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Cool and dry in Toronto – a strange gardening season

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I don’t know what’s going on, but this summer is just a non-starter here in Toronto.

We’re several degree’s below the normal average this month and it’s been cloudy and overcast for most of June and July. Plus … even though most days forecast rain, we’ve only had a little bit in our area … well, up until last night and today that is!

You might remember that I started this growing season talking about how we were having a warmer than normal early spring and how my plants were ahead by two to three weeks … yeah, well forget that now! I’d say most of my plants are behind by two weeks now.

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My roses have only flowered once and are slow to develop new buds this month (although a few roses have had some repeat blooms).

The sunflowers … they’re only maybe three feet high and haven’t really developed flower heads yet!

The cosmo’s, cleomes, daisies etc are just beginning to bloom … sporadically.

I have green tomatoes on the plants, but they don’t seem to be growing all that much … and my cherry tomatoes and tiny toms have totally stalled and have yet to produce any tomatoes! I can usually count on my tiny tomatoes before my regular sized ones!

I barely saw any strawberries in June … of course it’s possible that the birds, squirrels and even my dog might have got to them before me! We do have raspberries that are starting to mature now though … so maybe with this rain and hopefully some true summer heat (next week?) the berries and all the flowers will come along.

Actually I’m sure the rain will help – as I said it’s been dry in our area … even though I know it’s rained in other areas of Toronto … still the weather people say we’ve had a lot less rain than we normally do in July as well … so it’s cool and dry.

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How are things in your area? Is your garden a little behind because of cool weather or is your garden delightful?






Time to enjoy the garden

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July has arrived and I think that I’m just about ready to sit back and enjoy my garden for the next few months.

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What I mean by this is that from early April until last week or so, every time I visited my garden I had work to do! From spring clean up, pruning the roses and other plants to weeding to planting annuals to finally completing the big task of adding approximately 30 bags of red cedar mulch on my back and front garden beds.

We put mulch on our garden every year, but the last two years we only topped up the beds with a light layer. This year we noticed that the previous applications of mulch had really broken down, so we made sure to add a 3 inch layer this year – hence all the big heavy bags of mulch!

Other than doing a little pruning here and there as the roses grow and become floppy, and or staking the roses and other plants as they grow, most of the work is done. From here on in the main gardening job will be keeping it watered.

Actually there’s at least one more job. My husband and I made up a large garbage pail of Alfalfa tea about a month ago and it should be just about ready to be applied to the garden. Alfalfa seems to contain a growth hormone that causes the plants to row quite well once either alfalfa pellets are added to the soil and break down, or in our case once our evil stinking brew of Alfalfa tea has been applied. It’s a great natural fertilizer.  Obviously it’s also organic.  We are organic gardeners and never use chemicals on our plants or lawn.

We just have to make sure that we apply it to the garden when most of our close neighbors are indoors! It’s stinky! We usually apply alfalfa tea twice a year – once in early June and then again near the end of July, but we’re behind this year, so the garden might only get one dose this year.

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Speaking of enjoying the garden … The first huge flush of roses is just about over. The roses started blooming in early June and now that first flush seems to be dying down. Most of my roses are re-bloomers or continuous bloom … but nothing beats that first Spring flush of roses as it’s usually the largest!

IMG_5848 Other plants in bloom include Lavender, Salvia, Heuchera, some of my hostas, some of my clematis, Gazania, Marigolds, Petunias, Dianthus (Sweet William), Impatiens, Alyssum, Portulaca, Hollyhocks, Lilies, Daylilies, Maltese Cross and the list goes on. More plants will begin to bloom soon as well!

We also have a number of veggies growing ranging from Tomatoes, Tiny tom and Cherry tomatoes, cucumbers, beans, peas, a variety of lettuces, spinach and carrots. Plus we also grow strawberries and raspberries. Yummy.

Now if only it would get a little warmer here in Toronto. It’s been kind of cool the last two weeks with below average temperatures. It looks like it’s supposed to warm up a little bit this weekend, but overall it will still be below normal temps for a while. I do hope summer starts to feel like summer soon.

The only good thing about the slightly cooler temps is that I haven’t had to water the garden daily or even every second day and we haven’t really had the air-conditioning on. So we’re saving money on water and electricity. But enough already … It is after all supposed to be summer!

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How is your garden doing this summer? Are you finished most of the hard work and like me find it’s time to sit back and enjoy the garden? And is your weather a little cooler than normal too?

Making a Raised-Bed Garden

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Back in 2002 when we landscaped our yard and started our garden we decided to create a raised bed garden.

We decided on raised bed gardening for a number of reason. The main reason being the soil in our yard seemed to be composed of mostly sand and clay. It was dry and difficult to dig deeper than 6 inches or so. amending the soil to a suitable consistency would have taken too long.

patio4 Raised garden beds are easy to build. They are also easy to plant new plants in, weed and maintain.

Other advantages of raised bed gardening that we considered before creating our garden were the fact that the soil would drain quickly in the spring when the snow melts, and the beds would warm up a little faster in the spring as well enabling us to either plant earlier in the season or giving the perennials and shrubs a head start.

So how can you make your own raised beds?

– We used easy wall garden stones (you can read the details of how we landscaped our garden here), but you can create your raised garden bed walls with:

– Concrete blocks, bricks, rocks, natural rot-resistant wood or wood that’s been treated with a safe preservative.

You might also need:

  • Sheet plastic and or a wood preservative if you create wood borders.
  • Measuring tape
  • Shovel
  • Spading fork
  • Rake
  • Hammer
  • Nails
  • Topsoil
  • Compost

Since our raised garden beds were meant to be permanent garden structures we also used gravel screening at the base of the easy wall stones to give the stones a good foundation and also to aid in drainage from the garden beds.

Temporary Raised Beds

If you’re still landscaping and trying to decide where you want to place your garden beds you might consider creating temporary raised garden beds. You can easily change your garden design each season using temporary raised garden beds.

All you really need to do to create a temporary raised bed is shovel garden soil into the area that you’ve planned for your raised bed. You might consider using Triple mix soil as it’s been blended with garden soil, topsoil and compost. Otherwise you can amend your garden spoil by adding top soil and compost to the mix yourself.

Permanent and temporary beds can be shaped in any way that you wish. You can create rectangular, curved, or even round beds.

The basics of building a raised garden bed is that it should be about 12 inches deep and usually no more than three to four feet wide.

Our beds are build around the edges of the garden so we only have access to each bed from one side, however you might think of making a round bed in the center of your lawn or placing two raised beds side by side with two to three feet of space between them for easy access. You’ll be able to access the garden beds from both sides so it will be even easier to care for than ours!

Be sure to remove any rocks, sticks or other debris from the garden bed as you create it. Rake the top of the bed smooth and flat when you are finished building up the soil.

Permanent raised garden beds:

When creating permanent raised garden beds you should use rot-resistant wood (cedar for example) or bricks, rocks, stones or cement blocks. As I said above your bed should be at least a foot deep and no more than three to four feet wide.

If you choose to use a rot resistant wood when creating your raised garden bed you might want to use an earth friendly preservative such as linseed oil or a borax based treatment to slow the rotting of the wood.

Raised beds can be build on the soil of your yard, but I’d recommend loosening the soil with a spading fork or shovel first.

Once you’ve completed building the walls of your raised beds fill with triple mix or top soil, garden soil and compost.

Planting Raised Beds

Now that you’ve created your raised beds you’ll be able to visualize how your garden will look when the beds are planted.

Depending upon what kind of garden you’ve planned you can plant vegetables, herbs or flowering plants in your raised beds.

As my regular readers know our raised beds have a mix of roses (over 60); shrubs – boxwood, Rose of Sharon, Rhododendron, and Azaleas; perennials – lavender, bee balm, saliva, Maltese cross, peonies and many more; and spring flowering plants and bulbs. We also grow tomatoes, carrots, peppers, herbs and leafy greens right in our raised beds along side the flowering plants. The mix of plants actually look quite nice together.

Most of your planting should be done during the spring and autumn months.

You might want to add some fertilizer to the soil around your new plants when you first plant them. We use natural fertilizers such as alfalfa pellets or brew some alfalfa tea or compost tea to use as fertilizer.

If you’ve built your raised garden beds along the perimeter of your yard or fence you’ll want to plant taller plants at the back of the raised beds and shorter plants near the front. If your raised bed is in the center of your yard you’ll likely want to plant the taller plants in the center/middle of the raised bed and surround them with shorter plants.

Just be sure not to compact the soil as you work in your raised beds planting your new plants.

Be sure to water your raised beds regularly. One of the cons of raised beds is that they dry out a little faster than other garden beds.

Every year, usually at the end of May or beginning of June we add some mulch to the garden beds.

We don’t do this earlier in the season as we like to turn the soil around the plants a little bit prior to adding mulch. turning the soil tends to keep slugs at bay. Perhaps their eggs die when exposed on top of the soil. Mulch too early and you might find your garden full of slugs.

Adding mulch to your garden beds adds organic material that will break down over time and help fertilize your soil. The seasonal benefit of mulching is of course that it helps conserve water by keeping the soil moist below the mulch and of course a layer of mulch two or three inches deep will keep weeds away too.

Use straw, shredded bark, shredded leaves or other materials for mulch.

Tips

As I said earlier we have a number of plants in our raised garden beds. I put some thought into what kind of plants I would grow so that I would pretty much have continuous blooms in my garden from late March to November and sometimes even early December.

A variety of bulbs and spring plants work well for early to late Spring. Choose some plants that bloom early and some that bloom later in the season.

Many of the spring blooming plants die down once the weather starts to warm up so they are planted near perennials and rose shrubs. So once they die down, the perennials appear or the roses begin to bloom and the space that the spring plants took in the garden is quickly filled by the growing perennials.

If you grow vegetables in the garden you can arrange to grow them in succession as well. Lettuce often does best in the spring or at least before the weather begins to get quite hot. Once your lettuce is done you might plant beans or another crop of vegetable that isn’t mature until late summer.

This is what our backyard looked like in July 2003 – just a little more than a year after we’d put in the raised garden beds –

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Believe it or not, the garden is even fuller now as the plants have reached maturity. It’s beautiful and even more amazing that we did it ourselves.

You can do – get inspired!

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