Diary

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Tuesday, June 04, 2024

We are in yet-another-week of cold, drizzle, fog, rain …

Nonetheless I put on mud-shoes and plant out the four Sweet mama Squash seeds. The westernmost is in a hole that is filled in above some sort of rusted drain pipe; it may not flourish.

And then I start twelve more seeds from my sack of 1,000 pumpkin seeds.

Wednesday, June 05, 2024

Today threatens to be mild (grin) so I have four items optimistically placed on my ToDo List:-

I might get more than that done, but if I get those four done I’ll go to sleep a happy man.

(1) Plant those half-dozen potato plants from the green vermicomposter into the raised bed (and empty the green bin vermicomposter)

I dragged the green vermicomposter to the front door. There are more than half a dozen stalks here.

Outside I count thirteen, some with a small potato attached, some as just roots, as if they had developed from peel, and then the worms had devoured the peel.

I planted nine (3x3) in a four-foot plot and discarded the smaller shoots.

I am not – yet – into “hilling the potatoes”. Maybe later. One down three to go.

(2) Weed the remainder of the original gooseberry patch.

I doesn’t look all that much tidier, but it really is. Like the flower beds, I will need to make a second pass in a week or two.

I was happy to discover another batch of cuttings, ready to pot. Hooray!

I have marked some of the dozen cuttings transplanted two? months ago.

(3) Make eight crude rectangular frames to support the eight panes of glass; good for protecting seedlings in cold weather.

Take two pieces 30” long and two pieces 21” long and nail them together once the sorted collection of nails is safely housed in the “fittings” cabinet.

Yes, test the first frame with a pane of glass before starting the next three.

I assemble four frames and set each one around one the Sweet Mama squash seedlings.

There is a gap between the base and the uneven soil, but if the sun comes out I will have to remove the glass panes before the seedlings fry.

(4) Sieve enough soil for my terrarium.

I had a shot, but the soil is too wet after the rain of the past week. I tossed six shovels and gave up. On the other hand, I did negotiate to make strips in Steven’s land and sow pumpkins.

Friday, June 07, 2024

Three days ago I planted a handful of Detroit beetroot seeds in a plastic tub and placed the lid on. Yesterday I noticed a seedling. That’s the fastest germination I’ve seen for beetroot – 48 hours!

Saturday, June 08, 2024

This potato plant burst through two days ago – the first of my row of seed chits held over from last year. Hooray!

Monday, June 10, 2024

My pumpkin seeds (from the bag of thousands) are pushing through. One of them is showing off by pushing itself out of the soil using its radical!

Search

Wednesday, June 12, 2024

At five o’clock this morning Bernard dropped off a truckload of grass clippings.

And one of my neighbours dropped off grass clippings yesterday evening.

My transplanted gooseberry bushes are doing well, but are about to enter a fight with various weeds.

Of course some of the weeds are self-sown artichokes from last year’s crop.

Each gooseberry bush gets six or eight gloved handfuls of clippings; mulch to keep down the weeds in the immediate vicinity of the bush.

Once the bushes are cloaked, I will spread clippings on all the other space; that will suffocate about 95% of the remaining weeds.

I hope.

\The clippings will be taken into the soil by earthworms.

Here is a happy little bush in detail, with its collar of clippings.

I spent a half hour on Monday toweling out large weeds from part of a driveway bed. I put them on the driveway to give the roots a day or two to dry out.

The stretch I weeded will benefit from a two-inch thick layer of clippings; that should slow down any new weeds.

GRASS CLIPPINGS: They’re not just for compost bins.

Speaking of which, in the foreground you see another batch of compost has landed on the raised bed.

In the background: It is dead-easy to fill the bins before putting the face panel in place.

Thursday, June 13, 2024

At the end of the day, each bush is circled by a thick wad of clippings and most of the patch is covered by a thick wad of clippings. If Tomorrow brings grass, I can finish off this plot.

Friday, June 21, 2024

Yum! The gooseberries have appeared on my bushes again.

Saturday, June 22, 2024

Life proceeds apace; there are always grass clippings to bin, or to spread as mulch.

I start the day by tying six front-panels in place on the face of six emptied bins.

From now on I will have to toss clippings up and over the panels.

By 930 each of the six bins had received a barrow (or two) of grass, a thin layer of new compost, and another barrow (or two) of grass.

The huge pile is almost gone.

I tidy it, and leave it visible in case someone hears about my site, but not seeing me here heads off to the tip anyway. Perhaps a small pile will attract customers.

Yesterday’s weeds can spend the rest of today drying out.

I hope to travel through all these cans of trees this afternoon.

One task at the back (compost bins) and one at the front (weeding and planting a replacement gooseberry bush.

Wednesday, June 26, 2024

I wake to find the first Iris bloom of the year.

And my first blossom of the 20 potato chits.

Five of my six imported BC spuds are up, and the transplanted rhubarb appears to have survived.

Thursday, June 27, 2024

My margarine tub of a tomato slice has sent up about two dozen tomato plants.

Friday, June 28, 2024

Rain is forecast for today. The radar map shows two forks of rain, but Bonavista lies between two tines. I have until about 10:20 to get my first batch of beetroot seeds in.

Bernard, bless him, dropped off another truck of clippings late yesterday or early this morning. I forked six wheel barrows of clippings from last weekend into the six active bins, then brushed the wet stuff and Bernard’s pile into a smaller shape.

I still think in terms of a small pile attracting deposits of larger piles, especially with the long weekend coming up.

I raked clear another 4’x4’ plot. The row to the right (north) is filled, and this plot will be the fourth of six in the bed. Two more plots after this and my raised bed is half-loaded.

The plot strings not only delimit the plots, but I can easily rake off top debris through the string and into the next plot. The rake head marks the limit of smoothed earth.

I could sieve the small pile closer to me if I wanted to obtain serious pebbles and chunks of wood.

I will use the rotten sheet of plywood – circled in the furnace bin – as a kneeling pad.

Six rows of beetroot planted, starting from the top (West) two rows of Early Wonder, then two rows of Cylindria, and finally two rows of Detroit from the bag scavenged from Mike Mik three or four years ago;.

I figure that at least one of the three batches should germinate within a fortnight, and guide me to my second planting.

Saturday, June 29, 2024

This afternoon I planted out nine tomato plants. Which completes the second row of 6 plots.

At this eastern end is a plot of artichokes which I plan to leave in, thin out, and harvest in the fall. I want to change to Skorospelka.

Next are the nine teeny-tiny tomatoes that sprang, with two dozen others, from a 2mm slice of tomato planted early May this year.

Next the six rows of beetroot planted two? days ago.

Next four stands of rhubarb – three showing – transplanted from the patch at the side of the house.

Then the potato slips I found growing in that green tub vermicomposter in the laundry.

Finally the six potato tubers from the co-op in Bonavista.

This shot is from the western end, so 6 tubers from the coop, slips from the vermicomposter, and then rhubarb. In the background are the raked and watered plots of beetroot and tomatoes.

Sunday, June 30, 2024

Late this afternoon I saw what looked like a miniature black plastic bag, where Gary drops off bags of lawn clippings. But Gary doesn’t mow lawns on weekends. Turned out to be a dead crow.

Hit by a car, I hope, and not targeted by a youth.

Like the Lancashire women who would rush out with a shovel to collect the horse droppings for the husband’s rose bushes, I picked the body up and carried it to the compost bin #4.

Then I tossed half a barrow on top of the corpse.

A small experiment. Will the neighbourhood cats leap into the bin, uncover the bird and eat it?

If not it will be just added richness to next year’s compost supply for the raised bed.

Which reminds me, private fishing (which here means “for cod”) started yesterday. I must stand by to accept several barrow loads of cod carcasses from David.