I know I'm not the only one who does this. You know, this: You know how it is - you go to the garden shop and there's this and there's that and you just... can't...say... no. In this case, there were a few things on my "must have" list - including (but not limited to) cold hardy, dwarf cherries. They had four varieties so I bought... yes, four. But really here, growing fruit is a real trick. I can do well enough with gooseberries and currants (when they're protected from goats, chickens, and ducks), some raspberries and last year - blueberries. So, this is a garden trial I suppose. I think cherry leaves for ecoprinting, pruning for dye, and cherries for eating. I know you can see something that looks suspiciously like an elderberry by my knee. It is an elderberry. I love elderberries for syrup and flowers for cordial and wonder about the leaves for printing as well. I may have also gotten barberries and a hardy fig (which may or may not be hardy here) Ah gardening. Now I have to figure out what each of these needs. Haha. Time to research. Afternote: Yeah, that one had to go back. I don't need a toxic red berry elderberry planted on purpose. Fortunately, there were a few other friends ready to take its place. Yep, a Golf can fit a full sized quince, some hardy kiwis, and definitely knitting. Now, time to plant.
Now I don't know about you but here we re having a major drought. Summer came early and it came hard. I have raspberries ripening about two weeks ahead of schedule and lacking about two week's worth of flavour. Bummer. Everything's kind of like that this year too. So, here I am thinking about the fall and wanting to be sure I have an awesome garden that sustains us and I have no idea of how to go about that. Is it a warm El Niño year, or a cold one? I have no idea. Both seem to be written about. And if the season is two weeks (or more) ahead, will we have a longer growing season or an earlier winter? Yikes! So many decisions and as you all know, two weeks can mean the difference between life and death for a young plant. So, to that end, I've decided on a couple of courses of action. First of all, I'd always thought we were Zone 4 and truthfully, I'm sure we are some years. But largely we're just not. More like Zone 6 according to most of the hardiness charts. So, I'm going to garden as though we're Zone 5. I'm not just splitting the difference. I think if I go with the expectations that it will be a slightly harder, slightly earlier start to winter, likely the plants will survive. After all, it's better to have them a little mature at the start of winter, rather than too young. So, better to have it be all a bit more mature and harvest it sooner than have this happen too early: Though I confess, by the time it comes I will so be happy to see it! So, my plan is to use one of the garden planners to figure out what I need to be planting and when. Now, if you're super fancy, you could use this frost date finder along with this handy chart of temps that keep plants happy. While I am super fancy (of course) I'm also going to cheat and use something like this: Here's another one specifically for zone 5. Either way, it's definitely not too early to start thinking about which delicious things you'd like to eat over the winter fresh, from your own garden or greenhouse. And also think about ways to make that happen.
Not sure what I mean about that? Well, that will be a great topic for the next post, won't it? 'Night! |
AuthorI'm a 40-something writer and smallholder living in the wilds of BC with my family, our small herd of Nigerian Dwarf Goats, chickens, ducks, dogs, and cats. Archives
August 2017
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