Things I can't believe are growing

Some things that I thought were shoe-ins were total duds (ie spinach and radish), and others have been unexpected successes. I hope I'm not speaking too soon...

The bush cucumber on the sunny patio has two little fruits on it and lots of other flowers.

The broccoli is broccoli-ing and looks wonderful! There are 4 other plants like this. But I'm not sure when I'm supposed to pick it.

And here's the zucchini. I suppose I did expect that this would work out, but am delighted that it has none-the-less.

Apples for Pie

What to do with 22 lb of apples? First of all, I think I have figured out what they are: malus domestica (transparent apples). And get this, they're prized for apple pies and hard to find. So our Saturday morning mission was to find an apple peeler/corer/slicer that clamps to the counter. Wow does it ever work well. And the best part is, as some cross between a kitchen appliance and a handyman tool, it is likely to get the male in your house keen to participate.

We have 5 lb peeled, cored and sliced apples in the freezer now, and I don't know how much more to go. Maybe we dealt with a third or so. I'd like to dehydrate some, and maybe use some fresh for baking if it's not too hot out. I wouldn't mind canning some apple sauce, but I'm not sure it's the right apple because when I did a small test batch, I realized that a LOT of sugar has to be added to take the edge of the tartness.

The yellow plums are going to be ripe any day and we're not sure what to do with those yet. We'll eat as many fresh as we can and give some away, but I'm sure there will be more than we can eat. Any ideas?

It's a Jungle out There!

The melancholy of ending our epic sailing trip to Desolation Sound was quickly replaced by the joy of exploring a garden that had exploded into a jungle, and harvesting the ripe fruits and veggies.

On our trip, I had a few gardening-related experiences and thoughts. On a walk through Vananda on Texada Island, we encountered the most beautiful vegetable garden I have ever seen. So lush and organized, like a quilt of food to come. Apparently Texada is ideal for growing vegetables because of the lime in the soil and a warmer, dryer climate than nearby Powell River.

We had a number of books with us on the trip about the history of the places we were travelling to and through, and it's the settler history that was particularly interesting. Very few people actually live in the Desolation Sound area, but in the early 1900's and through the Depression, there were hundred or thousands of permanent residents, many people homesteading and making a living selling produce, eggs, meat, etc to logging and fishing camps, other settlers and even markets in Vancouver. There's one story of homesteaders shipping their berries to Vancouver to be made into jam.

In most cases it seems the homesteads only lasted for one generation, and there's barely a trace of them today. We scrounged around one site in particular, (Mike's Place in Melanie Cove that's described in The Curve of Time), and although we could pick out a few remaining apple trees covered in moss and on their last legs, and a few remnants of the rock terraces Mike built, we were amazed at how, in 80 years, there was virtually no trace. What hard work it must have been, and how sad I felt, to see it all but disappeared.

Back to my urban homestead, Yukon Gold potatoes that I planted in the little coffee sacks (pictured in this post) were dead when we got back. The big sack with the Red Chieftains is still going, so I wonder if the little sack got too dried out in the hot weather. Well I dumped out the sacks into a wheelbarrow and rummaged through for the potatoes. A sad little harvest, but it will do for one supper I suppose.

In the fruit tree world, we need to do a major prune on the cherry tree because they are mostly too high up to get even with our 10 foot orchard ladder. It's the only tree we didn't get around to pruning over the winter. We did a great job with the apple tree, and arrived home from the trip to find a lot of them had already dropped. So I picked them all today, and got 22 pounds. Hooray! They're a baking apple, tart and a bit of a mealy texture. I made apple sauce with a few of them yesterday, which turned out quite well. What will I do with the rest? Pie? More apple sauce? Dehydrated? Other ideas?

We didn't do any spraying of anything, wanting to see how the apples turned out on their own the first year. Many of them are blemish-free, but maybe 1 in 10 looks like this. Any ideas?

How are your gardens doing?

Off the Dirt for 19 Days

You won't hear my sordid tales of bugs and snails for a while. We are off in the Ooviloo for 19 days sailing up the coast and down again. Don't worry, the garden is being watered, and a couple of friends are looking forward to gleaning the ripe fruits and veggies while we're away (peas, lettuce, cherries, raspberries, strawberries, to name a few)

Hope your gardens are fruitful, and the sun shines and this weather gets a bit warmer (both for the plants and for swimming from the sailboat! Signing off.