The Hopeful Crop

Our seeds are planted, our seedlings are planted….let’s just see what we are growing this year on the farm. 90% of our crop was started from seeds and if you want to know where we bought our seeds, well, it was West Coast Seeds.

IMAGES IN GALLERY FORMAT AT BOTTOM OF PAGE!

We decided this year to give Lemon Balm a try for the actual farm. We are looking to make Lemon Balm Tea and perhaps even venture into making the oil for a natural mosquito/bug repellent. Both items would be sold through the farm website naturally. Pollinators love the lemon balm so that is a win-win for us. I believe Ashley dropped about 20 thousand seeds (not an exaggeration), of the 190k we had as a trial for this year. We don’t use any pesticides on any of our vegetables or plants so the tea itself should be awesome!  It will be an interesting process to extract the oils from the plant for the natural mosquito/bug repellent.

We planted just a few herbs from seed, but it looks like only two of the 3 will have a crop. Cilantro naturally as that will be used a lot in Lisa’s salsa which will be canned. The other is Dill which also will be used for canning her pickles! We planted mint seeds, but, they don’t seem to have germinated. Weird. We purchased a Thai Basil plant which is healthy and established, so that rounds out our herbs in the garden this year.

As an important note: some of our veggies will be harvested and frozen for our pigs. That includes the carrots, beets, beans, squash, corn, pumpkin, and cabbage. Feeding our pigs healthy vegetables is very important and with us having piglets on the way, we need to stock up on the healthy stuff as we head towards winter.

Nantes Coreless Carrots which have been planted in abundance. Carrots are awesome for many things, but, as we have pigs, yes, the carrots will be a great supplement to their healthy diet. All the carrots seeds have germinated and are growing strong.

Detroit Supreme Beets….  Wow, didn’t know a type of beet was named after Detroit. Plenty of beat seeds are in the ground and  many have already germinated and have broken ground. Some are much larger than others so far.

Cucumbers are something that has been a challenge so far. Not sure exactly what the heck is going on with them. The seeds are SLOWLY growing, just breaking ground, and really not making any noticeable growth changes. We actually bought 3 pickling cuke plants from local Kathy’s Greenhouse to make sure Lisa had the crop she needed for pickling. However, 1 of those plants is questionable. We will see as things move along into summer.

In addition to the pickling cukes, we also are growing Olympian Cucumbers which look like your standard field cukes. They are also slow growing.

Copenhagen Market Cabbage is part of our leafy division, lol. They are growing nicely and expanding each day.

Green Leaf Lettuce or as the seeds are called; Dillon Certified Organic Lettuce. Well, I am personally waiting for it to get to mature size because it already looks amazing. Looking forward to just pulling it out of the ground and chomping down on it.

The Squash Family. We are growing 3 types of squash (not including pumpkins); Table Queen, Butternut, and Black Beauty. All the seeds I believe have popped up through the ground and are growing. Should have a lot of squash hopefully this year. The squash is good though because the pigs will eat it also so the more we have the better.

Corn…..lol, now this is simply funny. Lisa and Ashley had some corn seedlings and they planted them. Weather being what it was, not favourable the past month, the seedlings were not really taking off. So, Ashley planted more seeds, and like the carrots, we now have a CROP of corn growing. 3 types, and it looks already after just 1 week that all the seeds she planted along side the seedlings are growing. Peaches and Cream, Calico Popcorn, Caramel Crisp Popcorn. Well, we all are familiar with the tasty Peaches and Cream at Summer BBQ Cookouts, but what about these other two? Well, the Calico Popcorn has multiple colours and the kernels are a bit smaller than your standard cob of corn. It is sometimes used for Fall decoration, but, it can also be used to make cool looking popcorn.

Now, I am looking forward to this Caramel Crisp Popcorn we are growing. It is a special breed specifically grown for Caramel Corn. Hmmm, bring a chair and knaw on the cob right at the plant! We will let everyone know how that turns out. PERHAPS the farm may have a new line of Popcorn for sale ?  ? ? ?

Beans and Peas… Green and Yellow Bush Beans along side of Super Sugar Snap Peas and Dwarf Grey Sugar Peas. Our peas are growing amazing, sometimes inches per day. The beans are growing but at their own pace. I am not a fan of most cooked vegetables and peas are definitely in that category. HOWEVER, raw peas and beans off the vine, well, you may find me spending a bit more time by that section of the garden this year.

Onions are naturally a necessity in this home. We are growing your standard every day Spanish Onions and also RamRod Onions which are green onions. All of which are growing nicely!

Potatoes…. What garden is complete without at least a small potato crop? Lisa saved some potatoes from last year and they rooted nicely over the winter. Into the ground they went and we have a ton of potatoes growing very well and they will most likely be done well before the end of summer. I am thinking ready before the end of July and perhaps another crop can get into the ground? We also are growing Clancy potatoes from seed which are a small nugget sized, red and cream rose coloured potato. Perfect with a Sunday roast!

Sunflowers, well, ARGGGHHH! My green thumb apparently has limitations. All the seedlings I had from 3 different types of sunflowers didn’t survive. So, we have 1 garden bed area where we just dropped seeds for all 3 and let’s see what happens. We are growing Velvet Queen, which are red sunflowers, Titan and Giganteus which are both yellow and can grow upwards of 12’ tall. So, we are hoping for a ton of sunflowers, but, will be happy with a nice variety!

Pumpkins, also an issue this year. The weather has not been favourable for a lot of things, and pumpkins are one of those things. We are growing Dil’s Atlantic (potential 1000-1500lbs), Big Max (potential 100-200lbs), Howdens (potential 10-50lbs) and sweet sugar which are for baking specifically. The goal is to fill a freezer with pumpkin for the pigs. Anything above and beyond that, AWESOME!

Cantaloupe. Yes, Lisa wants to give it another go. We tried last year and did get a tiny softball sized cantaloupe. Let’s see what we pick up this year.

HOT Pepper Plants, or aka “Hot Pecker Plants”. We have 4 varieties of Hot Peppers growing this year. Habanero, a classic; Thin Hot Cayenne; Alter Ego; and Carolina Reaper’s. All the pepper plants have at a minimum flowers if not fruit already on them so we are hoping for a good crop. I am sure Lisa will be putting together some hot sauces; hey Andy, how about some Carolina Reaper Hot Sauce?

Tomatoes! Well, all the seedlings said NO! Our weather has just been that bad. So, we got a few plants from Kathy’s Greenhouse; Beefsteak (large), Early Girl (two varieties, large), and 2 “Tumbler” tomato plants which are like cherry tomatoes. They have been planted so let’s keep the fingers crossed for a good crop.

It seems like a lot but when you throw pickling, canning, pigs, and everyday use into the mix, well, it may just not be enough. Plans are underway for next year already…. very exciting!

Thanks for reading and if you have ANY questions, just email me, Colin, and I will be more than happy to answer anything related to the above. I took some good quality time in selecting specific varieties that should flourish in our climate. So far, So Good, and let’s cheer on Mother Nature to keep moving forward.