Tag: gardening

Late November

A Bighorn gives a stretch.

A little colder as of late, but overall, a mild month. The lake is still open and it doesn’t look like I am going to get my usual skate in before the end of November. 

The ground hasn’t been frozen until last week. The garlic has had a couple extra weeks to establish. I don’t know if that is good or bad. We shall see.

Mr and Mrs Carrot.

Up behind the mountain today. Only a couple of inches of snow, none in the valley bottom. I cut a few cedar boughs along the creek for Christmas decorations. Lisa makes wonderful wreaths.

***

A week ago I saw three very large Bighorn rams in Radium. A few days later I went back looking for them. I found two, the third, the biggest was nowhere to be found. While I took a few photos a young woman stopped to look as well. She said it was reported the largest one was hit on the highway.

Full curl. Those horns have seen some action.

Incredible considering there are fences, speed signs and even an animal overpass. The woman was from the United States and said she couldn’t believe how fast everyone drives around here. She was referring to the highway through the Kootenay National Park. I told her those are people from Alberta in a hurry to get out here and have fun. I told her Albertans are Canada’s Texans. She laughed and seemed to understand immediately.

Now, before anybody gives me shit for that comment, I realize we have our own share of yahoos in British Columbia. I could well imagine residents of small towns three hours from Vancouver probably hate being taken over by people trying to escape the city.

Regardless of jest, considering all of the precautions in place and provincial money spent, it’s a shame to see Bighorns being killed on the roads.

***

Saw a large heard of elk on the side of Swansea. The bulls kept hidden.

Kale still putting out in late November. No wonder Kaleman is so tough.

Rain

A Mule Deer doe and fawn get ready to bed-down for the night beside the shed.

It is refreshing to have rain in July. The land is still green, unlike in recent years where it was yellowing and tinder dry at this time of year.

Lisa and I avoided the valley bottom yesterday opting for the higher country. The berries were abundant with the excess moisture. We could smell them on the cool mountain breeze.

Soap Berries. kupaʔtiⱡ in Ktunaxa.

We came across a new batch of huckleberries that deserves a better look. It could be a good year for this delicious fruit. We picked a few handfuls that we enjoyed on the spot, letting Willow also have a few.

Forcing flowers.

The garden has taken off with giant heads of broccoli and lettuce. The garlic is just about ready to harvest. Peas and beans are developing pods. Raspberries are ripe. Carrots are fingerling. All and all it’s looking good.

Thank goodness for the coolness.

Notice the fawns camo spots between its eyes.

Calypso Bulbosa

Venus’s Slipper

Like the old saying, been up to my ass in alligators. Was able to step away from the grind a few evenings ago to lay on my belly on the forest floor and study the first orchids of the season.

They were abundant, small fairies hovering above the moss and crumbled deadfalls.

***

Lisa and I took our grandkids for a walk in the bush today. We unfortunately came across the carcass of a black bear, shot and skinned. The kids didn’t see it and we changed our route.

They are in season right now. I am amazed there are any bears left considering the pressure from hunting and poaching. Parts of the bear are valued in traditional Chinese medicine. The gall bladder, liver, testicles, fur, paws and head are highly valued.

I have found dead bears cut open with head and paws missing.

***

It is warming up. The grass is already burning. The garden is coming along with the weeds. The garlic has scapes and they are damn spicy!

Garden Planted

Damn it feels good to have a few days off. The rest of the garden is planted. The tomatoes started in the basement are on their own and look healthy. They looked happy to be planted. Of course we had a short windstorm today that knocked them around. It’s up to them now.

We’ll see if anything comes up. The birds are enjoying the sprinkler as it has been dry with not a lot of runoff due to low snowpack in the mountains.

***

The other day Lisa thought she heard something in the basement. She was right, it was a scratching and banging in the stove pipe. I opened up the pipe and nothing. I checked the chimney and stove, still nothing.

That night the banging and scratching started back up. Willow did her job letting us know of potential intruders. We didn’t get much sleep.

In the morning I took it all apart again and nothing. Once I put it all back together the noises resumed.

We went to Cooper’s soccer game. When we came home the noises were still coming from the pipe but now they were coming from where the pipe joins the stove.

I opened it up and there was an American Flicker, a type of woodpecker hiding in the flume. It must of, somehow flew down the chimney. When I had opened everything up it would go back into the chimney where we couldn’t see it. Once it went down the pipe to the stove it couldn’t get back up.

Lisa opened the basement door. I reached in and gave it a nudge. The Flicker burst into flight and flew across the room and straight out the door.

We couldn’t have been happier. I’m sure the bird felt likewise.

Fall gardening

Getting some water on the garlic.

Planted 120 cloves of garlic and 64 daffodils. We had a good crop of garlic this summer and I saved the big heads to be used for seed. We have our fingers crossed for another good crop next year.

The garden is getting big for Lisa and I. Sometimes it’s tough to find homes for all the veggies it produces.

Tomatoes, tomatoes everywhere!

A few weeks ago I picked all of the green tomatoes and put them in the dark basement to ripen and ripen they did – all at once. We have made and canned sauce, salsa and tomato soup. Lisa has also dried plenty and has them stored for use.

We decided to put the remaining ones (7 beer flats worth) out on a table by the road with a FREE sign. Lisa also put a notice on Facebook group advertising free stuff.

Fifteen minutes later the tomatoes were gone. That Facebook is something else! We had people coming for hours after and turning around when they saw they were all gone. Lisa put up an updated notice on the Facebook post saying they were gone to save any others the trip.

Willow enjoying the last of the Marigolds.

We were glad to see them go. The garden took a beating from the grasshoppers but the tomatoes strived.

Other than kale and beats the garden is just about done for the year. Next week is calling for snow. We shall see.

Weed

Ready to be picked and trimmed.

Good to be up a little later. Tomorrow will be the first day in a very long time I won’t have to get up for work at 4:30am.

No bugs to speak of. The garden is hanging in there without a sign of frost. Tomorrow I will have to pick a few flats of tomatoes.

Plenty has been neglected. Wood needs piling. Photos need editing. The yard and garden needs sorting.

Bought a small axe, wooden handle, short at 28″. It kept slipping out of my hand as I am used to a three and a half foot handle. An axe with a wooden handle that long is hard to find and expensive, but worth it. If I ever win the lottery I am going to have bunch of axes, fancy ones, made in Sweden and Germany, and split wood just for fun.

A couple pictures of colourful cannabis flowers. It is coming good and needs to be harvested before frost.

The tomatoes are in the same boat. Same as the spuds.

Tomorrow is a day off. With luck I’ll get some work done.

Labour Day

Coming fast. Quite an assortment of heritage varieties. I will have to look at my notes to see what I started. There are some big ones out there!

Everyone hopes things settle down after Labour Day.

Not sure what to do with them all so put them up as an art installation. Waiting for SFMOMA to call and have it reproduced.

The garden is dry and neglected. Beans that should have been picked, broccoli in flower, zucchini the size of prosthetic rhino legs, cabbage splitting, tomatoes fallen over and growing on the ground, beets the size of turnips and onions saying, ‘get us out of this parched earth’.

The one and only Calendula that survived the grasshoppers.

It got away from us this year.

Electric lettuce. Just like ordinary lettuce, you can’t even give it away.

Gardening

The good neighbour Larry always gives me some plants. He starts them inside starting in February. To say he has a green thumb is an understatement.

I also start a few plants in March. When I have one or two that don’t look like they are going to make it, I let them convalesce at Larrys, and he breaths life back into them. It is like a spa for plants.

The plants he gives me must feel bad, because they go from a perfect environment to where they must survive.

‘Treat ’em mean, keep ’em keen,’ he says, is my motto.

Late October

Fall colours.

The garden is still kicking, turnips harder than algebra, cabbage holding on despite the hounds taking a bite, leeks and sunflowers.

It’s been a sunny fall. Now things are changing. The leaves are being blown off the trees in bushelfuls.

***

CBC reported the Civil Service has bloated by another 35,000 government jobs since Covid. More defined pensions to pay out. Everyone is happy, especially if you work for the government. These employees had three paid statutory holidays in September. Nice work if you can get it.

***

Until I was forty I worked for myself. Since then I’ve worked shoulder to shoulder with a supervisor who was a white supremacist, a lazy cuss, who would take his following, mostly from Alberta, up Findlay Creek to shoot their guns while praying for a breakdown in society so they could shoot the mud people. He was a Nazi supporter and holocaust denier and Pentecostal Minister. None of that hampered him from succeeding in the shit hole town he landed in.

***

Another guy I worked with, at the School District, beat his wife and kids. He told me they deserved it and he had to sleep in his van, during the day, because it took it out of him.

***

Even another guy at the School District, a manager, had a crush on a custodian with fake tits. He was useless in every way, so was she, even the boob job was bad. They deserved each other. His claim to fame was collecting generous government severance packages when it was determined he wasn’t fit for government. This is very difficult to do. Once let go another branch of government rehired him. Nice work if you can get it.

***

I remember those three fuckers whenever I get frustrated with my job.

winding down

Brandywine, Chocalate Cherry, Sweet 100 and Black Krim.

The garden is on its last legs. It’s a good time of year when you can go out and grab supper; broccoli, spuds, kale, beets, carrots, and plenty of tomatoes.

We have yet to have frost so the tomatoes are outdoing themselves. Plenty of ripe ones. They need picking everyday. Lisa and Scarlett took a bunch down to the old folks home yesterday, something our kids did regularly when the garden produced more than it does now.

Life is good when you have home grown tomato salad for every meal.

A dragonfly testing the poppies.