Finally finished the fence

Posted on August 17, 2015 by Julia at Home on 129 Acres

The benefit of using the old longe ring for the garden meant that we already had a fence. However, it was a beautiful sturdy weathered wood fence. Perfect for form, not so good for function when it comes to a garden.

The ring was used to exercise horses. Meaning anything smaller than a horse could fit through the fence.

Matt and I decided to add chainlink to keep the bunnies and other hungry creatures away from our garden.

I had collected a few rolls of chainlink from the ends of various people’s driveways, but the ring is so big that I had to buy three more rolls. So this project was definitely the most expensive part of the garden so far coming in at nearly $300.

Fortunately, we didn’t have to buy posts or anything else besides staples. We made use of the wood fence and stapled the chainlink to the existing posts.

Lesson learned, we should have thought a bit more about who does what.

I stretched the fence, and Matt hammered the staples. I have less muscle than Matt, so stretching the fence was hard for me. Matt has bigger fingers than me, so he hammered his fingers a lot while he was holding the staples between the links of the fence.

Matt wasn’t going to give in though. There was no way he was switching roles. So we worked our way around the garden taking breaks to hammer the ground in frustration or slap mosquitoes who just won’t go away this summer.

When we reached the end of a roll, we joined it to the next section by weaving in a single strand of fencing. Just twist, twist, twist until the wire reaches the bottom. (To separate a section of fence, you just reverse the process and untwist one piece of wire. Your fence will easily split in two.)

Eventually, we got a rhythm. A lot of it consisted of us asking each other, “Ready?” And then, “Hold it, woman!”

Our marriage survived, and our garden is fenced.

Fenced, but not gated. We bought wood for the gate last week but haven’t built it yet. So we are still welcoming the hungry creatures–horse-sized and smaller–to our garden.

The thing that I like about the fence is that the chainlink is pretty much invisible, so we still have the aesthetic qualities of the wood fence that I fell in love with from the start.

And to be honest, our garden isn’t really under threat from the local wildlife. Our beans were munched shortly after they sprouted, but the rest of their gardenmates have survived… and thrived. In fact, I think Matt would be happy if a hungry hoard descended on the zucchini.

Harvest!

Posted on August 7, 2015 by Julia at Home on 129 Acres

I know this blog has turned into more of a gardening blog over the last little while as opposed to a home reno blog. We have many more renos to go, but in our limited Canadian growing season, I am going to garden. I appreciate you all sticking with me. In case you can’t tell, we’re loving our new vegetable garden. We’re especially loving all of the food that we’re harvesting.

We were a little late on planting (the whole building the garden thing delayed us a bit). So I’ve been trying to be patient when it comes to looking for edible vegetables. However, I’ve perhaps been a little too patient.

I thought the zucchinis were still at the blossom stage. A closer look revealed we were past the harvest stage for some zucs. Yipes. There were nine good-sized (really fairly large) zucchinis. And two days later, I harvested seven more (and there’s been one more since then).

So far, I’ve made grilled zucchini, chocolate sour cream zucchini cake, zucchini bread, chocolate zucchini bread, zucchini soup and zucchini parmesan. I even snuck a few into my parents’ car when they came to visit the farm. More are coming though. Anyone have any good zucchini recipes?

Out of a whole package of bean seeds, only four plants have grown (the others were nibbled right after they sprouted). That means our harvest has not been huge, but we’ve had a few lovely yellow beans.

Beside the beans, the tomatoes are turning red. The cherry tomatoes blow me away. I’ve never seen tomatoes grow in clusters like this. And of course, they’re my favourite sweet tomatoes. Very few make it to the house. I eat ’em like candy right in the garden.

The potatoes plants are blooming. I hope potatoes themselves grow in time for harvest this fall.

And beside the potatoes, in a mass of leaves and vines, squashes are starting to form. I’m absolutely going to figure out a trellis system next year for the squash. They’re taking over. Good thing we have a big garden, but there are lots of other plants on the wishlist for next year. The squash are going to have to learn to share.

We’re picking lettuce, beets and green onions as we need them, the red raspberries have transplanted successfully, and I have hope that a few of the black raspberries are going to make it. It looks like even the peppers may be perking up.

This is the closest I’ve ever been to being a farmer. And I have to say I like it.

What are you growing, harvesting and eating at your house?

Pepper problems

Posted on July 31, 2015 by Julia at Home on 129 Acres

Anyone have tips for growing peppers? Our plants aren’t doing so well over here.

Remember this picture of the little pepper and blossoms from a few weeks ago?

Well, the plants haven’t grown at all. In fact, they’ve regressed. See the little green nuggets laying on the soil?

The little peppers fell off their stalks. (My finger is in the shot for scale to show you how little the peppers grew).

The peppers are the only things that aren’t doing well in the garden.

I thought maybe they weren’t getting enough sun, but we’ve planted two different batches in two different locations.

We’ve tried jalapenos as well as sweet red bells.

None of them are growing.

Do you have any tips?

Bounty of berries

Posted on July 22, 2015 by Julia at Home on 129 Acres

This year is an incredible year for raspberries. We have canes growing all around the farm, and they’re all loaded with tiny berries.

I’ve never picked this many berries any of our previous summers.

It took me awhile to pick them–not just because there were so many. I had to do it all one handed because this was happening on my other side. Oh Ralph, so helpful.

After harvesting the berries, I decided to harvest some canes. The plan is to have two rows of raspberries in the vegetable garden: one red and one black. I had already started the red row with canes from my parent’s garden,and they’re doing well. A few days after transplanting, though, the black canes aren’t looking so hot.

I’m hoping I can convince them that they’ll be happy in the garden. I also have hopes that with a little domestication, hydration, fertilization and cultivation, I’ll not only have healthy canes but big and juicy berries.

Do you grow raspberries? Are they black or red? Who else has a four-legged helper for picking? Any tips for domesticating “wild” berries?

Snapshot

Posted on July 15, 2015 by Julia at Home on 129 Acres

Baby pepper and a pepper blossom growing in the garden.

The pepper plants are not doing so hot so far. Hopefully this baby grows up.

Odds and sods

Posted on July 3, 2015 by Julia at Home on 129 Acres

I took advantage of the mid-week Canada Day holiday to turn this week into a bit of a vacation. I’ve been trying to embrace the “summer time and the living is easy” mantra, so I don’t have a DIY or farm update to share today.

Here’s some of what we’ve been up to instead:

We spent Canada Day with Matt’s brother and sister-in-law, as is our tradition. I cannot say that Baxter the Canadog embraced his adopted country. He tolerated his patriotic kerchief, the parade, the crowds and the fireworks. He wanted to meet all the dogs and smell all the smells, and was a bit disgruntled that he didn’t get to spend every second socializing. He got lots of compliments on his kerchief though.
I planted some more peppers–4 more red and 12 jalapeno plants. Matt and I both keep adding lots of plants to the garden. Good thing we have a big property.
I’ve visited a few antique stores–not my usual haunt–during this vacation. I think I might have found a set of dining room chairs. They’re on hold until Matt can check them out later this morning. Fingers crossed he likes them.
Chiot’s Run is a new blog for me. I don’t have a lot of gardening blogs in my reader, and I’m really enjoying this one. After spending a fair amount of time yesterday thinning my beets and rutabagas, I’ve decided that next year I’m going to follow Susy’s lead and make myself a square foot gardening template for root vegetables.

What have you been up to this week? What’s your definition of easy summer living?

I wish you all a wonderful weekend. And to my American readers, happy Independence Day.

Guess what

Posted on June 26, 2015 by Julia at Home on 129 Acres

I used to do guess what posts every so often. Always on Fridays. And I always revealed the answer on Monday.

It’s been awhile since I’ve done one of these posts. In fact, it’s been more than a year. I’m doing one today, but it’s a bit different.

You see, I don’t know what this is.

We uncovered it in the garden.

It’s metal (obviously heavily rusted). It has a hole in the rounded end.

Anyone know what this might have been used for?

Garden update

Posted on June 24, 2015 by Julia at Home on 129 Acres

Unlike Mary, Mary, I am not feeling at all contrary. I am feeling quite excited. Our garden is growing!

Matt and our rototiller Fairfield were hard at work again this past weekend, and they got the whole garden tilled (or at least the half that we’re using this year) for the second time. I weeded where Fairfield couldn’t reach and went over everything with the cultivator to pick out the last of the roots.

We still need some more chainlink for the fence, we still need a gate, and we still need to pull out the weeds along the rest of the edge (and of course there’s the whole other half of the ring to clear), but it’s already looking like a garden.

And we’re going to have a harvest.

The tomatoes are big enough that Matt had to put the cages around them. Blossoms are forming and even a couple of very small tomatoes.

Squashes are our main crop. First is the zucchini.

Then there’s the butternut, acorn and pie pumpkins.

In the middle of the garden is the beginning of the first of two rows of raspberries. I got them from my parent’s garden last weekend, and they all seem to have rooted.

What’s not doing so well are the bush beans. I don’t know what’s happening, but they don’t seem to be very happy.

Also not so happy are the peppers. I think maybe they’re not getting enough sun because they’re up close to the fence, and they were a bit shadowed by weeds.

However, one in particular has been grievously abused by two weekends in a row. First Fairfield uprooted him, and then I got a little too close with the cultivator and pulled him out again. Hopefully he recovers.

The crop that seems to be thriving the most are the rutabagas. I think every single teeny tiny seed sprouted. I still have no idea what one does with rutabagas. I’m going to need to figure it out, though. Look at how many there are!

Since taking these photos, we’ve also planted potatoes and lettuce. So much goodness!

There are no silver bells or cockle shells, but I’m not sure I’d want them. I’m more into edibles this year. Vegetable garden 2015 is happening!

Any advice on the beans or the peppers? How about some ideas for the rutabagas? Anything else we should consider planting this year?

Fairfield goes to work

Posted on June 8, 2015 by Julia at Home on 129 Acres

Ladies and gentlemen, meet the newest member of our family, Fairfield.

Perhaps I shouldn’t say newest. When Matt heard that we were getting a rototiller from my cousins, he said, “Knowing your family, it’s going to be ancient.” I scoffed. Then I had to eat my words when we picked up the tiller from my cousins.

Turns out, they got the tiller from one of my aunt’s friends. This friend was my grade 4 teacher, Mrs. Fairfield.

Matt usually takes responsibility for naming, but he’s still hung up on the tiller’s advanced age, so his only suggestion was Grandpa Joe. I think Fairfield is more appropriate given the tiller’s history and its usual work site. Although I’m not sure Mrs. Fairfield will be flattered. (Auntie Anne, perhaps don’t mention this to her).

If you’ve been following along, you’ll know that I was a bit anxious about tilling the weedy soil. Would any tiller make it through? Let alone our senior model with its small tines?

We pulled off the tarp that has covered a large section of the garden for more than a month. It looked pretty weed free.

We had covered another section with a piece of carpet that I’d unearthed. I was surprised to discover that the tarp did a better job of killing the weeds than the carpet did. The carpet just made them flat and pale.

We haven’t given up on the carpet, though. We’ve moved it and the tarp over to the other half of the garden. Our supervisor needed an appropriate monitoring post, obviously.

The rest of the family was hard at work. Matt and Wiley mowed the weeds that hadn’t been under cover.

Then Matt and Fairfield went to work.

And they kicked butt.

The rototiller totally worked. Even when they got into the grassy bits, Fairfield powered through.

There was still some manual labour required. Fairfield broke up the soil and the weeds pretty well. But Matt and I did have to go through with the hand cultivator and the pitchfork and pull out the roots. It was much easier though, thanks to Fairfield.

It’s looking like a garden. We actually have space to plant a few things this year (we’re going to leave the other half covered with the tarp and the carpet for the rest of the season, probably).

As of the end of the weekend, we had the dozen tomato plants and four red pepper plants that you’ve seen before, plus a row of green onions, zucchini, yellow bush beans, beets, acorn squash, butternut squash, pie pumpkins and rutabagas (Matt threw that suggestion out as a joke, so of course when I saw the package of rutabaga seeds I had to buy it).

My most important Home Goal for 2015–the vegetable garden–is actually happening.

Thanks to my cousins for passing along their tiller (and thanks to Mrs. Fairfield for passing it along in the first place).

What are you growing in your garden? Any advice for growing rutabaga? How about tips for running a rototiller? How old’s your rototiller? Feel free to introduce it to Fairfield in the comments.

Planted!

Posted on May 27, 2015 by Julia at Home on 129 Acres

It may not look like much–especially considering that there’s still carpet lying over the weeds–but the first plants are in the garden.

We’re still waiting on our hand-me-down tiller to arrive, but that didn’t stop Matt from coming home with a dozen tomato plants and 4 red pepper plants. So that meant I got out the pitchfork and went to work to dig out the weeds in a corner of the garden by hand.

It was just a small corner, but it was home to two heaping wheelbarrows-full of weeds. The roots didn’t go deep, but they snaked along just under the surface making a thick dense mat. I really hope the rototiller is able to break up the ground. It didn’t take me as long as I thought to pull out the weeds by hand, but doing the whole garden by hand will not be fun.

So you’re still seeing a few weeds and grasses and roots strewn through the dirt. But you’re also seeing tomatoes and peppers.