Castor Bean.

We have been trying to capture the size of the Castor beans in a photograph for the blog but they just never do them justice. I grew a new Castor bean this year called Zani Palm, which is to grow up to 8'. It does not get red like the regular Castor bean. The photo is a picture of one of the Zani Palm's. I use them for windbreak around a garden area. I probably have about 18-20 Castor beans around this area. The flower in the forground is a Crocosmia, that is produced from a corm that I overwinter.

We have started to harvest the vegetables this last week. We have the garlic all dug, as well as most of the onions. We are also starting to harvest the leeks and will have those available this weekend at the Saskatoon Farmer's Market. The tomatoes will be available along with green peppers, jalapeno peppers, green onions, zucchini and yellow beans.

A large selection of flowers will be on display this Saturday as well.

Farmers Market.

Wanted to share with you pictures of our tables and flower displays at the Saskatoon Farmers Market. This time of year it is very colourful at our booth.

Delivery day.

As you can see the truck is always jam packed with buckets full of flowers, on delivery day. Generally most shops preorder some of the product, but there is always something new that was not preordered. When we stop at a flower shop we pull the flowers off the truck and they pick and chose what they want.

I was picking raspberries yesterday, and I heard this small, squeak, squeak, like a baby rodent or something. So, I slowly snuck toward the sound, until I saw what it was. What I saw was a garter snake and it looked like the sound was coming from the snake. But on closer inspection, it was not the snakes mouth opening and closing...the snake had a frog in it's mouth and the frog's mouth was opening and closing and making the squeaking sound. I guess we would squeak too, if we were being eaten by a snake. Nature.... it is always fascinating.
Today we are preparing for market once again. Harvesting flowers and vegetables. We are very pleased once again with the green pepper production this year. The peppers are a great size and they are so juicy and sweet. The plants are all producing with great gusto. The varieties we grow are, Northstar and Fat n' Sassy. Highly recommend both of these varieties. They are a variety good for northern climates and the last 2 growing seasons have produced large quantities.

Garlic patch.

We picked 2 heads of garlic, different varieties, one which was planted in the fall and one which was planted in the spring. The large one was planted in the fall and it is a hard neck variety, whereas the small one was planted in spring and it is a soft neck variety. The picture really doesn't do it justice, as the large head is 9" in diameter. Looking forward to the garlic harvest.

We tamed the jungle in the back garden yesterday. We took the hand held rototiller in and tilled pathways through the vegetation in some areas. You don't realize how things are growing in the pathways until you can't get through with the pails of cut flowers. Feels much better to get that completed. Some varieties of tomatoes are starting to ripen, as well as the beans are going full strength. Lots of fresh vegetables available. The gophers are enjoying the ripe tomatoes as well. They always get the first ripe tomato, except they only eat half of it and leave the rest and then go on to a new tomato the next day.

Market day Saturday will be very colourful with lots of flowers and vegetables. We will have onions, beets, peppers, zucchini, beans and fresh herbs. The sunflowers will be plentiful along with zinnias, dahlias, amaranthus, bell's of ireland, gladiola's, cosmos, rudbeckia's, tansy and more. We always bring along an assortment of succulents, hypertufas, and other plant material.

Red globe!

Last night the sun was setting and it was a huge red globe...it was spectacular. Truly something we have to take the time to enjoy before it is gone. Update on the bat....it disappeared overnight, so hopefully it was able to recover from it's ordeal.

Things are progressing very well out here. All the plants are super sized from the great growing conditions, the flowers are all large and the colours vibrant. The Castor bean leaves have never been as large as they are this year. It is truly a wonderful place to hang out..and we do hang out alot, trying to control the growth of some plants and the weeds. Feel free to come out for a visit, we would be happy to give you a tour around the gardens. Contact us through the blog e-mail and we can set up a time.

We came across this info, which may be beneficial to you all, if we get some high temperatures.

Before you water a wilting plant - put your finger in the soil a few centimeters down to see if it is damp. Plants wilt because they are losing more moisture than they can pick up from their roots. If their is adequate soil moisture, adding more is not going to make it any easier for the plant to survive, in fact it is only going to make it harder. It's called soil saturation and this leads to root rot and more wilting.

If there is adequate soil moisture, the appropriate action is to take a deep breath and allow the plant to recover on it's own in the evening. A thick layer of mulch will help the soil temperature to stay cool during heat spells and this in turn will keep the plant healthier. This is also particularly true with container plants.

Enjoy the heat...if it comes. Hope it does because the tomatoes sure need a jolt.

The picture is a milk thistle.

Bat rescue!

We found a bat treading water in one of our water barrel's this morning. So we scooped it out and put it on the ground. The first picture with it's wings out, is right after we took it out of the water. The second picture is after it was out of the water for a few hours and it had dried somewhat and it's wings were drawn in. It is alive, but not sure if it is hurt or not. Has not tried to fly yet. It opens it's mouth and shows it's teeth when we touch it. They have quite big fangs for a little creature. They are really cute. They have a small nose and eyes and big ears. Hopefully it will be fully recovered soon, so it can go about hunting mosquito's again.