Tagged equinox

15 Celebrations in Spruce and Birch

welcome to the party – grab a shovel!

A happy intersection of events resulted in the planting of 15 trees at the homestead this March. Our new saplings were procured from the Pierce County Conservation District annual native tree and plant sale in Puyallup, Washington. I discovered their sale only just this year thanks to the magic and happenstance of the Internet.

These trees were lovingly planted during a wonderful spring rainstorm on March 14th, and with all the wet and wonderful forces of the waxing moon in Cancer to inspire them. Five Birches and ten Spruces are now growing where evergreens were removed some 15+ years ago by the original property owners. Our land is well suited to these tree species because it has lots of healthy, wet soil with good drainage.

If you follow the trio of trunks of the tallest hemlocks to the ground, you’ll see where the new trees are now tucked. The land dips down in the foreground, which will give the new trees a few years to get some height before the 10-year-old White pines, Douglas firs, Red cedars and Hemlocks overshadow them. The t-stakes visible in some of the pictures below were probably used for a horse corral; they will be reused in the future when we embark on the Great Chicken Adventure.

15 trees & 15 celebrations

1. For Mothers & Grandmothers: Paper Birch (Betula papyrifera)

2. For Fathers & Grandfathers: Sitka spruce (Picea sitchensis)

3. For the Festival of the Trees #58: celebrate tree celebrations!

4. For Berry Go Round #39: (because I missed the deadline for BGR #38)

5. For Arbor Day 2011: shovel-dance in the rain!

6. For the Spring Equinox: get out and dirty while robins sing the sun up.

7. For the International Year of Forests 2011: Forests for People! Reach into the Earth and connect.

8. Reparations: replace trees sacrificed for the foundation of a happy home.

9. Reparations: replace trees sacrificed for the satellite dish of an awesome internet connection.

10. Gratitude: give thanks for the gifts of health and friendship and work and fleeting wisdom.

11. Humility: give thanks for the gifts of lessons learned and challenges faced.

12. Friends Departed: sustain the memories of those who have shared their love and are now beyond us.

13. Friends Arrived: seed a little hope in the shade beneath a rock, see what grows out.

14. Justice: for the trees cut down each year, I plant these trees as a small offering of restitution, and with the hope that others will plant location-appropriate trees in kind.

15. Just Because: because there is simply no such thing as ‘too many trees.’

BGR

Come out and party

with me! Soil your fingernails,

dig in, plant a tree!



Garden Cold Frame Solstice Updates

Working Cold Frames in June

Since resolving to spend more time in the garden I’ve made good headway sowing vegetable starts, flower seeds, and other good summer growth.

There’s a lot to report, so I’ll start today with the cold frames… which reminds me, I need to create a good naming system! I’ve always considered naming the cold frames with flower names (because it’s a great excuse to get out the paint brushes and have fun). Let’s designate the current cold  frames as: Daisy (foreground), Mum (right background) and Nettle (left background). In this first image, you can see our three working cold frames, each in their current daily configuration of closed, open, and partially open.

You might recall the first cold frame adventures from the Pennsylvania garden. Our design has been carefully refined over the past four years, and we’ve decided that the 4×4 boxes work best for our needs, mostly because they are easier for one person to lift and carry, and because they allow more flexibility by adjusting each cold frame to meet the specific needs of the plants inside.

New Moon Sunflower Starts

Daisy currently stays closed. This month Coldframe Daisy is a nursery for sunflower starts. They are a bit late, but I have a hunch we’ll have a late summer, and I don’t mind short sunflowers. I originally tried sowing the sunflowers directly in flower beds, but the birds and mice pulled up all the seeds and ate them in one day. What you see here are week-old sunflower sprouts, which have doubled in size since this picture was taken three days ago.

Cold Frame Experiment: Tomatoes and Peppers

Coldframe Nettle is housing an extra-special experiment this season, and will stay propped open at four inches, opened only for waterings and other maintenance. Last year I found that the tomato plants in the open-air vegetable garden were vibrant and healthy, but the fruits never ripened on the vine. The reason is because of the cool nights and generally moderate summer temperatures of the Pacific Northwest (unlike the tomato boom we enjoyed in PA thanks to that warm, summer rain brought in by the Gulf Stream).

Late last summer Coldframe Nettle was sown with tomato seeds on a whim. The plants soon surpassed those in the open-air garden, filling the cold frame with large, vine-ripened fruits which spilled out the sides, much to the husky dog’s delight.

Adventurous Tomatoes

This year I’m trying the same approach by deliberately planting an entire box with peppers and tomatoes. Even at the peak of summer, this cold frame will stay propped open only slightly, and trellises will be set on either side (as you can see, the tomatoes already know what’s going on). This will keep the heart of the plants extra warm, while leaving space for the fruits to crawl out and climb. My hope is more ripe fruit, so we’ll see what happens!

Fresh Start Basil

Other cool things to note about Coldframe Nettle: the basil you see hugging the tomato at the back is actually a grocery-store survivor. You wouldn’t believe how sad it looked before I put it in the cold frame – now it’s a whole new plant!

Tough Peppers

Speaking of harsh-looking, those peppers are looking rough for a reason. I didn’t baby them once I brought them back from the nursery, and instead let them cook hard on our first sunny day. The result: much more vigorous growth from tomatoes and peppers alike. Visible at the front of the box are the surviving green onions from last year’s cold frames, and between the plants I’ve sown carrots, plus additional peppers and tomatoes. I’m curious to see if I can get successions  of the latter two to survive into late winter.

Cold Frame Greens

Coldframe Mum has been the lettuce and greens box this spring, which is why it’s propped all the way open all the time. The colder I keep the greens, the longer I’ll have greens to eat. I’m fighting their natural summer urge to bolt (hence the semi-butchered look) and I’m already snipping salads on borrowed time. These plants will eventually be transferred to the open vegetable garden where they can flower and drop seed to their hearts’ content.

Jade's Favorite Greens

This season’s salad greens include a few of my absolute favorites: mizuna mustard greens (Brassica rapa nipposinica), red oak leaf lettuce (Lactuca sativa var. crispa), pak choi (also bok choy, Brassica rapa), and arugula (Eruca sativa). There are teeny tiny purslane (Portulaca oleracea) sprouts in there (however funny I find it that I actually have to purchase purslane seeds), as well as a handful of calendula sprouts (for transfer to flower beds), and two pouches of onion sets that are really in need of a fresh hill in which they can grow big and juicy.

In July Coldframes Daisy and Mum will be ready for replanting, probably with carrots, onions, and some kitchen herbs I’m missing (like cilantro, another cold-loving vegetable). Next up, I’ll show you what’s happening in the front yard on the corn hills.