. I also built and installed the last of the trellises this one for the cucumbers to grow on. I decided not to build one of the tomatoes I'm going to grow them on the steel spirals that I have used for years now. The heirloom varieties are all indeterminate and would grow tall on a trellis if I lived in a different climate. With our short season I will have to stop the top growth at 3 to 4 feet as soon as there are a couple of trusses of tomatoes, if I don't they will never ripen.

For my last project of the day I started transplanting the left over seedlings in large pots full of compost from my composter.

Transplanting squash and pumpkin May 21, 2010

A lot of work but the squash and pumpkins have been transplanted, now to hope we don't have any late frosts. It will be fun to watch this squash patch to see what grows out of it. They are all heirloom varieties that came in a seed packet from the Yahoo Heirloom Gardening group labeled, “Fun with winter squash”. I added some buttercup and blue Hubbard and pumpkin seed but I have no idea what the other seeds are. Hopefully I will get to try some varieties that I haven't had before.

Rain Gauge 1.75 inches of rain May 20,2010

Rain Gauge 1.75 inches of rain May 20,2010, originally uploaded by Campobello Island.

After almost 24 hours of non stop rain my new rain gauge say we got just a bit over 1.75 inches of rain.

I lifted the row cover to check things out and there is good news and bad news. Several of the brassica plants have been chewed on and one of the kale is gone except for the ribs of the leaves. I suspect slugs but I can find any in the bed. I went to Machais anyway and bought some organic slug bait to sprinkle around.



The good news is the beets are doing fine. Seed packets and gardening book always say not to start beets early in the house because they don't transplant well. Evidently that is another book that my beets haven't read. They are all doing fine and I don't even see one that has wilted. Fingers crossed.

Transplanting in the square foot garden and greenhouse

Well the things that I transplanted into the square foot garden and greenhouse are doing well so today I decided to fill another bed and put it under row cover too. I transplanted three varieties of beets, two varieties of lettuce as well as fennel and Swiss chard. I had a problem with the row cover the other day, after I put it on the the raised beds we had a few light rain showers and water started to pool on the a surface which was making it press down on the newly transplanted seedlings. To solve this problem I put a bamboo cain in the center of the bed tented the row cover over it and I did the same today with the second bed.

In the greenhouse everything is looking good so I finished planting it today. I planted a grow bag of Red China Eggplant and one of Ground Cherries. I have several of each of these left to plant in the garden next week but they are both heat loving plants so I though they would do well in the greenhouse.

Planting Brassicas in the Square Foot Garden

A cool damp morning so I decided it would be a good day to plant the brassica vegetables in the square foot garden under floating row cover. I have four different varieties growing in the light garden kale, broccoli, savoy cabbage and Brussels sprouts. Due to the size of the plants at maturity you can only put one plant in each square foot cell. So I filled one of my four foot square raised beds with these wonderful green leafy vegetables which are full of antioxidants, vitamins and minerals. Four each of broccoli, Brussels sprouts and cabbage and three of the kale. The sixteenth square was already planted with calendula flowers.

Once everything was planted I covered it with floating row cover to protect them from any late frosts, we are still two weeks from our last frost date, and to keep pests like the cabbage moth from laying their eggs on the tender young plants.

Pasta with smoked salmon and creme fresh

I had this dish three times while I was in France this winter. The first time Pru made it while we were walking together in southern France, it was so good I even had leftovers for breakfast. After that I made it for myself when I was walking alone after Pru went back home and at the end of my trip I found it on the menu of a restaurant in Paris all three times I thoroughly enjoyed it ad I think it is one of the best pasta dishes I have ever had.

This version of it is a bit different, being a vegetarian, I've added some mushrooms and peas to the dish,but it still has the same great flavor.

The ingredients:

250 g of your favorite pasta
250 ml crème Fresh
85 g wild smokes salmon
2 cloves garlic
3 or 4 mushrooms
250 ml frozen peas
olive oil, salt and pepper

If you can't find crème fresh,like me, it's easy to make your own. To 250ml heavy cream add one table spoon of a good quality plain white yogurt mix it together cover and keep at room temperature for 2 to 3 days until it cultures and turns thick, that's all crème fresh is just a cultured cream.

While the pasta is cooking in salted water saute mushrooms, garlic and peas in olive oil. When the pasta is ready add to the saute pan along with a little of the pasta water and the crème fresh reduce over high heat for a couple of minutes add the smoked salmon and cook for another minute. That's it ready to eat, add cheese if you want but no Italian would ever use cheese with fish.

Square foot garden behind rabbit fence.

Square foot garden behind rabbit fence., originally uploaded by Campobello Island.

A great day in the garden yesterday I spent the day moving from project to project.. Built another trellis and installed it in the square foot garden , I have two more to build but I'm glad to say they will not be going in the section of the garden that is behind the three foot rabbit fence. Not a lot of fun trying to get these things over the fence.

My plan had been to plant Cannellini Pole beans on this trellis but when I opened the packages of seeds that I had received from the Yahoo Heirloom Gardening group there were only five beans in the package and I question whether or not they are actually Cannellini beans they look too big to me, anyway not enough seed so I planted more Tall Telephone peas along with the five bean seeds.



In the afternoon I discovered that my grow bags had arrived at the Co-op garden center. My next door neighbor trucked them home for me. My tomato seedlings are still small but I decided to transplant some into the greenhouse. I have had three in a pop-up greenhouse out in the square foot garden for a week now and they are doing fine, so I'm sure there will be some benefit from getting them established early in the greenhouse. I also planted two Greenhouse Cucumber Seeds variety Carmen. These have to be direct seeded as they do not like to be transplanted. Very expensive seed $8.65 for five seed, but the yield off each plant is amazing all blossoms are female so every blossom produces a cucumber.



I also planed three tubs of potatoes in straight compost from my composter. The potatoes are some that were left over the winter in the basement and have grown foot long sprouts, I'll be interested to see how they do in compost it sure looked dark and rich.

Construction in the Square Foot Garden

A beautiful day and I got several projects started and some finished.

I ordered lumber a couple of days ago to build trellises for the square foot garden and a wheelbarrow to replace my old garden cart that finally gave up the ghost last fall. This was delivered in the morning so I set to work putting the barrow together and building the first trellis. The barrow is a bit smaller then I had though it would be but that is a good thing this way I won't be lifting heavy loads I have enough back, knee and hip pain now I don't need to add any more. The first trellis is built and installed ready for the peas to start climbing which won't be long now, they are up and growing fast. The trellis is very tall and I can't imagine any thing growing to the top of it but at least the space is there if it is needed. I will be building three more for my cucumbers, tomatoes and pole beans.

My mystery tree is in full bloom again this year. It was a Siberian Apricot when planted years ago but that died and the current tree came up from the roots so I suspect it is what ever the apricot was grafted on. I think it might be a plum but I'm not sure. It had lots of blooms last year but no fruit so I just placed a branch of peach and plum blossoms, from my neighbors trees, in a glass of water taped to the tree to see if cross pollination will give me a little fruit this summer.

The Square Foot Garden May 7, 2010

At last I guess I'm over the cold that I've had since I got back home and I feel like working in the gardens again. I got a fair amount done today. First I prepared another of my square foot raised beds by marking it off into square foot cells. Once that was done I prepared three of the cells for tomato seedlings that I picked up in St. Stephen yesterday, mine are just starting to get their second set of leaves and are too small to transplant. I bought one each of three different varieties just to try something different. In preparing the cells I added a good amount of Seafood Compost and some organic fertilizer to each. The compost is very important with tomato plants as it contains a lot of calcium which helps to prevent blossom end rot in tomatoes. I planting these tomatoes in my garden several weeks before our last official frost date. Once they were planted I put my pop-up greenhouse over them. I bought this last year from a company in England and it was just large enough to cover the three plants, I nailed it down to the wood on two sides and secured it with tent pegs on the other sides so hopefully it won't get blown away.

That little job done I planted one cell of Radish a variety called French Breakfast. I have bought this variety in France but I don't know where it gets it's name, I have never seen anyone in France eating Radish for breakfast.

I have searched for years to find a Canada Lilly and last summer I mentioned this to one of my Internet friends a young man from New Brunswick who used to run a very successful garden center in northern NB. He sold the business a few years ago and has been traveling the world ever since working in gardens both private and public in Australia, New Zeland France, Spain and currently he is working at Kew Gardens in London. He said I should be able to get it in Quebec from Horticlub a mail order company run by one of his friends. Sure enough they had it in stock and I would be sent one this spring. The timing was perfect it was delivered to me yesterday just as I was starting to plant the Lavender that I planned to grow in the same bed with the Lilly. A good healthy looking plant. My original plan had been to plant it in one of my fields in the landscape since it is a native Canadian wildflower but my friend said there would only be one problem with that, it would not stay wherever I plant it. Most Lilly grow next years bulb directly below this years but not the Canada Lilly it moves a few feet sideways to grow next years bulb. So I decided to plant it in a large , eight foot square, raised bed. It should be fun watching Lilly fuse-ball as it bounces around inside the bed from year to year. The lavender is still small but should grow nicely in this bed. I mulched everything with red cedar bark mulch and I think the end result isn't half bad.

Garden Tour

This is a video response to a request from a youTube friend, jihadacadien. He posted a video of his property and asked to see the property and gardens of his friends.

Peas are coming up in the Square Foot Garden May 2, 2010

Peas are coming up in the Square Foot Garden May 2, 2010, originally uploaded by Campobello Island.

Both varieties of peas broke through the soil so that's the first crop direct sown in the garden to start growing.

We are about three week away from our traditional last frost date so I've decided that today would be a good day to plant squash, pumpkins and cucumbers in the light garden. Many gardening books and seed packets don't recommend starting squash indoors due to the difficulty in transplanting them. Maybe this will be the year that I have a problem with them but I have done this many years in the past without and losses due to transplanting. To the contrary I have problems when I direct seed them in the garden. The tender plants that have just emerged from the ground are very susceptible to slug and other insect attacks, but transplants with several sets of leaves stand a much better chance of survival. A list of the varieties that I planted today:

Fun With Winter Squash – A mixture of heirloom squash varieties saved by members of the Yahoo Group Heirloom Gardening.
East Elite Winter Squash
Blue Hubbard Squash
White Wonder Cucumber
Lemon Cucumber
Boothby's Blonde Cucumber
Big Max Pumpkin

I will also be planting Carmen the English Greenhouse Cucumber but I prefer to direct seed that one into a grow bag in the greenhouse, it really does not like to be transplanted.

The squash and pumpkins will not actually be in the square foot garden. I have a large raised bed, 7 by 13 feet, which doesn't make it appropriate for square foot gardening so I plan to plant it full of squash and pumpkins. Squash is one of my favorite vegetables so it will be fun to try all of the different varieties that will hopefully result from this planting.

Square Foot Garden April 29, 2010 - Garlic

Square Foot Garden April 29, 2010 - Garlic, originally uploaded by Campobello Island.

A nice sunny day after a night of rain so I decided to plant a few cells of Calendula in the Square Foot Garden. No sign of the peas or carrots that I planted but the weather has been cloudy and cool. We are supposed to have a few warm sunny days now so I wouldn't be surprised to see the peas up and growing soon.

No Knead Bread - My Metric Weight Version

I've been making this bread for a couple of years now and have made some adaptations to the original method but basically it is the same loaf with the same wonderful results.

Adapted from Jim Lahey, Sullivan Street Bakery
Time: About 1½ hours plus 14 to 20 hours’ rising

3 cups all-purpose or bread flour,(I use 450g) more for dusting
1 5/8 cups of tepid water
¼ teaspoon instant yeast
1¼ teaspoons salt
Cornmeal or wheat bran as needed (I use flour).

1. In a large bowl combine flour, yeast and salt. Add 1 5/8 cups water, (I now use up to 420g)and stir until blended; dough will be shaggy and sticky. Cover bowl with plastic wrap. Let dough rest at least 12 hours, preferably about 18, at warm room temperature, about 70 degrees F.

2. Dough is ready when its surface is dotted with bubbles. Lightly flour a work surface and place dough on it; sprinkle it with a little more flour and fold it over on itself once or twice. Cover loosely with plastic wrap and let rest about 15 minutes.

3. Using just enough flour to keep dough from sticking to work surface or to your fingers, gently and quickly shape dough into a ball. Generously coat a cotton towel (not terry cloth) with flour, wheat bran or cornmeal; put dough seam side down on towel and dust with more flour, bran or cornmeal. Cover with another cotton towel and let rise for about 2 hours. When it is ready, dough will be more than double in size and will not readily spring back when poked with a finger.

4. At least a half-hour before dough is ready, heat oven to 450 degrees F. Put a 6- to 8-quart heavy covered pot (cast iron, enamel, Pyrex or ceramic) in oven as it heats. When dough is ready, carefully remove pot from oven. Slide your hand under towel and turn dough over into pot, seam side up; it may look like a mess, but that is O.K. Shake pan once or twice if dough is unevenly distributed; it will straighten out as it bakes. Cover with lid and bake 30 minutes, then remove lid and bake another 15 to 30 minutes, until loaf is beautifully browned. Cool on a rack.

I have enjoyed all of the loves that I have made using this method but I have had a problem with consistency so I have been working on a using weights for the flour and water instead of volume measures. After several tries I've settled on 450g of Flour and 375g of water. I'm also finding that I get a much better loaf using unbleached flour. The finished product is 680 g loaf.

This collage shows the various steps that I go through to make my loaf. If you click on the photo it will take you to my flickr account and you can read the notes on the photo by mousing over the different photos in the collage.



I hope you try it for yourself at first it might seems a bit complicated but it really is very simple and fail proof. Happy Baking. PS: I have made the loaf with half white and half multi-grain floour which is great too. The one drawback being the heavier the flour you use the less rise you get in the loaf.

Square Foot Garden April 26, 2010

I just checked the light garden and I'm pleased to say that I have germination of all 17 variates that I have planted so far. Some of the earlier things to come up have already grown their second set of leaves and other thing are just coming through the surface but at least everything is starting to grow. The only thing that has missed in a few places are the Deacon Dan Beets there are a few cells that are empty but not to many and that is good because the lady that supplied me with the seed said they were five years old which is just about the end of their life cycle. I still have some seed left so if nothing comes up in those cells in the next few days I will reseed them.

I have never grown Ground Cherries before, or for that matter eaten them, so I'm really glad to see a good germination of them because I only had a few seed. I've been doing a little research on them and I can hardly wait to try them, hopefully I will have enough to make some jam too.

Today was carrot planting day the packet information says they can be planted a month before the last frost date and that is just about now. I always start putting seedlings in the garden on or around the Queens birthday, May 24th., her birthday is actually in April but the official day for the celebration in Canada is in May. The variety that I'm planting is called Napoli and the packet says it is an early Nantes type, whatever that means. I'm also using pelletized seed, for the first time. Love carrots but I hate having to thin them out and the seed are so small it is almost impossible to get them planted evenly so I'm trusting the advertising and believing that pellet seed is the answer to this problem. Each seed is a little white pellet and it was much easier planting them, I still managed to drop some so there will be extras popping up all over the place. The Square Foot Gardening book called for 16 carrot plants per square foot cell so that's what I did. I covered the seed lightly with soil-less planting mix and resisted firming up the soil. Fingers crossed for early carrots.

We had an amazing winter in this area and so far a glorious spring everything is up and growing so early unfortunately so are the black flies there were lots of them in the garden today, the earliest I think I've ever seen them.

Why I love France in seven easy lesson.

When I came back home I had an hours worth of video clips, 105 clips in all, on my flip camcorder and one of my youTube friends suggested that I turn them into youTube length movies (Under 10 minutes long) and post them on youTube. Well I just finished that little project and I've decided to put them all together here on my blog. There are seven little movies and they are basicly just the unedited clips joined together sometimes the video isn't great, sometimes the wind blocks what I trying to say and sometimes they are very funny like the scene with the three dogs or the Basque family out for a walk Mom, Dad, the Kids, the dog and of course the donkey or my two attempts at crossing a rushing stream with full backpack.

This first one is my arrival in cold snowy Paris on February first the train trip down south to Beziers and some of my travel in the south of France.



The second video is taken at the Acquarium at Montpelier and the start of the Le Puy walk.



The third video is mostly Wild flowers and walking through the national forest.



The fourth video was recorded March 30th, 2010 as I walked on a rainy day in the Basque country.



The fifth video is the last day of my walk, March 31, 2010 and the time in Saint Jean Pied de Port.



The sixth video was taken while I traveled around in France and my short trip to Brussels, before going to Paris at the end of the trip.



The seventh and last video you have seen before if you have looked at my earlier posts but I though I would put it here too so they would all be in one place, it's my river tour on the Batobus in Paris.



Well that's it I hope you got a kick out of them some of them really crack me up.

Square Foot Garden April 23, 2010

Time to plant the peas. I'm planting two heritage verities Tall Telephone Garden Peas the king my father and grandfather used to grow when I was a child a very tall variety that they used to stake with alder brush for them to grow on. Mine are being grown at the back of one of my four foot square raised beds and I plan to build a frame out of 2X4 lumber and chicken wire for them to grow on. I added a liberal amount of seafood compost to each cell and worked it into the soil before planted the eight seeds recommended for each cell. One good thing about knowing exactly how many seed you have planted is it makes it easy to replace any seed that don't germinate.

My second variety of peas is something really different, Blue Podded Peas. They are an old heritage variety that actually have blue pods, that should really stand out in the garden. The seed catalog said they are not eaten as fresh peas but are dried and used in soup. Which is fine with me because I love pea soup. I just have one problem with that when I opened the seed packet the seed are brown, I hope that doesn't mean that I will have brown pea soup.

Square Foot Garden April 21, 2010

Square Foot Garden April 21, 2010, originally uploaded by Campobello Island.

The day after I returned from France I got my light garden started and planted seventeen different vegetable varieties. Mostly heritage varieties and open pollinated, no GMO's here. I have been surprised to discover how many sources there are for these old varieties which are no longer commercially grown, all the way from seed companies that specialize in heritage seed to individuals that save seed from a favorite vegetable and share it through internet discussion groups. I have several more vegetables that I will be starting a little later on as well as several that will be direct seeded in to the garden, this is a list of the seed planted so far:

Italian flat leaf Parsley
Lettuce Gotte Jaune D'Or
Lettuce Merveille des Quatre Saisons
Cayenne Peppers
Brussels Sprouts Oliver
Cabbage Perfection Savoy Drum-head
Ground Cherry Golden Husk
Tomato Black Cherry
Tomato Buckbees New
Fennel Solaris
Swiss Chard
Broccoli Diciccio
Kale Toscano (Palm)
Red China Eggplant
Golden Beets
Deacon Dan Beets
Guardsmark Beets

Within 48 to 72 hours of planting both lettuce varieties had germinated.

As you can see I have gone heavily into beets this year, they are one of my favorite vegetables and in the past I have had great difficulty growing them. I plant them the germinate and are starting to grow nicely and the next time I go out to the garden they are all gone. I think my problem is the bunny rabbits or some other pest so this year I'm starting them under lights and will plant them in the area of the new square foot garden that is surrounded with rabbit fencing. In case it is some other pest I'm also going to use floating row cover until the plants are well established. Most seed packs say that beets are hard to transplant so this might be a problem but all I keep remembering is my grand father always transplanted all of the beets that he thinned out of the rows into additional rows of beets, they would wilt for the first few days but as long as they were well watered he always had good success with them. Mine are seeded into individual one inch cells so it should be easy to pop them out and transplant then without too much disturbance to the roots.

Today is day four since I planted my seeds and there are things coming up everywhere Swiss Chard, Brussels Sprouts, Ground Cherries and Savoy Cabbage. Things are off to a good start and I think the next item to be planted will be peas directly into the garden, they can be safely planted in the garden 4 to 6 weeks before the last frost date and right now we are about 4 weeks from our last frost date in late May.

The date on this video should be April 21, 2010, too late to change it now.

Versailles Hall of Mirrors

Versailles Hall of Mirrors, originally uploaded by Campobello Island.

Home safe but not so sound. Two days after I got home I came down with a bad cold, sore throat etc. I guess I'm improving but it hasn't been fun.

Took this little video clip in the hall of mirrors at Versailles the day before I flew home. Ivan and I spent the afternoon at Versailles and had a wonderful farewell dinner at, "Au Chien qui Fume".

I had no idea of the ash problem from the Iceland volcano until I arrived in Moncton and Christina told me about it. Just as well I would have worried about it throughout the whole flight.

Evidently I was on one of the last flights out of Europe. By the time I arrived i n Moncton all European flights had been canceled.

Last Monday I managed to get on the Batobus and take this little video of Paris from the river.



Well that concludes my little trip and camino walk. Thank you for following and for all of your comments. The blog will continue and for the next few months it will mostly be focused on my Square Foot Garden a new gardening project that I started last fall.

Galeries Lafayette

Galeries Lafayette, originally uploaded by Campobello Island.

Well I guess I'm in the wind-down stage of my trip yesterday I did my shopping and this morning I got my laundry done and ready to pack for tomorrows flight home. This photo is the glass dome ceiling in Galeries Lafayette wish I had the kind of money you need to really shop there all of the top names in jewelry and clothing are there with amazing price tags.

I also went back up to Montmartre in the afternoon it is such a fun place to people watch and watch the artists doing portraits.



This afternoon I'm meeting Ivan and we are going out to the Château de Versailles for the afternoon .

My flight leaves for home mid-morning tomorrow and I'm ready to get back home and get to work in my garden.

Paris Marathon

Paris Marathon, originally uploaded by Campobello Island.

Well I've been busy doing the tourist thing for the past couple of days. Yesterday was Paris Marathon Day and I just happened to be in the right place when the largest pack went past. I didn't wait around to see the finishe, don't like large crowds that much.

I have had exceptional weather ever since I arrived in Paris. When I was walking by the Seine yesterday the name on this boat caught my attention, New Brunswick, there was a young man washing his car next to it so I asked if the owners were from New Brunswick and he said they are friends of his and yes they are Canadians and from New Brunswick.



I think Segways are the neatest things and I would love to try it sometime but not on the streets of Paris, death by Segway doesn't interest me.



Today was my visit to the Louvre which I enjoyed but what a mob of people, it really makes it hard to enjoy the things that you want to see with so many people talking and trying to get in to see the things that interest them. I stayed about four hours and that was all I could take for one day.









Lots more photos in my Flickr account click on any photo to go there.

Tomorrow I hope to have a nice relaxing day shopping.