Garden Wisdom Blog — category: Garden Resources

Gardening instructions can be full of peculiar phrases from British gardening traditions. “Potting on,” “pricking out,” and “hardening off” are all things we do with seedlings to help them prepare for eventual transplanting out into the garden. Hardening off seedlings is probably the most important concept that new gardeners can grasp to improve successful transplants. It is the process of gradually introducing seedlings started indoors to the much harsher conditions of the garden outside. As bright as any indoor grow lights might be, none compare to direct sunlight. Plants that have not been introduced gently to direct sunshine may show...

The bean is an annual plant of the family Fabaceae. This is a huge plant family, with over 19,000 species, so there are many interesting facts about beans. Only orchids and asters outnumber the members of this botanical group. Among the bean plant’s many close relatives are peas, runner beans, broad beans, soya beans, peanuts, alfalfa, clover, lupins, and sweet peas. All these plants are grouped botanically based on the common structure of their flowers and other characteristics. All of them can be considered “Legumes,” although most of them are inedible and many are even poisonous. The particular species we...

The changing seasons, and the longer daylight hours in summer are a result of the angle of the Earth’s axis in relation to the sun. It’s easy to forget how these changes can affect the growth of plants, and in particular, vegetables. Soil temperature plays a very important role in the success or failure of the vegetable garden. Beet seeds, for instance, do not require particularly warm soil to germinate, and they will produce nice leafy tops if sown in early spring, but if the soil is too cold at planting time, they may not produce well-developed roots. By contrast,...

As far as the calendar is concerned, spring is half over, despite the sense for many of us in 2017 that is yet to begin! There are still dozens of seeds to start in May. It can still be cold at night, so some seeds will continue to benefit from starting indoors in a warm room. Most seeds will germinate faster and more evenly if heated from below with a heating mat. Other seeds actually prefer cool soil for germination, and they can be direct sown in May here on the coast. Start these seeds indoors in May: Asparagus (start...

Last summer I planted a few rows of fall and winter harvest leeks in our demonstration beds at Kirkland House here in Ladner. We chose the varieties described as “winter harvest” since they are bred to stand up to frost, but included Alto Varna, which is known mostly as a fast growing summer harvest leek. All these leeks were sown last July, and transplanted into five inch holes in early September. While they are intended for harvest between November and February, they lasted in very good form until late April. While we did harvest a few leeks over winter, the...