kalegrower

Summer of 1987 was an adventure. I worked at the Plant Biotechnology Institute in Saskatoon Saskatchewan, courtesy of an NSERC (Natural Science and Engineering Research Council) award. The lab that I worked in studied alkaloids produced by the secondary metabolism of papaver somniferum, or opium poppies. Most of my work involved helping the grad student maintain her plant-free cell cultures which grew in enormous flasks. The opium poppies themselves were shrouded in great mystery. They were grown in a top secret Government of Canada location in the middle of a remote wheat field (probably next to the cannabis), and as a summer student I never actually saw the poppies that entire summer.

Late last fall I noticed papaver somniferum seeds in the West Coast Seeds catalogue, which they refer to as “giganthemums”. The seed packets show an enormous pink flower and describe the blossoms as the size of a baseball. I must have been super excited when I ordered them and obviously didn’t review my order because I ended up with many seed packets. This year, I will be growing these in my front garden along with all my other poppies and some I will grow in the poppy bed in the back.  

Since I didn’t blog about my garden once last year, I have some catching up to do. In fall 2020 I replanted my blueberry plants closer to the house where I hope they get more sun and ripen better. This leaves a large space near the dogwood tree in the back. Inspired by my garden friend Brian who did a huge bulb planting in the fall, my plan was to fill the empty space with spring bulbs. Unfortunately, by the time I went looking for spring bulbs it was mid-November, and the nurseries were displaying Christmas trees. So I am going to plant this space with giganthemums, saved seeds from my friend’s chocolate cosmos and from last year’s double cosmos, and tequila sunrise heirloom California poppies in stained glass red and soft cream, a gift from Brian. Stay tuned!  

Salal control. The other big plan for 2021 is to continue cutting back the salal taking over the front yard. In the fall I pulled up the long snaking salal roots that were growing around the trees and that were entwined with the crocosmia corms. This year I need to cut it back from the other side before it reaches and engulfs our house.

The front garden is still a total mess. A few years ago I tried to control the weeds using layers of cardboard covered with dirt, but that was unsuccessful. Last year the grass crowded out the gentians and hollyhocks. This year I am going to try again with more hollyhocks, more gentian seeds and some of Dr. Bonnie Henry Pollinator Blend that I received for Christmas. This year I hope the flowers win.

Vegetable Plan 2021 is based on what worked best in previous years. Last year we had shortages of usable thyme and parsley. Actually, the thyme is doing well and has spread throughout the herb bed, but most of it is on woody stalks and is hard to pick and eat. This year I am planting more thyme, parsley, cilantro and chervil in the flower bed closer to the house, once the spring bulbs are finished. Both the sage and rosemary are overgrown and taking over the beds they are in, and i have finally reached Peak Bay Leaf, and my two plants are producing faster than I am consuming them.

Fava beans are always one of the big successes; last year was no different. I planted both Windsor beans which grow up to six feet and Eleonora beans which are supposed to be shorter and more robust plants, but in the end couldn’t tell them apart. Fava flowers closer to the bottom of the stalks bloom first. Halfway through the fava fertilization it started to rain and rain, so none of the flowers on the top of the stalks were fertilized. Despite this, we still had high yields of beans, which we are still eating. This year I am going to plant favas at the end of February in bed #3. Although this bed now gets a lot of shade in the summer from the apple tree, I am hoping that the beans get started before the apple tree is in foliage.

Winter Kale is still growing in bed #1: Nash, Lacinato, Starbor. The stalks are almost bare except for small leaves budding at the top, and I expect to get another harvest when the weather warms up.  Once the kale is exhausted (May?) I will plant pole beans (Fortex and Blue Lake) as well as dried beans (black beans, calypso, borlotti). Last year the dried beans which were very successful and we ended up with a few pounds of each.

In 2019 I had the BEST garlic crop so decided to take some of the best heads and replant them. Instead of getting large heads with 5 or 6 or more large cloves, most 2020 garlic heads were disappointingly small, with only two or three small cloves. Planting my own garlic is a mistake I’ve made before. Boo. So, in the fall of 2020 I planted Italian hard neck garlic from West Coast Seeds. These are in bed #2. The other half of the bed is now planted with regular and purple asparagus. I planted the crowns in spring 2020 (they looked like something out of “Alien”) and last year we just watched them grow. This year will be the first harvest (hopefully).

Last year most of my arugula and lettuce were eaten by pests. The birds pulled up the small sprouts and the slugs ate the rest, despite using wire mesh over and copper netting around the beds. This year I am going to plant arugula (March) lettuce and herbs (starting in April) in bed 4, again and maybe plant some between the kale in bed #1. My family loves salad so I am hoping to make this a big lettuce year.  

This year I want to plant zucchinis and squash again, but plan to start them inside. Not sure which bed they will go in: with the favas, with the beans or with the lettuce? I will see where I have the most space.

Last year the man had the BEST tomato year ever. Like everyone, he was trying to grow his own tomatoes and when he purchased his plants there were only romas and small orange tomatoes left (sunburst?). The Romas ended up rotting on the vines, but every day we ended up with many of the small orange ones which we ate in salads, roasted, froze and enjoyed for a long time. I am hoping he has similar luck again this year.

Last year we replaced a dead hedge with a trellis and planted four varieties of table grapes along its length. When I purchased the vines they were just little sticks which I planted too close together. Maybe I can transplant some to the front once the vines fill in. Last year they each grew about one foot, so each of the plants are about 18 inches high. I don’t expect them to produce grapes this year yet, but am hopeful for 2022.

In my last blog I mentioned that there is a wasp nest in my garden compost. Yesterday the husband once again proved his handiness/heroism. Armed with only a pitchfork, a can of raid and a motorcycle helmet, he dug through the compost bin. He found tiered layers of wasp nest between the different compost layers and pulled them all out and tried to kill as many of the wasps as possible. We are now letting the compost pile air out a little bit, with the hope that the displaced wasps will find somewhere else to live.

While the husband tamed the wasps, I was on the other side of the garden safely digging up the stray raspberry canes that were making a break for the back meadow area. I replanted them in the spaces left in my raspberry patch by the canes that died (who I knows why) and then I tied them all up to the supports, spacing them out to hopefully discourage rust. There are a few late raspberries starting to ripen as well, and they are huge and flavourful from the rain. 

Last week I was registered for a course on “Putting your garden to bed for the winter” at the UBC Farm. Sadly, it was cancelled due to lack of interest. I was hoping for some definitive answers about winter mulching, as opinions differ greatly. I pretty much like to let the leaves fall where they may and let the perennials rot away, and then I clear it all up when the new shoots and bulbs start to appear in the spring. (Lazy, I know). However, last year Sourpuss Neighbor down the street accused me of creating an “environment that encourages pests” because I swept the fallen leaves around my boxwoods for mulch and nutrients rather than pay someone with a 300 decibel leaf-blower to stand in my front yard and dry each wet leaf one by one and blow them into the street. Another walk-by garden advice-giver told me that by raking up the remains of those same leaves before May 15th I was killing all the bees that were over-wintering in the soil. No one except us finds joy in our garden it seems….

Short version:  It seems odd to be doing an annual recap in September, but that’s how I’m rolling this year. 2019 was a great year for apples, lettuce, tomatoes, garlic raspberries, zucchinis, zucchini flowers, fava and green beans. I neglected my garden but plan to make up for lost time this fall.

Long version: We had an exceptionally beautiful and mild summer here in Vancouver. It rained more frequently than usual, so there were fewer wildfires and no smoke (yet…please keep your fingers crossed). We were busy with everything and I didn’t do much in the garden except pick fruit and berries. I didn’t even have my uber-garden friends over to see the garden this year as I was too embarrassed by how overgrown and dried out everything was (sorry Brian and Nancy).  I hardly took any photos this summer, but that may be more a function of me trying to break up with my phone than a lack of appreciation for the many beautiful things growing around me. 

The highs:

• Our apple tree went crazy. The apples were smaller than usual and has fewer insects and imperfections. We ate A LOT of apples, and my son baked many pies. We have a freezer full frozen sliced apples and many jars of apple butter. My nephew and niece even got in on the apple-picking action.
• Our fig tree produced two figs! This is the first year it has produced fruit.The tree is now about seven feet tall and fortunately has some decorative qualities.
• It was a great raspberry year. Some days I ended up picking more than 3 litres of berries. I made lots of jam and froze lots for winter desserts. Late in the spring something ate many of the new canes as they sprouted, so I expect fewer mature canes next year, which will probably mean less berries.
• Copper ribbon is the best. West Coast Seeds sells wide rolls of woven copper ribbon that slugs can’t cross. I used it to surround and protect my seedlings and they thrived.
• I think I finally figured out how to sequence the planting. We had a pretty steady supply of veggies (which our neighbors loved), and I didn’t have more than one garden bed empty at one time. The herb bed has finally reached equilibrium. I am encouraging the parsley, dill and cilantro to re-seed itself.
• The dogwoods are recovering. Both of our dogwoods in the back yard had some brown leaf disease last year. The arborist sprayed  them both several times with some kind of toxic chemical and they are doing much better.
• The UBC Farm outproduced our garden. Every Saturday I picked up my weekly share of veggies from the UBC Farm CSA* and then spent the rest of the week trying to cook and eat everything before it went off. Some weeks it was just too much and I just chopped and froze the remains for winter soups. We ended up giving some of our garden veggies to our foodie neighbors, who graciously accepted bags of lettuce, overgrown zucchinis and Jan’s cherry tomatoes.  (*You can sign up for the UBC Farm CSA wait list for 2020. $680 = 20 weeks of veggies and 10 weeks of fresh eggs.)
• The solar farm is producing. This is the second anniversary of having solar panels on our roof and the biggest change (apart from not paying for electricity) is how much cooler our house is in the summer. The panels insulate the house from the heat.

The lows:

• The front yard experiment failed. The plan was to place a layer or two of corrugated cardboard cover over the entire front grassy area, and then cover it with dirt. For a year. This was supposed to kill all the grasses and weeds, leaving me with a clear, sunny area to grow more blueberries. Although most of the wild flowers are gone, the area is still full of grass and some kind of non-flowering woody plant that is covered with thorns. The plan now is to seed the area with poppies next spring. Who doesn’t love poppies?
• Wasps or mosquitoes? Usually you get one or the other, depending on moisture, this year we had plenty of both. There is a wasp nest in the back, right-hand corner of my compost bin and every time I throw something on the pile, they get agitated. I haven’t been stung yet this year, which is a good thing. I am going to wait until it gets very cold (hopefully when things freeze) and will dig it out.
• The end of the silvery glitter garden shoes. They were initially purchased for travelling as they were easy to slip on and off, but beinf totally waterproof, they created an evil foot microenvironment on the plane. But they were perfect for gardening and added some faux glamour to my horrible gardening wardrobe. They’ve served me well for four years but are falling to pieces.
• The “F-you” boulevard. Since we live in a small Fiefdom outside the city of Vancouver, we have to ask permission when we want to do things like replace our boulevard with artificial turf. Our request was not only denied, but we were told that we would need to obtain a special watering permit if we wanted to lay down sod in that location. So this year, the husband planted barley or some other low-water grass crop and it is now about two feet tall and dried up. See how it contrasts with the emerald boulevards of our neighbors. Not one has said a thing about this to us, either because they don’t really care or because they are afraid to threaten their supply of organic veggies.

Okay that’s it. Good luck with being back at school/work and make sure you enjoy the rest of the summer weather. I will try to blog more frequently this fall/winter.

Winter aconite

Cornelian cherry

Short version: I think spring is finally here. A rabbit was hanging out in our garden. Blueberries in the back, changes to the front, and a sauna.

Longer version: My last blog post (in January) was definitely not prophetic. I thought it would be an early spring. The last two months were not only snowy and cold, but the snow persisted for much longer than usual, and now everything is late. Some of the other garden bloggers that I follow (hi Pat2!) have also commented on how abnormal Spring 2019 weather is.

The snow revealed a new garden visitor: a rabbit! I didn’t see her, but her tracks were everywhere. Our bird feeders attract lots of birds, many squirrels and the occasional rat. We have a posse of raccoons prowling the neighborhood and every once in awhile we see a skunk. Although our cats stay indoors, other cats occasionally pass through our back yard, as does the rare coyote. But this is the first evidence I’ve seen of a rabbit. Jericho beach has a population of feral rabbits, so I assume that she may have come from there. Hopefully she was just passing through…there are already enough entities consuming my vegetables.

In January, one of the coniferous shrubs suddenly started to drop all of it’s needles. Over a month I cut back and removed the branches until just the stump was left. Today we dug it out – it was a major effort and took three hours of cutting, digging and finally torquing it out. I can see why some people might be tempted to use dynamite. In the space that was formerly taken up by the shrub I planted eight blueberry plants, two of each of the following varieties: Duke and Reka (hardy, early season, firm fruit); Chandler (mid-late season, long ripening season, large fruit); Bluecrop (vigorous, hardy, mid-season). I want to keep track of which plants are which and have made a map (which I can’t seem to see on my iPad….hmmm).

One of my main projects for this year is to reclaim most of my front yard. Until a few years ago, the entire area was taken up by an enormous fir. After the tree was removed, we tried planting the area with daffodils and other bulbs (year one) and then a wildflower seed blend (year 2). Things just went downhill from there and last year we ended up with a wild mix of day lilies, foxgloves, something that looks similar to fireweed, those tall blue blue-bell things, and lots of grass. LOTS OF GRASS. Sure, it sounds fabulous and I admit that I did make a few nice bouquets but mostly it was unmanageable. All winter I’ve laid flattened cardboard boxes over the dirt and covered everything with a layer of compost/dirt, with the intention of suffocating the weeds. I am  about 80% done – I still need a few more boxes and few more bags of dirt. The original plan was to wait a year and plant blueberries, but now that I’ve planted blueberries in the back, I need to think of something else for the front.

The front yard in June 2018

Finally, the biggest change to the back garden has been the addition of a barrel sauna. Inspired by a fabulous sauna we had last September at a friend’s cabin, I did some research (not enough, it turned out) and our sauna kit arrived just before Christmas. The sauna is now up an working and is truly excellent, but it required much more effort (time, energy, $$$) than anticipated. If anyone is thinking of buying one of these kits, please call me first.

Below is a photo of eight tiny blueberry plants with the sauna in the background. The tall sticks are to hopefully prevent anyone from stepping on the tiny blueberry plants.

The short version:

It’s a mild winter here in Vancouver and I’ve already planted my fava beans. I’ve given up valuable gardening space for a passion project.

The long version:

The mild winter and the recent sunshine pulled me outdoors all week. I’ve pruned the boxwoods and lavender, cut back the dead foliage from the lily, crocosmia and black-eyed susans, and have cleaned up all the piles of rotting leaves and needles that have accumulated in unexpected corners.

The mild winter meant that we’ve enjoyed kale and mustard greens including arugula, pac choi and mizuna. With the recent sunshine, the chives and parsley are starting to grow and the first garlic sprouts are peeking out. Two weeks ago I replanted last summer’s surviving golden Swiss Chard: it was growing in a very dense row so I dug up and pulled apart the plants and spaced them more evenly. Already popular with the slugs/birds/rodents, the green foliage is being eaten as fast as it unfolds, leaving behind spiky yellow stems.

Today I planted an entire bed with fava beans. These seeds I saved from last year, and were the ones left on the plants for too long and dried naturally in the pods. This is an early planting record as I usually don’t plant these until late February. According to West Coast Seeds you can plant fava beans in October but in my experience the October favas never survive the winter. Hopefully the warmish weather will continue and they will all germinate.

I am starting to plan everything else that I want to grow. Space is limited this spring as two beds are already completely full, but the favas and garlic will be finished by summer in time to plant fall/winter crops. The other two beds will  somehow magically accommodate peas-potatoes-cucumber-zucchini-squash-pumpkins-nasturtiums-calendula-lettuce-lettuce-lettuce-arugula; I might have to go vertical. Planting space is down this year because I traded away my usual fava territory to Jan (complex real estate negotiations) in exchange for the space where he used to grow his tomatoes.

Next blog: The passion project.

Before my first trip to Spain in 2010, I bought a Spanish language CD to help my sons and I to learn a bit of the language. The CD consisted of minimal dialogue (similar to a recitative) and a series of songs incorporating Spanish words and phrases, often sang as a English/Spanish duet. The CD was ultimately not very useful for us, as it was mostly about meeting and hooking up with potential new romantic partners. Some of those songs are now stuck in my head forever, and once in awhile one shakes loose. This was one of those weeks, and the words and melody of “Estos son los colores de mi vida” (“Theeeeese are the colours of my liiiiiiiife“) have been on repeat since last Tuesday.

On that day I attended the BC Cancer Foundation lunch and was seated next to another guest who had just designed and landscaped a new garden. She described her garden design MO as: “three types of greens, you get to pick two”. Apparently there are three key shades of green – yellow green, red green and blue green – and you need to limit your plant choices to two of those shades in one area to achieve harmony.

HUH. (Long pause while I stopped to consider that).

I’ve been squinting at plants ever since and think she is right. I pulled out my dad’s color wheel (see above, front and back) which shows examples of yellow green, blue green and red green. Our front garden has lots of red green – the  Japanese maples, the cornus kousa and the cherry tree, while the back has mostly yellow green grasses and shrubs as well as blue green spruces and coniferous shrubs. I am seeing green in a whole new way.

But that is not all….

Maybe Tuesday, September 18, 2018 qualifies as a life changing day, in subtle ways. Later that same evening I attended my first level 1 Sommelier class. The wheel shown above was part of the course materials. Sweet Jesus! Why do they have to make the print so small? Risa and I were squinting hard to identify the appropriate descriptors for each of the wines we tasted. If that first class is any indication, my sommelier fantasies are in jeopardy. Not only was I unable to taste some of the wine flavours that others readily identified, but one of the wines actually tasted like NOTHING. NOOOOOO-THING. Yikes. And every time I have picked up the wheel this week to study (aka: drink more wine), that stupid “Estos son los colores de mi vida” song has popped into my head. ……

So, this is a pretty accurate summary of what self-employment can be like when things are quiet: social lunches, drinking wine, humming along to songs in my head, cooking lots, working in the garden and squinting at plants, color wheels and wine glasses. I am enjoying this September break because in another week and a half the fall projects all start.

Happy Fall everyone!

Summer brings so many wonderful things and I’ve tried to appreciate them all: the wind in the leaves, the flowers, the sound of the birds, and all my people. With several weeks of summer left, it may be premature to award prizes, but here goes.

(1) The raspberries. 

It’s okay to play favourites, and raspberries are mine. They get an inordinate amount of the attention, water and fertilizer. Although I installed a watering system early in the year, one of the hoses split (boo) so watered by hand the rest of the summer. I made lots of jam, we’ve enjoyed raspberry ice-cream and I have many pounds of frozen raspberries in the freezer for future desserts.

(2) The arborist.

This year we hired a real arborist. He did a fabulous pruning job on several of the overgrown and poorly pruned trees, removed some, treated disease and fertilized others.   We have a bumper crop of apples, and for the first time ever harvested plums and a bumper crop of seven pears (it is a very tiny tree).

(3) The flowers.

This was a spectacular year for flowers. With the rhododendrons, lilacs and everything else in bloom, at one point this spring I was the girl with the most flowers. Cyclists stopped their bikes on the street in front of the house. Neighbours emailed to say how much they loved the display. My favourites were the enormous pink poppies in the front and saved seeds to propagate further.

(4) UBC Farm: Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) and the long table fundraiser.

The UBC Farm CSA charges $680 for 20 weeks of produce, including eggs every second week. My Saturday highlight is to collect my share at the UBC Farm. Although the CSA emails a list of what vegetables to expect, there are usually some substitutions and extra items. I’ve tried a lot of new recipes this summer (see below) and we’ve mostly done a great job of eating everything. Yes, I am joining again next year.

This is what the tart is supposed to look like…

In July we attended the UBC Farm Long table dinner. It was just like it sounds – people seated at long tables in the poplar grove – except much better. The light was magical, the company was awesome and the food was spectacular. I’m on a mission to recreate the fruit and mascarpone tart that was served for dessert. I am not so talented with the pastry and so my friends christened the latest attempt as a “floop”, then ate it anyway.

(5) Quick pickles

We’ve been struggling to eat all those beans, so it was a big relief to learn to make quick pickles. I quick pickled crunchy radishes and beans, flavoured them with garlic and dill from the garden, and they are spectacular. Meh on the small peppers, however.  The recipe from Lucy Waterman: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/food-and-wine/article-how-do-i-quick-pickle-vegetables/.

(6) Visitors

One of the best things about having a garden is that it is easy to share, and the best parts of my summer were sharing my garden with friends. Most of the visit involved eating. Having a new kitchen means that I now feel a lot of pressure to serve something special. I tested out different recipes on many of my friends and they brought wine, salads, preserves and baking to share. This part I hope to continue well into fall.

Okay, that’s it for now. Back to the garden….

This year I was enticed by photos of multicolour Easter egg radishes in the West Coast Seeds catalogue and recipe inspiration from my favourite cookbook. I read the seed planting instructions carefully, and did a first sow mid-February, then again early of March, two rows each of Spanish black radishes and the Easter Egg variety. Everything came up, the radishes were well watered by the rain, and appropriately spaced. Last week I pulled a few bunches of the Easter Egg ones (they come in purple and pink),  briefly considered taking a photo but ate them instead. The Spanish black radishes are now all leggy and bolting, but without any radishy bits. Boo.

This is the third year in a row that I’ve tried the Spanish black radishes and I have no idea what I’ve done wrong. If you know, don’t bother telling me, because I am not planting them again. I was chatting with my ultimate green-thumb friend Brian and he doesn’t even grow radishes anymore as he hasn’t had a lot of luck either.

Other garden things:

• The weather is unseasonably hot and so we are watering all the time. Some plants like the lilacs, lilies and poppies are loving the heat, while the peonies are suffering.
• It feels like mid-July and I am wearing my matronly Mediterranean Villa wardrobe every day because it is so hot.
• Last year’s kale has gone to seed. The yellow flowers were very popular with bees and am hoping to harvest some of the seed pods for late summer plantings.
• Last year’s Italian endive overwintered and then went crazy this spring before bolting. We enjoyed the last leaves in an over-spicy “magic crockpot creation”; we currently have no kitchen so are alternating between barbecuing and bad crackpot recipes. Tip: crockpot pasta is a bad idea.
• Peas and fava beans are doing fairly well.
• Last weekend I planted half a bed of tricolour bush beans and half pole beans.
• This weekend I am hoping to plant all my “June” seeds: cucumbers, squash, cilantro.  I will have extra space for it this year as the only spring seeds to really grow were the lake storm: endive and fennel didn’t germinate, but if it did, the slugs got it.
• Last weekend my West coast brother and I visited family in Edmonton and planted my Albertan brother’s vegetable box for him. I set up a daily outlook reminder so he will get into the watering habit. Mannix: beans should be up!

I rely on a month-by-month birthday calendar that hangs on the wall in my office. When google’s artificial non-intelligence kept multiplying birthday reminders, I stopped using my electronic calendar for this task. Perhaps a function of my advancing age, I now have as many dead people in my birthday calendar as live* people. This annual reminder  is far from morbid, but gives me a chance to fondly remember family and friends who still mean so much.

Today, April 2, is Elizabeth Loomer’s birthday, one of the most devoted** gardeners I’ve ever known and my gardening inspiration. We first met in the fall of 1986, when I rented her basement suite. The small house in Cadboro Bay was surrounded by Elizabeth’s gorgeous garden and every window looked out on flowers and greenery. My parents were more practical gardeners and our yard was divided equally into lawn (with a few trees) and a vegetable patch where my parents worked hard to get things to grow. In contrast, Elizabeth’s garden was a verdant living entity that had to be tamed. Her garden and greenhouse were always full of wonderful things: enormous rhododendrons, unusual berries, and quiet corners where one could go to escape. She would bring the garden inside: gorgeous zen-like arrangements of branches and blossoms floating in bowls near the entrance.

In the years I lived there – and beyond – Elizabeth was second mother to me, and her daughters the sisters I always wish I had. Elizabeth’s enviable gardening talent (and the greenhouse) lives on with her daughters (both still in my birthday calendar). Today while I was working in the garden I thought of Elizabeth, and appreciated how much she changed the way I garden, with her encouragement and example.

In the garden this weekend

Whew, it was great weather, so I spent a lot of time outside.

• I installed a series of soaker hoses for the raspberries. I am short about 15 feet of soaker hose, so left the front of the raspberry batch without irrigation as that is the easiest to water manually.  While the majority of canes are now budding, some seem slower and I worry that they are not well. I also sprinkled berry fertilizer throughout the patch in anticipation of the Big Spring Rains coming next week.
• It’s April, so I planted nasturtiums everywhere.
• I planted one row of Italian Endive, a row of Freckles lettuce (a slug favourite), a row of “Kale Storm” seed balls and two rows of Orion fennel in bed #1 next to the garlic (which is all up now). I activated the Slug Shield*** and am hoping for the best.
• I did a lot of general clean up, weeding and admiring of small blossoms including violets.

The forecast for Vancouver in the next week is rainy. I only hope that it stays warm and doesn’t freeze.

*Shameful confession: there simply isn’t space or time for the dramatic and self-absorbed, so every few years I transcribe only the deserving into a new calendar.

**Exactly how do you describe a good gardener? Talented? Gifted? Dedicated? Experienced? Visionary? A combination of some or all of those things?

***The slug shield is a woven copper ribbon that you can wrap around your favourite plants and around entire beds. One roll is enough for two – half raised beds. I also sprinkled around crushed eggshells in a sort of voodoo mojo slug repellent thing.

Today I harvested the first bouquet of kale this year. I roasted the kale Melissa Clark style, at 450 degrees with lots of olive oil and tossed it with a Melissa Clark-inspired yogurt-garlic-lemon juice dressing. Topped with toasted walnuts, half an avocado and fresh chives from the garden, it was fabulous.

“Dinner: Changing the Game” is my current favourite cookbook and features Melissa Clark’s fast (less than 45 minutes), tasty and adaptable recipes. I was introduced to the book through a cookbook club (cook bookclub? cookbook bookclub?) started by my friend Sarah. I am already part way through our next book, “Salt Fat Acid Heat” by Samin Nosrat. Although Melissa’s book has changed how I cook, Samin’s book takes things to a whole new level. She breaks down and describes each of the elements of cooking (as per the title) and teaches the reader how to improvise. Kitchen improv skills are essential for adapting to the sometimes unexpected combinations and quantities of fresh garden produce.

Garden update

Vancouver is still unseasonably cold, but things are growing. The peas and radishes that I planted three weeks ago are sprouting, so yesterday I planted a few more rows of each. I surrounded the pea bed with my new slug-repelling copper ribbon from West Coast Seeds and covered the bed with a frame to hopefully keep the birds from plucking up the sprouts. Still no sign of the fava beans.

Raspberry propagation: advice from the master gardener

One of my largest raspberry canes snapped off after getting weighted down by heavy snow last month. I asked one of my friends (who may or may not be a master gardener*) what I should do and she directed me to this website:   http://homeguides.sfgate.com/replant-broken-raspberry-plant-54577.html

I won’t reproduce the instructions here, except to emphasize that I washed the pots with soap and water and made up the potting mixture exactly as they advised. Each piece had about six leaf nodes, and the plants that I am trying to propagate vary in size depending on how high up the cane that they came from. At this point each of the plants has started to leaf and even flower; I am not sure if I should let them continue leafing or if I should pinch off the leaves. More research required.

*Apparently, being a Master Gardener is like being in Fight Club: the first rule of being a Master Gardener is that you do not talk about being a Master Gardener. Or something like that.