Garden 2024 Update #2

I'm doing these garden updates mostly for myself to keep accurate records of what worked, what didn't, and why. 

I thought it would be fun to make them public, in hopes of inspiring or encouraging anyone else out there attempting to grow their own. 

I accidentally deleted the actual #2 update. Some pics from the now-deleted last update:

Since my last update I'm thankful to say overall, things are still going really well.

Seen in the pics above are sweet potato slips at about 30 days after clipping off the sweet potatoes, and there were roughly 18 of them.  Things have changed a lot since then. 

The yellow onions are still doing really well.  So far, after many years in a row of yellow onion failure (in one form or another) I'm delighted to say this is the best they've ever done for me. Since my growing philosophy is simply to grow what you eat, and this household goes through a lot of onions every year, this has been my most challenging crop. I'm hopeful this is the breakthrough year where it all goes well!  I greatly overplanted with the hopes they'd all do well, so whatever I don't use will be going to my daughter and son-in-law's garden to feed their family. 

For the last several years I've gone between a growing station in my dining room to a cheap plastic/aluminum greenhouse on my deck. I loved the greenhouse (and it held up impressively well, but wasn't designed for the harsh, southern Ontario winters)  but it was too much work to dismantle & rebuild every year. This is my set-up now in an almost 0% traffic location of my laundry room.  It really didn't take much to re-imagine the space, move a couple of things and create a very convenient indoor, temperature & light controlled grow room for all my seed starting needs.  What's growing here currently is sweet potatoes, yellow potatoes, yellow onions, Alpine strawberries, 3 varieties of tomatoes, 3 varieties of peppers, ground cherries and a pot of lemon balm I planted from seed last spring. 

In a couple more weeks I'll start my zucchini and that will be it for the indoor seed starting this year. One major change is not growing my pickling cucumbers from indoor seelings.  I'll be direct sowing cucumber seed this year, and seeing how that works out over starting them indoors.  

Overall, germination has been really successful except for a couple of things I used older seeds for, that were purchased last spring. That was sort of an experiment to see if year old seeds did as well as recently purchased seeds.  Results: they do not. Lesson learned.  This year I'm also going to be more geared toward seed saving with all my most common crops. 

This is my kitchen window shelf now, where the sweet potato slips live in their jars of water, while they develop their lovely roots.  I've lost an accurate count but after I snipped more off the potatoes today and added them to the jars, there are roughly 60 slips here. One slip will produce roughly 6 sweet potatoes so, assuming each one remains healthy until time to plant ... you're looking at roughly 360 sweet potatoes here. 😲

I don't have nearly enough room prepared for that many slips so all the extras will also be going to my daughter and son-in-law's garden.  One of the coolest things about these slips is that they all came from only 3 medium sized sweet potatoes. If this is something your family eats a lot of, this is a fantastic way to save money on groceries. 

All of my tomatoes are doing well.  I'm growing sauce tomatoes, slicing tomatoes, and cherry tomatoes.  Germination rate has been really good for most all of them except the sauce tomatoes.  Only around 50% there, so I re-seeded a few days ago and we'll see how it goes.  If I don't have what I have already planned for by outdoor planting time I'll pick up plants at my local organic greenhouse.  Which is always a dangerous trip since I tend to then come home with extra peppers, some different herbs, and sometimes another fruit tree. 😂

I have experimented enough over the years to know for sure now, that I need to toss out any and all seeds over a year old.  Every time, they've proven to be very low producers in germination rates so it's time to get rid of them.  I'll only be keeping any flower seeds I have, and creating a spot for those in the front yard.  I have some really big ideas of turning my front yard into a Pollinator Paradise, so this will be a fun step this year to see how that goes. 

I hope this blesses you and encourages you to be a good steward of God's awesome gifts.    

  
 

Spring 2024 Garden Update #1

It's the last week of February and here in Southern Ontario what's called the "hardiness zone 6a" there is still plenty of winter, and winter weather left before our estimated "last frost" of the season in mid-May. 

So while winter is what's still happening outside, here's what's happening inside.  Mostly with 2 crops I haven't had much success with!  So this year will be more experimentation to see what works best. 

Sweet Potatoes

Best practice is to start your slips roughly 8-12 weeks before the last frost date, and I grow mine on a heat mat & under a grow light for 12 hours a day. I've never tried growing them in water, but growing them with the sweet potato half covered in rich, well watered soil works well for me. I'll be spacing 4-6 slips in 20 gallon grow bags this year, to see how container growing works in my zone. (I'll be documenting that and sharing how that turns out!) I've experimented with growing in conditioned straw bales before but it was a big disappointment despite sticking with the protocol suggested. Suffice it to say, I ended up with plenty of fantastic mulch!  

So this year it will be grow bags (which I've had great success with, with other garden plants), and a brand new locaton with more direct sun than the last location.  

Yellow Onions

Onions are another crop I've struggled with over the years.  From old seeds that didn't germinate well or were just weak and puny, to squirrels, chipmunks and various other garden visitors, I've struggled to keep my onions growing & thriving.  This year, things look far more hopeful, at least initially.

I planted these seeds on the 8th of January to give them a solid 16 weeks jumpstart to the growing season. I've read that each onion stem should be the size of a pencil by the time you transplant outdoors, but to be honest, mine have never been that large by the time I planted them outdoors. Chopstick size, at best. 😊

In the past I've tried various options such as "over seeding" where you grow a condensed number of seeds in one space and then thin them all out before planting, a condensed row planting, and then single cell planting of literally a single seed in each plug tray.  This year I'm trying a single seed per cell approach as well as a "middle of the road" overseeding with roughly 10-12 seeds per 3 inch pot.  

So far, they're all doing really well.  Almost 100% germination, and the 10-12 overseeded pots are the strongest of all of them.  My goal this year with yellow onions is to be planted in a 16 foot long raised bed along the south facing fence line. Hoping for some beautiful, delicious yellow cooking onions by the end of the season.  I'll also be covering them at least initially, with some format of pest cloth. 

Tapping Maples 

Something brand new to me this year, is Maple tree tapping for turning sap into syrup. I've been researching this subject for about a year, but I only have 1, single Norway maple on my property. 😊  

It's a massive 35+ year old tree , and can easily take 2 taps and I figure... it's there, why not use it? 

I purchased plastic spiles (commonly referred to taps, the black plastic part, seen in this image to the left) that came highly recommended but they've turned out to be a a really big disappointment. The first two broke while tapping into the tree and had to be replaced.  

Tapping maples and collecting sap is weather dependant so it varies from year to year. The season is generally late winter for about 4-6 weeks of good sap flow before the buds on the branches begin to swell, and then the syrup turns "buddy", meaning it takes on an unpleasant starchy flavor of the budding branches and is no longer useful for making sweet syrup. 

My single Norway was tapped last week, and the sap began flowing greatly yesterday, but there are some big issues with leaky tap holes so I'm troubleshooting and will be replacing the plastic spiles with stainless steel spiles.  I'm sure at this point there is the same amount of sap flowing down the trunk of the tree as there is collecting in the sap bucket, so my goal is to seal the leaks, and collect ALL the sap for maple syrup production. With only one tree for tapping, I need all the sap I can get. 

One more fun project that will be updated as the season progresses. 

Wishing for all of you, God would bless the work of your hands that you might grow in abundance for yourself and your family.  💖