Bringing in Your Plants

Autumn is just around the corner! It's September now. The days are getting shorter and the nights cooler. It's time to bring the houseplants back inside.

Trays for the plants have always been a concern for me. I bring in a lot of geraniums and so forth from the garden and start many plants indoors early in the spring. This year I am going to use boot trays under the plants! It's an idea that just came to me while shopping at Home Depot today. It's the only thing I could find that is big enough for this pot but it works perfectly. I can add other pots to the tray as well and use them in front of the patio doors too! I love the idea!

I planted most of my plants directly into the garden in June this year, so will have those to dig up and plant into pots with fresh soil shortly. I will have to look carefully to make sure there are no earthworms, earwigs or other insects coming in with them.

I'm buying more boot trays today!

Cannas from Seed

I have successfully grown canna lilies from seed for a few years now and am always on the lookout for more canna seed. I love cannas! They are so tropical looking and perfect for filling in holes anywhere! 

Dwarf Yellow

This past winter I started many different canna seeds that I received in a trade. The above pic is a few that I grew from those seed. Some turned out to be large flowering dwarf yellow ones, very nice! One tall peach, beautiful! Several tall with very small yellow flowers but large tropical leaves and, so far, one dwarf gold colour. I will put the ones with small flowers together in bare spots in the new large flowerbed at the front. The nicer ones will go into the courtyard, the pond and various pots. 

I have developed a technique that usually works well. Canna seeds have a coating that has to be opened to allow water to enter and germinate the seeds. This is not so easy to do. Many seeds need scarification (as this is called) but cannas are particularly difficult. The first year I tried several different methods but the only one that worked for me was using a rasp in the drill on high speed and holding the seed to it with a pair of needle nose pliers. This year I have a whet stone that I used with success. 

The seed only needs a very small and very shallow opening in the black coat to germinate. I don't want to harm the seed inside or it will not grow. After this step, I soak them overnight in warm water before planting. If done correctly, they will germinate in about 2-3 weeks in warm temps in potting soil indoors. Many that I have started in this manner in Jan-Feb have grown to bloom in the same season, even in Ontario, especially the dwarf varieties which don't need a long growing season. 

One Peach Canna

Growing cannas from seed is very rewarding! I like all the tender bulbs that go into cold storage for the winter. I can put them where I need them in the spring, filling in holes and covering dying daffodil leaves as they age. Dahlias are another favourite for the same reasons. 

This coming winter I want to grow more cannas. I would love to trade for canna seeds that are not yellow. I have only yellow cannas now. I would like some with red leaves and some with fancy striped leaves and some with large red flowers. If you have seeds from these varieties and would like to trade, please contact me.

Pumpkins and Squash

These are the pumpkins we are growing this year! They are Halloween pumpkins but we are also growing some squash for eating. It's the Okanagan where everything grows well! I haven't tried growing large, winter squash in the far north yet, but I intend to soon with the help of a greenhouse.

These are our butternut squash plants, Growing fast and healthy with many blooms. Butternut squash makes great soup! We will revisit these squash when they are ready to eat in the fall with soup recipes.

These are our sweet dumpling squash plants. As the name implies, sweet dumpling squash is very sweet. They are tiny apple sized squash that are easy to fill and bake for one person. All of our squash plants are so green and healthy!

We are also growing some Hopi Black squash. It's an old rare heirloom once grown by the Hopi natives. It has a great sweet flavour and is darker with more beta carotene. It has a lovely flavour, a lot of meat and a smaller seed cavity, making it good for baking and making into pies.

We have one more type of squash growing in our garden. It's a cushaw or mixta variety, usually grown only in the deep south but we are trying it here. We only have the one plant but it's doing very well. It's large, green and healthy!

We will have all of these squash seeds for sale this winter! (Provided they produce fruit that matures and the seeds get saved properly, of course.)

We plan to sell the Halloween pumpkins in the fall and to roast the seeds. The squash seeds can also be roasted and eaten in the same manner.

We are growing these particular varieties because most of them do not cross with the others, being from different squash families (there are 4 families of squash). The seeds will be pure and we can use them to grow the same ones next year, except for the pumpkins and sweet dumpling squash. Both of these are of the c. pepo family and will be cross pollinating, so we won't be using those seeds for planting next year. We will just buy more seed next year for these varieties, if we wish to plant them again. 
 
You can also prevent them from crossing by using the tape method described here, "Preventing Cross Pollination".  It also describes simple hand pollinating which can be done to provide more squash. It's not necessary to use the tape if you are not concerned with keeping your own seed.

Squash can replace pumpkin in most recipes and many people like it better. We will post some great squash recipes when they are all ripe in the fall. 

In addition to the pumpkins and squash in our garden, we are also growing some heirloom tomatoes which you can see in some of the photos above. Unfortunately, these were planted a bit too close to the pumpkins...

Growing Grapes

I have learned a lot in the past year about grape culture. I read everything I could get my hands on about growing grapes as soon as we came to the Okanagan for the winter  and I have learned a lot more with experience this year.

The above is a picture of what our grapes look like now. It's about 500m of wine grapes growing on a fence in a straight line, more or less. Approximately 1/4 of them are dark purple, the rest are green. Some are specifically for making wine and jelly, and some are seedless for eating. The dark purple ones make fantastic grape jelly!

When we arrived here in the fall, the grapes were one big mess! 500m of a 10' x 10' ball, all the way down with many side shoots and lateral shoots from the ground and all over the trunks. It had been ignored all season and for years.

Grapes are pruned in the winter when they are completely dormant. The next February I cut them all back to just 2-3 large trunks each. That is all that a grape root can handle. You really only need one main trunk that divides into two horizontal pieces (called cordons) tied to a wire about waist high, but because single trunks sometimes die, it's safer to keep two or even possibly three.

Early Spring Growth

The winter pruning also consist of leaving just two buds at each growth spot along the cordon. These will produce the next year's long stems. The long stems are tied to the high wire as they reach it and trained to grow along it. Only the tendrils are tied to the wire. You can choke and damage that vine if you tie the main stem. I like to use tin ties for this because I can undo them and move them around as I check the grapes. 

It's important to plant your grapes on a fence going north and south. This way you can remove leaves to give them the morning sun fully but keep the west side shaded. 

The hot afternoon/evening sun will burn the grapes making them not as good for making wine and jelly. The grapes form near the buds on the cordon so they are shaded by the top vines and leaves growing on the above wire, (see pictures).

East Side of Grape Vines

Only two clusters of grapes are allowed to remain on each stem. More than that will make smaller grapes. I continually remove any others growing higher on the vine. Once the grapes form, I remove any leaves on the east side that grow to shade the grapes. 

All green growth below the waist high wire, with the cordons growing on it, will get rubbed off or cut off as the season progresses. Nothing should be growing below the grapes. In the spring and early summer this is almost a daily job.

Every morning in the spring, I walk along the grapes removing low sprouts, removing leaves shading the grapes on the east, arranging the grape clusters to hang freely as they grow, pulling the few weeds too close to the grape trunks to be sprayed with weed killer. The new strong vinegar weed killer works very well! As the long clusters develop, the few small grapes growing at the tip will be removed. This will encourage large grapes on the cluster and ensure that they all ripen at the same time. 

I love puttering along the grapes in the early morning. It's a quiet and stress relieving activity that I look forward to.

DIY Book Sale

I have written a few books in the past few years. Most are the Do-It-Yourself type. Right now I am having a downloadable book sale. You can buy ALL the books I have ever written for $14!




Here is a list of the books included:
"Make Your Own Organic Wine At Home"
"Make Your Own Organic Soap At Home"
"Keeping a Few Chickens At Home"
"The Homemaker's Handbook"

- The first three are self explanatory. Clear directions and lots of pictures.

- The Homemaker's Handbook" is a large book of tips for the homemaker in every category of the home, with a large section on cooking and recipes. It's more like an extended cookbook. I wrote it 25 years ago but most of the information is still applicable.




You can download all of these books in one .zip file from the DOWNLOAD page of our website. (Yes, its up and running again, although there's not much on it yet.)

If you have any problems downloading the books, please let me know. Feedback on the books would be appreciated too!

Brugmansia and Datura

 

This photo above is a brugmansia bloom, also called "angel's trumpet". I love brugmansias! I fell in love at a greenhouse many years ago in Thunder Bay. They had one about 15' tall with blooms a foot long! It was unbelievable! I have usually grown at least one since that year.

First I have to say that the pics in this blog are not mine. I don't remember where I got them. Somewhere online during my research on the subject. I apologize if I have used your photo and offended you.  Please let me know and I will gladly remove it.

Brumansias (called "brugs" by growers) come in other colours. I have seen peach and yellow, similar to the one above and red ones with smaller flowers.

The plants are not hardy enough to stay outdoors all winter anywhere in Canada, unfortunately. I treat them like canna lilies, callas, glads, dahlias and bring them into the basement/garage/root cellar after they go dormant in the fall.

They do well in a large pot in the summer or you can plant them directly into the ground. If they are in a pot you can simply use a dolly to wheel the pot into the cold storage area. If they are in the ground they can be dug up, the root ball placed into a garbage bag and then stored for the winter after they go dormant in the fall. When the outside temperature is steady at the same temp as the storage area, they can go back outside to wake up in their own time when the temps are steadily above freezing. You can also bring them indoors, potted, and wake them up early if they are small enough.





It's very important that the roots do not freeze at any time! Your cold storage area needs to be cold and dark and always above freezing! The dark and cold are important to keep them domant for the winter. Semi-dryness is important too. Just a little water every month is all that's needed.  Too wet and they will rot and die.

They can be grown as houseplants through the winter, if you have enough light and space but they usually attract red spider mites long before spring comes and just don't stay very healthy indoors.



  

It may sound like a lot of trouble to go to for one plant, but if you have ever seen a large one in person, you will understand how truly stunning these really are!










 They are also extremely poisonous so be careful with the leaves and sap and wash your hands well after handling.




 

These (left) are my current brugmanias. You may have seen them growing in my indoor grow room in the previous post. I got stem pieces in a trade, rooted them and now have several around 2' tall. I grew them to about that height under lights this fall/winter then put them into the basement cold storage to go dormant until I can put them outside in the spring. I needed the room under the lights.






They are super easy to root in water and grow from stem cuttings. The important thing to remember is to keep the water always warm! Never let it get cold. You can often find growers in the fall who have cuttings available since they usually cut them back before bringing inside. 

Datura

A close relative of the brugmansia is the datura, also occasionally called "angel's trumpet". You can tell the difference by the flower growth. Brugmansia flowers always hang down and datura bloom always stick up. Daturas are annuals that stay low to the ground and spread, while brugs are woody tree like forms, especially if you remove the suckers. Daturas are true annuals, regrowing every season from seed. It's difficult to keep them over the winter but they are very fast growers!

They come in a few colours, usually variations of white or purple and some blue, with single or double blooms.

Like brugmansia, every part of the plant is deadly poisonous! But they are are beautiful!