pumpkin harvest and garlic planting

This past weekend, my brother's family, my sister's gang and my motley crew all met up at our parents place to harvest the pumpkins, plant next years crop of garlic and chop fire wood.  The pumpkin vines had grown rambunctiously across the entire garden but only produced three giant pumpkins.

 

Once the photo shoot of the pumpkins and cute cousins was done, we pulled out the vines and weeds and added some compost.  Dad started to rototill the garden but was interrupted by running out of gas and instead of driving 10 minutes to the closest gas station decided to remedy this by siphoning gas out of the car.

Rototilling complete, we planted four types of garlic: red Russian, white porcelain, a Spanish variety, and a soft neck variety mom had picked up in Montreal. 

Here are  few other random shots of the day:

A Bamboo Story

There are not many plants that I admire and fear as much as bamboo.  The Zen quality of the rustling sound and shadow made by the tall strands as well as the potential to create a quick privacy screen have intrigued me.  However, I've also been warned - be careful it will bust through concrete and take over your yard, then the neighbours yard and then the world.  Still not completely deterred I did some research and found out that running bamboo is probably the most aesthetic kind (versus clumping varieties) but running means just that, roots that will take over unless control methods are taken (special barriers etc.)  So I set out to find bamboo to pot on my deck at which time I discovered it was very expensive, which seemed puzzling - if bamboo is running amok - shouldn't there be lots of it around for people to give away?   In the spring I was very excited to find an add on craigslist for "you dig, you take" bamboo within blocks of my house.  I call my DDS for an emergency plant escapade, dropped one kid off, found HH's reciprocating saw and our best shovels and off we go. Now the DDS' had yet to meet a plant that they couldn't wrangle, though the bamboo owner was impressed with our power tool she still had a bit of a smirk when we asked us to lead us to it.  The "grove" was a serious example of a hostile bamboo takeover.  The backyard was very small and had thick bamboo extending from the back fence with roots now approaching the foundation of the house (it had been allowed to free range for 10 years).  The home owner wanted it gone and was at the point of bringing in heavy machinery if it was not vanquished that weekend.  45 minutes of back and shovel breaking labour we were not able to get out any of the tall premium bamboo along the awkward area of the fence, the roots were too fierce.  We opted to take some baby roots with signs of possible shoots home for our own propagation.  After witnessing what bamboo can do I was nervous potting my little shoots for fear they might escape and wreak havoc.  Below you can see the potted golden bamboo roots have grown to about 24 inches after 5 months, still a few more years until they can make any kind of privacy screen.

 

Yesterday on my way home I spotted something on the side of the road.  I think visual acuity for all things free on the side of the road might be hereditary.  Anyway, there it was, big tall bamboo pre-dug with tidily bundled roots with a "free" sign.  I went back later convincing my daughter we were going on an adventure.  The bundles were definitely heavier and more awkward to lift than my toddler.  After getting the roots into the vehicle  we drove the 3 (well maybe 5) blocks home with about 15 feet of bamboo trailing out behind us.  This afternoon I lugged it up onto my back deck to admire my score, 20 foot bamboo is a wee bit more than I bargained for, so I chopped it down to about my height.  Here is the glorious free bamboo with a Maple tree in the background:

 

 

Autumn pile of leaves

We are lucky enough to have a tree in the neighbouring yard that dumps heaps of maple leafs into our backyard.  Right now the leaf piles are strictly for fun but eventually once completely dropped they will make their way into the veggie patch where they'll decompose to add lovely organic matter to the soil.  Here are some pics from this past Thanksgiving weekend.

20 minutes between fall down pours in Lauren's yard

So nap time happened to coincide with a  short rain free period  and I managed to take a few pics of what's happening as things wind down in my yard.

We grew these mini pumpkins ourselves.  I think they came from pumpkin's that were put in the compost last year.

Nine bark shrub was given to me as a shower gift when my baby b. was born.  Baby and shrub are both thriving.

 I love the ornamental grasses this time of year, these are Japanese blood grass and a miscanthus swaying in the winds brining in the next storm.

This is the beginning of a long neglected under the deck project, stay tuned to see how the "pit of despair" turns out.

Cauliflower has finished up but the New Zealand spinach in the foreground needs to harvested before the first frost.

Mystery squash or pumpkin (also likely from compost seeds), may have naturally cross pollinated with other squash.  You can see asparagus fronds draping over.  This is my asparaguses first year - apparently only a few more years to wait until we'll get to harvest asparagus.

fall garden

I snapped a few pictures of my garden a few days ago before the rains arrived...  The weather forecast says we won't see the sun for another 4 days, I guess fall has arrived on the rainy westcoast!

I have a few young apple trees, by far the best producer this year was my Honeycrisp tree; the apples were giant and tasted great.

 My dahlias are still blooming strong although the rain will probably knock lots of the blooms over.

 A tuberous begonia that I left in the garden and it came back on its own from last year.

 Fall crocus.  I thought I had dug them all up from my front border and moved to my back but apparently I missed a few.

I planted this pineapple sage in the summer and it is growing like crazy, I love the chartreuse colour of the leaves.  Apparently it makes good tea, I have yet to try it.

 Asters in bloom.

Scarlet runner beans that I planted in August, they are blooming but I'm not sure if they will produce with the cooler temperatures and rain.

 Sunflowers.

With the pouring rain outside, I guess I really have no excuse not to clean my messy house!

Lauren's planting fall bulbs

Autumn is my favourite season to garden.  The garden is giving its last grand finale with Dahlias going strong, apples and pears to harvest and the trees of course turning colour.  It is also time to start tidying up, moving/dividing plants around and planting spring bulbs.  Planting spring bulbs is an annual event for my daughter and I.  It was one of the very first things she helped me plant when we first moved into our suburban home, she had just turned 2 at the time.  Bulbs are great for children as they are big hardy easy to manipulate objects that are simply placed in the ground.  The concept that they will turn into flowers in the spring is beyond a 2 or 3 year olds grasp but when spring arrives and the tulips emerge they are amazed and proud when reminded that THEY planted these flowers.  My 7 year old is now able to dig and place the bulbs with very little assistance.  We're trying out a few new bulbs this year instead of the usual dafs and tulips and I've got plans for the school garden and kindergarten's to "help" me with some more bulb planting this year.

Here's a selection of what hopped into my cart, kale and cabbage will be planted in the school garden as well.

 

Daughter hard at work once the sun came out in the afternoon.

 

A fun place to browse for some great bulbs is from this local online supplier:

http://www.botanus.com/products/The-Vancouver-Sun-Awesome-Allium-Collection.html

I'm tempted to buy this weeks Botanus special but am trying to reign in my garden spending.  I tried allium's last year and found they were the first to arrive in the spring making tall spikes topped with Dr. Seus pom poms that were rather cool!

 

Harvest Fest

To celebrate all good things from the garden and our local farms Shannon decided to host "Harvest Fest" in  her yard last weekend.  Everyone chipped in to bring food made from local ingredients - so many wonderful dishes that I'm afraid if I listed them all I might forget one.  Needless to say the amazing food and drink just kept coming while we all basked in the September afternoon sun. The kids occupied themselves the whole time and might even have eaten some vegetables.


HH made the sign.  He put a "shout out" to DDS (dirt digging sisters).  It was fun having people guess what DDS actually stood for.

 

 

Yes, that is a local organic sustainably brewed beer in the foreground.

  

 

 

 

The hosts sit down for a moment and enjoy the fruits of their labours.  It was a great afternoon - thanks to all who came.