Monday 25 June 2012

A Better Day Boating

We had a better day boating yesterday.  The wind was no where near as strong which made for a smoother ride.  We went swimming at Constance Bay.  This video http://youtu.be/Su9bhrKjiMk shows the boys in the boat.  Homer (in front) and Cosmo sitting back.  Although the water did get a little rough, it was far better than last Sunday with 3 ft swells.  The boys are a bit scruffy looking because we were swimming about 1/2 hour earlier.  We didn't get shots of them diving off the boat this time but will try next time..

Friday 22 June 2012

Cucumber Cages

A couple weekends ago I scored some farmer's page wire fencing from my brother-in-law.  This type of fencing is 4 ft tall and has large 5" squares.  Perfect for cucumber cages.

I cut them into 45 to 50" lengths and made round cages.  I placed them over the cucumbers and secured them to a stake.  The plan is for the plants to climb the cage and not spread out over the garden.  The benefits will include:  a) space savings; b) increased air flow (reducing the change of disease); and c) keeping the cucumbers clean and off the ground. 



Thursday 21 June 2012

Boating for the First Time (this season)

I've been kinda busy lately and haven't made the the time to post as frequently as I was.  Since it was a beautiful day this past Sunday, we decided to take the boys boating and swimming.  Besides, dogs need weekends too.

Although it was a nice day, it was terribly windy which made for a very uncomfortable and unpleasant ride.  Although I jumped in the water for a few minutes it was just too rough for the dogs.  Some of the swells were as much as 3 ft high and some even swamped the boat.  It was so windy that a catamaran overturned and the owner had a hell of a time righting it.  This was the day that a bi-plane overturned at the Rockcliffe airport.

As you can see from the photos below, the dogs really get into their boating (when it is relatively calm).  Next time we'll go swimming and I'll take some photos or even a video to show off their doggie ladder climbing skills.



Friday 15 June 2012

Watering #2 – The Main Garden

Very early this spring I redesigned my watering system for the main garden which involved burying all the waterlines which would permit me to mow and whipper-snip without damaging or moving any – making for a cleaner, tidier garden.

The redesign actually started last fall when I installed an outdoor tap on the side of the house, closer to the garden.  This meant installing a new ‘T’ into the watering system in the basement.  The T was placed after the sulphur-removing aerator but before the water softener – a neighbour recommended bypassing the softener in order to reduce my consumption of softening salt.



From the outdoor tap I ran a small piece of flexible rubber hose to some ½” PEX water line which connects to another tap for better access and convenience.  I installed a T with a ball valve which leads to a buried ½” PVC (75 psi) trunk line.








The water line runs to a central spot in the garden where it comes out of the ground to another tap.  I again installed a T with a ball valve which runs back down to a buried ½” PVC distribution line.

Using more T’s and elbows, the water is distributed to each bed coming to the surface in one of the corners.  Since the final delivery of water is through ¼” soaker hoses, there is still sufficient water pressure even after all of the valves, elbows and T’s.
I just love using the 1/4" soaker hoses for my plants as they release the water relatively slowly letting the water really soak deep.  Also, watering the roots and not the plants keeps the plants drier helping to reduce the risk of diseases.

The picture to the left shows my four juvenille potatoe plants.  The total length of the soaker hose is about 24".  It's not much put over the coarse of an hour or two, plenty of water is released.



Thursday 14 June 2012

Ah Crap!

Trailer full of fresh horse manure.
Last weekend we went out for dinner to my wife's brother's hobby farm south of Ottawa.  I took out a few pieces of junk for him and came back with some gold.....black gold.....but not the Texas-T variety.

He has three horses and lots of fresh horse manure.  Thinking ahead to next year, I brought back a trailer load of horse manure right out of the paddock.  I'll let it compost throughout the summer.





Layering old plants and straw and the manure.

I shovelled it into my compost bins and layering it with the brown plant material I had already accumulated.



   









Manure and plant material.

I can report that just five days later the compost piles are cooking away nicely and have reduced in height by at least 1 foot.  I'll try to get a photo of the pile steaming in the morning.












Due to poison ivy poking up here and there around the compost bin, Homer and Cosmo were relegated to staying on the lawn.....at least for a while.  I'll hit these plants, and a ton of others, with Round Up on the weekend.
Poison ivy popping up next the compost bin.....Round Up time!

Homer and Cosmo laying on the grass in the shade of a tree like good boys.....at least for a little while.
Knowing he shouldn't be there, Cosmo quietly lays down in the shade while I work.  There is no poison ivy where he is laying.


Tuesday 12 June 2012

Compost

Composting is easy, costs almost nothing and produces a product that can be used even if you don’t have a garden.  I have two composting bins, and with the City of Ottawa’s green bin, my wife and I compost almost everything that is compostable.

Items that we compost ourselves include: a) uncooked kitchen vegetable scraps; b) minor amounts of paper towel and newspaper; c) egg shells; d) dead plants; e) coffe grounds; and f) minor amounts of grass clippings (most grass is mulched by the mower).  All other cooked foods, meat scraps and most of the paper towel go in the green bin.

Our standard black bin composter is located beside the garden nestled among the branches of a pine tree.  All kitchen-related materials go in here.  I will also add some garden waste (Halloween pumpkins, non-diseased vegetable plants) to this bin.


One of four buckets of beauty compost.

Our typical black compost bin and Homer.


















Quite frankly the compost that comes from the black bin ranks 10 out of 10 on the awesomeness scale.  Every spring the bin yields about 4 large plastic buckets.  To make emptying the compost easier I put the bin on a concrete patio stone.  Instead of spreading this compost thinly over the garden beds I take a more direct approach to applying it.  When I dig a hole for a seedling I make it extra large in order to add one heaping scoop of the compost to each hole (an extra scoop or two for pumpkins and zucchini).  This way the roots grow in direct contact with the compost.  When you see the large yields I get you’ll be a convert.

Seedling hole with a scoop of black compost.
Back along the edge of the forest I have a larger composter with two bins.  I got the idea for this bin from The Victory Garden book.  I made the frame from scrap, untreated 2x3's and 2x4’s.  The walls are common chicken wire providing ample aeration.  The purpose of having multiple bins is to toss the material from one into the other which mixes and aerates the pile allowing composting to start or reactivate and makes room for fresh material.   Into this bin I put most of the plants from the garden, some grass clippings, straw, and any other large-volume, slower-to-decompose organics.

Our two-bin composter.  The right side is 1/2 full and it's only the spring.

The two-bin compost piles will get fairly big over the summer.  When this starts to compost it gets really hot – I have seen water vapor coming off the pile on a cool morning.  Once I stuck my hand in the middle of the pile while wearing very damp work gloves, it felt as though my hand was burning.  In the fall after the material has composted sufficiently, I spread it evenly over my garden bed or over weak areas of the lawn.


Some simple rules of thumb I follow when composting are:
  • More the merrier.  The more material you put into the bins quicker the bacteria will become active.  Think of it as requiring a critical mass to start up.
  • Mixing the pile frequently. Mixing helps aerate the material and exposes fresh fuel for the bacteria.
  • Watering the pile.  I tend to water my composters if we go two weeks without rain and if the weather turns really hot.  A dry composter = no or slow decomposition.
  • No meat.  The meat will attract animals and take forever to break down.
  • No dog waste.  No sir!  I will put horse/sheep/cow/chicken poo in my garden but not dog poo.
The benefits I experience with my composting are: a) incorporating fresh organic material back into my garden beds on an annual basis; b) hardly ever using fertilizer; and c) large healthy plants with great yields.

A pretty interesting series of Youtube videos regarding composting can be found here and here.  The first guy tends to be a bit long winded but both videos are informative. 


Friday 8 June 2012

Big Storms....Big Problems?

Today we got a couple of huge down pours as a result of a thunder storm system that rolled through around dinner time today.  With the rain came a fair amount of pea-sized hail.


As you see, today's rains were so hard that most of the plants have been spattered with soil.  I'll have to rinse them off tomorrow morning.

These storms added to a very wet couple of weeks for us with plenty-o-rain and many overcast days.  A few years back we had a similarly wet May and June.  The excessive moisture introduced diseases to my zucchinis, tomatoes and cucumbers which negatively impacted the health of the plants and reduced yields.  I hope our weather dries out for a while.


Thursday 7 June 2012

Poison Ivy

When we built the house we landscaped a large area but also left a sizeable ‘natural’ area towards the forest which contains large ugly juniper bushes and scrub grasses.  Unfortunately, it also contained the single healthiest crop of poison ivy I’ve ever seen.

Over the past few years I have been in a relentless battle against this stubborn horde of triple-leaved harbingers of pain and suffering.  I personally am very rarely affected by poison ivy (proper clothing, footwear and an apparent immunity) but my wife on the other-hand…oh boy!  When she gets a poison ivy rash, she gets a good one which also causes me and the dogs indirect pain and suffering.

So why not just avoid the area?  Well, you see, Homer and Cosmo just love going into the forest.  Although the three of us usually limit our treks to the late fall, winter and spring, dogs will be dogs on occasion and have a tendency to pick up the poison ivy oil on their fur and pass it along to my wife.  Another reason for getting rid of it is the new ‘vineyard’ I am planting this season.  I want everyone to be able to walk around the area without having to tip-toe in through the poison ivy.


My weapon of choice is Round-Up herbicide as it has the ‘nuking’ power required to eliminate poison ivy permanently.  Nowadays, the City of Ottawa and the Province of Ontario pretty much make you feel like a criminal when purchasing even small quantities of herbicide as it’s locked in cages and some stores make you sign a waiver prior to purchase.  Luckily, thanks to a contact that will remain unnamed, I have plenty of concentrate to allow me to make the quantities required for the large area I have to deal with.  Even with Round-Up though, the viney nature of poison ivy typically requires more than one application throughout the summer, and even over a couple of years, in order to completely obliterate a sizeable patch.
One week after spraying with Round Up.  Droopy leaves and black spots are nice signs of a dying plant.  No other vegetation is present because I removed a large juniper bush for landscaping purposes.

Here is a link to an Ontario government page which gives more details about poison ivy. http://www.omafra.gov.on.ca/english/crops/facts/99-015.htm

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Wednesday 6 June 2012

Weekend in Wine Country


Last weekend my wife and I, along with her sister and brother-in-law, went down to Toronto for a Blue Jays game and a couple of days to Niagara-on-the-Lake for a few winery tours.  Although the weather was cold and wet, we stayed dry for the most part and timed our outdoor activities accordingly.

My sister and brother-in-law have been to Niagara-on-the-Lake numerous times and know a lot about the area, wineries and restaurants which really helped with logistics.  Although I’m not much of a wine connoisseur, I would say the others know their way around a wine bottle quite well :).  In fact, my sister and brother-in-law are wine-club members at Peller Estates which was our first stop.  Their privileges allowed us to go on the tour for free with some tasty perks....woot.

Never being to a real vineyard before I found it quite interesting and learned a lot which will help me with my little one.  One thing that struck me was how closely all the wineries planted their vines; the soil is deep here so the roots tend to tap deeply rather than laterally reducing competition between the plants and permitting close spacings (~3 feet).


A relatively young vine at Peller Estates.

Barrel aging at Peller Estates.















Eric, our tour guide, was a down-to-earth guy and let us taste three wines including a pricey ice wine.  His tips for enjoying wine were practical but not pretentious.  After the tour, the four of us were escorted upstairs to a private wine bar where club members and guests are permitted to taste countless wines (and even more ice-wine)....woot.

Our visit to Chateau des Charmes was also really fun.  These grounds and vineyards are also immaculate.

Because we spent just a bit too long in a small bakery buying awesome pastries, we missed the scheduled tour start time.  Everything was made right again by Sylvie, a very friendly, knowledgeable employee, who gave us what amounted to a private tour nonetheless....woot.  On this tour we were able to visit grape crushing, wine fermenting, storage and bottling circuits.  This tour also ended up with a generous tasting of wines including the best ice wine of the weekend....woot.

Closely-spaced vines.

Barrel fermenting at Chateau des Charmes.




27,000 litre storage vessels.

4,200 litre storage vessels.

















Below are some interesting facts that will put the sheer volume of wine they produce into perspective:
  • It takes 3 to 5 bunches or 1 to 1.5 kg of grapes to make 1 bottle of wine.
  • The 27,000 litre storage vessel contains ~36,000 bottles of wine which, at 1 bottle per day, would take almost 99 years to drink.


Tuesday 5 June 2012

Cutworms

My garden beds have cutworms that can chew through the stem at or just below the soil level.  The don't eat the seedling but simply cut it off killing the plant -- pretty damn annoying.
Sometimes I can rescue a seedling from a premature death by recognizing that the plant is droopy compared to its neighbours.  A quick check immediately at the stem will reveal a 1" long, green-grey cutworm and damage to the stem.  Although I visit my garden every day, the cut worms can work really fast so I have to be vigilant in the first three weeks or so.

To prevent damage to newly planted seedlings I install homemade cutworm collars.  The collars are wrapped around the base of the plant to a depth of a couple of inches.  Although some don’t make a complete ring, this still provides a sufficient barrier to prevent the cutworms from getting access to the plant.














I typically make the collars out of used coffee or pop cups. I remove the bottoms and cut them down the side. My wife was able to score a few sleeves of Coke cups (a few years worth). I noticed that these are less sturdy than the coffee cups therefore cutting them a bit shorter would have been better.

I know people that swear by placing broken-up egg shells around the plants.  They tell me they have very few issues using this method.  But this would call for cracking a ton of eggs to be usefull in my garden.

After about three weeks I will remove the collars and toss them in the recycle bin.  One year I left them in thinking they will simply degrade.  All the cups did degrade except for a thin plastic films which tended to get stuck on my pitch fork for years to come.



Mulching Around Plants

Mulching around plants is a good way to moderate the soil temperature, keep the soil moist and inhibit weed growth.  Over the years I have tried many types of mulch in the vegetable garden including black plastic, red bio-degradable ‘plastic’ made of corn starch, compost, wood chips and straw.

Presently, I don’t use any mulch in the vegetable garden with the exception of compost around my garlic and in my asparagus bed.  Why not use mulch more extensively?  Simply I find it a bit of a pain in the butt (at least for my vegetable garden) and my extensive experimenting with mulches has shown no discernible difference in yields.

First off, the sheet mulches did work great for keeping the soil moist but I found that installation was a pain as the edges have to be buried which meant making extra cuts for my watering system.  I do plant my seedlings close together so cutting holes in the sheets actually opens up a large percentage of the covered bed.  Re-using them in subsequent seasons is also a pain as I rotate my crops every year and not all of my beds are exactly the same size.  This usually means discarding them.  They also moderate the soil temperature but my raised beds heat up quickly in the spring anyway so this feature was a moot point.

Secondly, wood chips and straw simply make a mess and only moderately control the weeds throughout the entire season.  I also find the slugs and other critters really like the shelter that mulches provide.

Right now my garden is a moderate size and the raised beds are easily accessible.  Not using mulch permits me to quickly pass the hoe in and around plants.  Since I visit my garden every day, weeding is rarely a chore.

I add compost annually keeping the soil very rich and the watering systems target the plants effectively resulting in very healthy plants.  This, along with relatively close plant spacings, means that the plants often form a thick canopy over the bed, naturally inhibiting weed growth.

I definitely use a thick covering of wood-chip mulch for the few perennial beds I have which means I rarely have to water them.  A few easy weedings per season will usually suffice to keep the beds clean.  The soil in these beds isn't rototilled annually so I can go about 3 to 4 years before adding more wood chips.