Second Year SFG in Canada

General update as of April 16.

This is the mini (micro?) greenhouse from Ikea. The plants are onions that were not doing well indoors and now look like they are ready for the compost bin.



These are Sugar Snap Peas waiting for me to get them down into the indoor MM. The containers are toilet rolls cut in half. The seeds were soaked overnight to plump them up.



This is the Pakchoi. The seeds were sown 5 days ago.



Various herbs (Parsley, Basil, Thyme and Romarin). The Parsley is doing OK but the rest are remaining quite small.



This is the Pink Pampas Grass being started for Mrs TD. It's not for the SFG beds.



The Big Beef Tomatoes in the centre row have sprouted nicely. The Roma Tomatoes in the first row are starting to sprout. There is no sign of the Sweet 100s in the back row.



The Marigolds are doing OK.



This is my second light. It's an old desk lamp that Mrs TD uses for her hobbies. Years ago I used it on my desk.  The "3-5 KVA Steering Gear" label came from when I started out as an electrical engineer designing electrical circuits for lake freighter ships that we being built at Port Weller Dry Docks on the Welland Canal near Niagara Falls.



The main grow light set up. Excuse my messy work area.



Coffee grounds from Tim Horton's after dumping out the second batch. They will be transferred to the compost bins once I get the bins ready.

Wonderful update with photos.

I continue to acquire coffee grounds from the local coffee shop. Each day I pick up a full bucket and leave an empty one with them for the next fill up. Today, one of the young fellas behind the counter offered to carry the full bucket to my car. He must have felt sorry for the weak little old man begging for free coffee grounds   . I thanked him but told him it was not necessary. If I keep getting coffee grounds, I'll soon have to start a third compost bin.

Did you accept his offer, TD. Or do you have this stubborn pride thing.

Me, I accept every offer of help I can get, and thank them nicely.

Me too!

Kelejan wrote:Did you accept his offer, TD. Or do you have this stubborn pride thing.

Me, I accept every offer of help I can get, and thank them nicely.

Nope ... I turned down the offer. How would it look for a senior macho man like me to have his coffee grounds carried out by a skinny teenager? 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x4IpVoRsH80

Note: I actually have one of those Homer "dolls".  Did you notice that skinny (skeleton) teen in the background.

sanderson wrote:Me too!

sanderson, we are only weak wimmin.  I got rid of my stubborn pride eventually.

The video is a hoot.

I just visited a construction site where they are building numerous new houses. I went to the yard office to see if they had scrap lumber that I could take. They would not let me go onto the actual building lots because I did not have a hard hat and steel toed boots. But all is not lost. One of the "white hats" told me they would place a bin at the corner of their yard office parking lot and put scrap lumber in it for me by the end of the day. Let's see what happens! On the way back home, I picked up more coffee grounds at the coffee shop and they are OK with keeping that going. To top things off my neighbour brought over a bag of composted horse manure. This "getting free stuff" really is habit forming. What else can I try for?

There is a freecycle web site where you can get free stuff if you ask for it. In my neighbourhood people are often giving away free plants too. If you just say: "I like your flower/ plant" they say "Wanna piece?" I do the same thing too  Apparently there is also a quarry where they leave out free white rocks near Ottawa too. If you become a seed saver, you can swap seeds at a feed swap meet for free. And one of my friends gets free trays for seedlings at Loblaws.

Also TD- we could swap some seedlings when they are a bit bigger. I probably have way more than I'll ever be able to use. I think you're probably only about 7 minutes from my place. I live close to the T and T store if you know where that is.

Mimi  .. thanks for your suggestions. And yup we are almost neighbours. According to Google Maps I am 11 minutes from the T and T store. I'm not sure my seedlings will succeed but we can check for possible swaps.

Concerning the free scrap lumber from the construction site. When I went back to pick it up this evening there was nothing there.  But there was another car just leaving the location and he did a U turn and left the neighbourhood. I think he got my lumber.

trolleydriver wrote:Mimi  .. thanks for your suggestions. And yup we are almost neighbours. According to Google Maps I am 11 minutes from the T and T store. I'm not sure my seedlings will succeed but we can check for possible swaps.

Concerning the free scrap lumber from the construction site. When I went back to pick it up this evening there was nothing there.  But there was another car just leaving the location and he did a U turn and left the neighbourhood. I think he got my lumber.

Hi TD, sorry to hear someone took your lumber. How disappointing for you. I can just give some of my extras if they keep thriving. I think I have more tomatoes than would ever fit on my property Your seedling look like their in good shape though- so don't hold out on me

I sowed seeds indoors for Big Beef, Roma and Sweet 100 tomatoes. It looks like all the Big Beef germinated and are doing well.  Only three Roma germinated (that's maybe 20% of what was sown) and none of the Sweet 100s germinated. They were all sown in the same seed starting tray, at the same time and using the same "soil" mixture. I soon will need to transplant the Big Beef seedlings into bigger pots.

I am also growing Big Beef this year for the first time as an experiment.  Hope the taste is good.  I understand it is a real good grower but not sure of the taste.

Can you get to the scrap bin at the end of their work day?

This morning I was at HD to pick up some lumber for a new SFG box and some hardware cloth for a compost sifter.

As well, I made another failed attempt at getting scrap lumber.  I went to a different house building site. When I asked about scrap lumber, I was told that they do not give away scrap anymore because of health and safety regulations. So as I drove around this new neighbourhood and at every house that they are building there is a huge roll off bin sitting near the road. The bins are overflowing with stuff. I can see beautiful, clean, long pieces of lumber sticking out from them. There's a ton of new homes being built in this city and each one has bin that will be hauled away to who knows where ... probably some dump where the stuff will rot away. Maybe the wood will be converted into wood chips if anyone takes the time to sort out the wood from the rest of the junk. What a shame ... I could cry.     

Then I went to pick up more coffee grounds at the coffee shop. They now have me go to the side door so that the customers can't see what is going on. Right next to the door there is a large garbage bin full of cardboard. With their permission I came away with several large pieces of clean cardboard which can be used under a new SFG box. This was truly dumpster diving.

So you lose some and you win some.


sanderson ... While it is tempting to do so, I don't think I will go around to the construction sites after working hours. I would expect they will have someone keeping an eye on things just to make sure the new stuff doesn't get taken.

A warm welcome to SFG Box #3 which appeared this morning. The easy work is done. I had the boards cut at Home Depot and all I needed to do was fasten them together with deck screws. Now I need to put down some cardboard and weed barrier, mix up some MM, and build a grid out of venetian blind slats. Not sure Mrs TD will like the location but this end of the garden is mainly vegetables and fruit (raspeberries) so approval should be forthcoming.

I think you need one more box just to the left of that new box to even out the layout.

yolos wrote:I think you need one more box just to the left of that new box to even out the layout.

Agreed but I have to go one step at a time. As well, this new box may have to be moved to a completely different location.

After completion of negotiations with SWMBO , it looks like I "may" have to convert this new 4x4 into a 2x4 and make another 2x4 to go alongside it in order to keep the symmetry with the other beds. I could do a second new 4x4 but I really don't need it.

trolleydriver wrote:After completion of negotiations with SWMBO , it looks like I "may" have to convert this new 4x4 into a 2x4 and make another 2x4 to go alongside it in order to keep the symmetry with the other beds. I could do a second new 4x4 but I really don't need it.

SWMBO = sweet wife my best overseer  ???

No, no.  You can never have too many squares.  Where is your imagination.  Fava Beans, Lima Beans, Bush Beans, Pole Beans, Sugar Snap peas, snow peas, English Peas, Leeks, Garlic, shallots, tomatoes, cucumbers, zucchini, summer squash, winter squash, lettuce, spinach, radish, corn, cowpeas, bell peppers, banana peppers, jalapeno peppers, strawberries, watermelon, potatoes, carrots, flowers, green manure crops, chard, kale, brussel sprouts, broccoli, cabbage, kohlrabi, amaranth,  beets, onions, raspberries, blue berries, asparagus, cantaloupe,  etc, etc,

Not to mention flowers for SWMBO in the front rows for color or cutting! Two 4' x 4' are definitely symmetric.

Ding, ding. She who must be obeyed!

sanderson wrote:Not to mention flowers for SWMBO in the front rows for color or cutting!  Two 4' x 4' are definitely symmetric.

flowers ... that is exactly what I was thinking as well.  The problem is that she already has tons of flowers in the rest of the garden. I was also thinking of strawberries. She would love a whole 4x4 box of strawberries.