CANADIAN REGION: What are you doing in February 2016

Brrr! TD. No sign of the Polar Vortex effect here for at least seven days.  Temperature at the moment is 4*C and by Monday it is forecast to be 8*C.  Eat your heart out.

Seriously, I do feel sorry for the East of Canada.  I do not function well when it is very cold, I just curl up inside and make myself comfortable.

This morning I glanced out the window and noticed that some sunshine had reached the trees that grow behind me on the hill.  The place at the far corner of my yard where my veggie garden starts, I could see the shadow of the hill halfway up a house on the opposite side.  So sunshine is on its way to my yard.

I was surprised to see the sunshine as the Weather Service has nothing but clouds and rain pictured.  This is just a break and I am going out now to take advantage of it.

This afternoon I read through "A First Time SFG in Canada" thread that documented my first year experiences with SFG. It helped to remind me of some things especially what worked well and what did not work so well.

Overnight here in Ottawa we set a record low temperature for Valentine's Day at -29.6 Celsius (windchill is -40 C).

Gruesome. We're having similar record-breaking weather here in New England. Good day to cozy up inside and divide seedlings.

CC

sanderson wrote:TD,  That's a coincidence.  I just browsed through the first thread of "Northern California & Coastal Valleys - What are you doing this month?"  It's a nice journey through the first couple of years.

Just a footnote to members:  A thread has a maximum of 67 pages.  At that point it is "locked" and a second thread automatically starts up.  

I didn't know that, sanderson.  Learn something every day.

Also, a thread has a minimum of one page.

Just read an article that stated that Ottawa was the coldest capital in the world on Sunday. I can do without that. Starting tonight we are expecting to get up to 30 centimetres of snow. 

The good news is that the shadow from our two story house is getting smaller as the sun is getting higher in the sky. This morning the shadow no longer covers the regular soil beds behind the SFG beds. That part of the garden is bathed in sunlight gleaming off the snow.

trolleydriver wrote:Just read an article that stated that Ottawa was the coldest capital in the world on Sunday. I can do without that. Starting tonight we are expecting to get up to 30 centimetres of snow. 

The good news is that the shadow from our two story house is getting smaller as the sun is getting higher in the sky. This morning the shadow no longer covers the regular soil beds behind the SFG beds. That part of the garden is bathed in sunlight gleaming off the snow.

Wonderful!  I share your pleasure.

Snowing heavily here. One of my chicken wire cages on one of the SFG boxes is almost totally buried. Probably going to get about 40 centimetres today.

I have just checked my 95% snow-free beds.  The garlic and tulips are pushing through the layers of leaves that I laid on them last year. I can see buds on some of the blueberry bushes.

The voles have made a mess of my lawn with many new above ground tunnels exposed by the melted snow.  I will probably flatten them tomorrow.

The garden as a whole looks kind of sad. It will look better when it starts greening up, that is quite some time away.

I am sure there will be some bad weather before spring finally gets here.

I did see some bright yellow crocus against the Library walls in Downtown.  That is the first place I see them every year. The purple ones are still in bud.

As of 7 pm we have had 50 centimetres of snow and it is still falling. That is a new 24 hour snowfall record breaking the old record of 40.6 centimetres set in 1947!  Unbelievable, we seem to be constantly breaking weather records these days.

What happens when it all melts, TD?  Not floods, I hope.

trolleydriver wrote:As of 7 pm we have had 50 centimetres of snow and it is still falling. That is a new 24 hour snowfall record breaking the old record of 40.6 centimetres set in 1947!  Unbelievable, we seem to be constantly breaking weather records these days.

That is A LOT OF SNOW! Wow! We have had almost none, maybe 4 inches....really strange. My sister, who lives in Columbus, had had a bunch more, 6x more, snow than me.....

Gonna be warm here by Friday, they say. Not sure how to feel about that

KJ ... Flooding has not been a problem in the past. Until today we have not had much snow accumulation compared to previous years so this one should be OK. I usually get a lake from the melt at the end of my driveway because the road is not sloped properly for the runoff to get to the storm sewer.

SR ... your sister got more snow than we got here. We received a total of 51.2 cm (that's just over 20 inches) in about a 16 hour period. For me, it was not so much the amount but the speed with which it fell that was impressive. Beautiful sunny day today and everything looks so clean and white with the new snow.

The Ottawa Seedy Saturday event is only a couple of weeks away on March 6. I've never been to one of these events so I may try to take in this one. It may be a good way to get some interesting seeds.

I've been looking at the Master Gardeners of Ottawa website. They have an archive of newsletters that include good articles on indoor seed starting and even one on Square Foot Gardening.

I'm trying to find a way to link up with other SFGers in my area but so far I have had no success in finding a way to do this. A few weeks ago I spoke to a local SFG Certified Instructor so maybe I should contact her again to find out if there is a local network.

BTW I am feeling totally overwhelmed trying to decide what I should grow this year and what I should start indoors. There are just too many options and varieties for my brain to take in. I still don't know for certain how many SFG beds I will have. I need to get back to the K.I.S.S. principle before my head explodes.

trolleydriver wrote:

BTW I am feeling totally overwhelmed trying to decide what I should grow this year and what I should start indoors. There are just too many options and varieties for my brain to take in. I still don't know for certain how many SFG beds I will have. I need to get back to the K.I.S.S. principle before my head explodes.

Now you know how I feel, albeit on a newby point of view

Take a deep breath ,TD and P14shooter.

Do what you can and do not fret about it. 

TD, just do one or two extra things and continue with what you have already done otherwise you may get burn-out and that would be a great shame.

P14, don't try to do everything at once.  There will always be things you just do not get round to.

Good advice, Kelejan!

I've got so many different seeds, it's very easy to get overwhelmed. I DON'T have to grow everything this year!

Since I'm saving seeds, I only choose ONE type of tomato. This year is San Marzano. (I'll grow some pear tomatoes on the deck at least 150 feet away from the San Marzano to prevent cross-pollination.

I chose ONE type of watermelon, ONE type of pumpkin, etc. Just relax & start with; Overall what do you want?" Then go to specific varieties.

Great advice KJ and AM.

I am definitely trying to do (or planning to do) too many things. Last year I had just discovered SFG, I kept it small (only two 4x4 SFG beds) and it was a lot of fun. Now I'm into microgreens, grow lights, self-watering containers, indoor seeding, expanding the number of SFG beds, trying to decide on which of the many types/varieties to grow, thinking of ways to extend the season, canning/dehydrating, etc., etc. I'm turning a part-time fun hobby into a full-time stressful job.

BTW ... I just heard the latest update on Canada's annual inflation rate. Year over year (January 2015 to January 2016), the cost of fresh vegetables rose 18.2% and fresh fruit fruit rose 12.9%. That is insane.

Wow!  That's some crazy inflation!

Back to the basics with you, young man!  

LOL! I understand about getting overwhelmed.  The first 3 yrs I wanted to try so many new veggies, it was silly.  

Now I grow alot more of what I love so I can freeze some and I give away the seeds of the other stuff. Easy peasy.

CC

In a few minutes when I have finished my coffee and checking this Forum,  I am going outside for half an hour to pull some weeds.

Returning form walking the dog, I saw that my roadside slope where I had trees taken down was clear of snow so I inspected it so see if anything was growing there after putting a couple of loads of Wood Chips on  to extend my growing area.

Some perennials are showing signs of bud etc, as also are quite a lot of creeping buttercups that look very pretty during summer but are invasive and are NOT wanted.  I pulled on a few and they came up so easily I am going to attack them half an hour at a time. The ones I have already pulled came straight up and their roots were about eight inches long.  Imagine what they will be like if I ignored them? It is going to be a boring job but I have learned my lesson about weeds in the spring.  Kill them now while still small and yiu get overwhelmed.

I finally ended up working a whole hour pulling up creeping buttercup.  Some were easy but as I had left them a year to grow :-( many had entangled roots and they were a lot harder.  I did start on the hardest ones that had grown up between the logs and where the roots were buried deep.  It really teaches me a lesson about keeping on top of weeds in the spring.