Thinking of going Organic?

Thinking of going Organic?

In the last few years, more and more of our customers have been inquiring about organic gardening. There is increased awareness regarding the importance of returning to the gardening methods and principles of our great grandparents when stewardship of the land was paramount. If homesteaders didn’t take care of their land, their very survival could be at stake. Fortunately there are now many more organic options in the way of products available at the consumer level than there was 10 years ago. Products such as biodegradable landscape fabric to biological pest controls. Here are some very simple tips to grow organically.

• Start from the ground up. Build a healthy soil with compost or manures. It encourages the beneficial microbes to do their job and lessens the need for additional applications of synthetic fertilizers. Products such as bone or blood meal, green sand, kelp, glacial rock dust are examples of organic sources of soil health enhancers.

• When starting your own flowers or vegetables, choose organic seeds. Seeds of Change is a seed company that has for 25 years, committed itself to harvesting and preserving seed free from being genetically modified and is grown without synthetic herbicides or pesticides. The seed is collected from only certified growers.

• Utilize Mother Nature’s own army of insect eaters by purchasing ladybugs and releasing them into your yard for a natural control of aphids.

• Plant flowers amongst your veggies to attract pollinators and insect eaters.

• Rotate your crops. Try not to plant the same crop in the same spot year after year. This will prevent depletion of various minerals from the soil and will not allow disease and or fungal spores to build up in the soil.

• Practice biodiversity. Instead of concentrating on a handful of plant varieties, include many different species to increase you garden’s biodiversity. This is easier than it sounds; merely tuck a curly parsley into your mixed annual planter that sits on your back deck or squeeze a few marigolds in with your lettuce rows. Be very brave and plant lovage in the back of flower beds and marvel at its thirst for greatness! (If you’ve ever grown lovage, you’ll know what I mean). The more variety of plants in your yard and garden, the more butterflies, ladybugs, pollinators and birds you will attract, and that my friends is a good thing!

Garden Containers… Some ideas

Here are some different planter ideas. I will let the pictures speak for themselves.  I would love to see what you have done… Please email your photos to me at info@artknappsurrey.com

Garden Gate Ideas

Here are some garden gate ideas. I would love to see what you have done… Please email your photos to me at info@artknappsurrey.com

Bloomerang Lilacs

A few years ago, there came on the market a fabulous new type of lilac called Bloomerang. It blooms in the spring and again from midsummer to frost. It’s  small habit fits into any garden with a sunny spot. All lilacs love heat, sun and once established can be drought tolerant. Top dress with lime (applied at the drip line) once yearly in early spring and feed with a low nitrogen fertilizer in spring. They are not heavy feeders so don’t go overboard. Prune lightly after blooming to maintain a nice shape. Bloomerangs will attract hummingbirds and blooms can be cut and enjoyed indoors. There is nothing like the unique, sweet scent of the lovely lilac!

PRUNING IS LIKE FLOSSING

One of the most overlooked or forgotten tasks in the garden is pruning. It’s
kind of like flossing one’s teeth. Dental professionals tell us flossing must be
done regularly for good health but we often let it slide. Pruning keeps shrubs
and bushes healthy. It removes dead, damaged or weak branches. It also can
determine form and structure. Yes there are many rules for pruning, but don’t
let that daunt you. If you aren’t sure if a certain shrub needs pruning (because
not all do), research on-line, consult a gardening book or ask advice at
your
favorite nursery.

Some shrubs, like rhododendrons, don’t normally require
pruning because they naturally maintain a dense form. Older, neglected
rhododendrons may, for esthetic reasons, cry out for a major overhaul to bring
them back to their original glory. Because rhodos form their flower buds the
previous year, this will result in loss of blooms for one year. It’s worth the
sacrifice because in the end you will be left with a rejuvenated, beautiful to
look at shrub. This type of pruning should be done in the dormant
time.

If a plant grows too tall or large from lack of pruning, it can
overwhelm neighboring plants and
surroundings. A little pruning each year
helps keep the plant in bounds, keep it healthy, allows good light penetration ,
improves air circulation and encourages blooms every year.

THE WONDERFUL WORLD OF ONIONS

What kitchen pantry wouldn’t be complete without the presence of wonderful
onions. While not being as glamorous or trendy as say arugula, imagine meals
without the unmistakable flavour of onion! There is such variety available to
home gardeners that can be grown in your backyard with minimal effort! Onions
are sold in roughly ½ lb packages in the bulb form. Started from this size, they
will mature faster than if started from seed. The exception is green bunching
onions that can quickly be grown from seed. Green onions can be grown in large
containers but the rest will be better in the ground. Plant them now to get them
rooting as fast as possible. Here is a quick listing of choices of onions you
could grow this year:

Yellow – This is the traditional cooking and storage onion. It’s what you buy all winter long from the grocery
store in 5lb mesh bags. It is medium size with yellow skin, lower sugar content but great storing abilities.

White – A higher moisture content than yellow onions so they won’t do well at storing but have a nice flavour and
typically are larger than yellow onions.

Red – Everyone has had red onions if they’ve ever eaten a greek salad. Red onions have a red skin overed/white flesh. They are often large yet any I’ve grown have only been medium sized at best. That being said, I just finished the last red onion from last years’ crop and it was still as perfect as the day I pulled it out!

Shallots – A small brown skinned onion with a mild flavour. It’s small size lends itself to being easily chopped into fine bits
when only a small amount of onions is required.

Multipliers – This onion type produces clusters of small onions for each bulb planted. They are mild and can be slightly garlicky if your soil allows. Soil composition plays a role in the flavour of all onions.

Walla Walla – This onion is usually purchased in starter root form that is roughly 4 inches long. This onion is named after the area in Washington state it was developed in. Because of it’s high moisture content, it must be eaten fresh as it will not keep. Walla Walla onions are however famous for their high sugar content making them fabulous for eating raw in salads, sandwiches and on steaks (my personal favorite).

Spanish – This is another name for a yellow, storage onion.

Raising Your Own Urban Hens

Urban hens are simply hens that are raised in your own backyard. You don’t require a barnyard and most importantly… You don’t need any noisy rooster for egg production. With the green movement, raising your own hens is becoming increasingly popular, and here are few reasons why:

• Better tasting, healthier eggs. Fresh eggs have 25% more vitamin E, 33% more vitamin A and 75% more beta-carotene than eggs from factory-farmed chickens.
• Local advantage. Raising your own hens is a great, sustainable way to support the local food movement and keep your family’s food supply fresh and close to home.
• Good for your garden. Chickens provide high-nitrogen fertilizer for your garden, and aerate your soil as they forage for bugs and eliminate many common garden pests.
• They are fun, inexpensive and really interesting.

Getting started:

Step 1: Check with your local municipality about the specific laws and ordinances in your area. (Most cities and counties allow up to a certain number of chickens per residence.)

Step 2: Decide what type of chickens you want to raise. The staff at Art Knapp Plantland in Surrey, Books and the Internet are great resources on backyard chicken keeping.

Step 3: Buy healty chicks or hens which are ready to lay.  Art Knapp Plantland in Surrey usually has a good selection of healthy birds.

Step 4: After you bring your chicks home, play with them and pick them up so that they get comfortable being around people.

Step 5: Provide your chickens with fresh water and food everyday. You can feed them chicken feed and vegetables.

At two months: Once your chicks have feathered out, they’ll need a little more room to roam. Create a chicken coop and outside run for them. Allow about 2-3 square feet per chicken inside the coop, and 4-5 square feet per chicken outside. Ensure that their new digs are predator-safe.

At 7-8 months: Your chickens should begin to lay eggs. At this time, you’ll need to create a nesting box for each chicken—if it’s not already built into your coop.

Basic Tropical Plant Care

Basic Tropical Plant Care

Tropical house plants are commonplace in our lives, in our offices and in our homes. However, they often get put off in a corner and more or less forgotten about, that is until they grab your attention because they look so bad. The care they need in order to look beautiful is much less time consuming than you might think.

If you follow a few basic placement guidelines and consistently provide a bit of care for your indoor plants they will look their best all year round. The don’t require very much time, just 30 minutes every couple of weeks in addition to watering will be enough. In order for your plants to be really happy, think about it from their point of view, remember where most of them naturally come from: The Tropics.

For the best looking tropical plants you need to recreate that environment as best as you can. It’s quite easy to establish a nice environment for them with minimal effort. These are some basic guidelines:

• Tropical plants love skylights, windows and humidity (bright bathrooms are perfect)
• They don’t like to be moved once you’ve given them a place in your home or office
• They don’t like to be touched excessively or put in main walkways where the leaves get brushed frequently
• They don’t like drafts, or direct rays of sunlight
• Most of them love to be misted (with a few exceptions like the hairy ones, such as African violet)
• Wipe their leaves with a soft, damp cloth when they get dusty, this helps with humidity as well
• Trim off the dead branches and leaves
• They like mild frequent feedings (in the growing season with diluted food mixture)

There are even several tropical plants that are a great match for the so-called “brown thumb”, meaning the person that kills every plant near them. There are several that will tolerate poor conditions and care and still come back to vibrancy with a bit of water and attention.

Two varieties that I would recommend to those people are Pothos and Sansevieria (Snake plant). These are two of the toughest to kill and easiest to keep alive indoor plants you’ll find. They will take months worth of neglect and still come back with the slightest improvement in care. The Snake plant likes to be left alone and even prefers to be neglected, it can die if you water it incorrectly and give it attention!

Pothos is recommended for the brown thumb as well. It will grow nicely in a several different lighting situations, and keep growing even if you forget to water it for a bunch of days or weeks. If the leaves begin to go limp, well then it’s time to water! The plant will accept this kind of treatment and perk right back up again with a splash of water like nothing ever happened.

If you follow the above guidelines you will surely have better success with your indoor plant garden.

By Stacydee

Hummingbirds Are Pollinators Too

Hummingbirds Are Pollinators Too

Everyone knows that bees pollinate our gardens and flowers. They do a vital job for us and our food supply, our very existence depends on pollination occurring. Did you realize that hummingbirds are pollinators too? Hummingbirds are actually assisting bees in their task. The hummingbirds’ diet consists mainly of nectar, insects, tree sap and pollen.

They are very beneficial to your garden and their presence should be encouraged. When the hummingbird drinks the nectar from a flower, he sticks his head right inside to reach the most possible sweet liquid. In doing this he rubs his head on the stamen of the flower and gets pollen on his head and sides of his beak. He then travels to the next flower, drinks again and inadvertently transfers the previous flowers’ pollen to the new one.

The hummingbird can eat as much as half its’ body weight in a single day. They must find .05 ounces of food each day to survive. This equates to approximately 50 or 60 meals every single day.

Hummingbirds are able to hover very still and have great precision to drink from the tiniest of flowers. They can do this because they beat their wings in a figure eight pattern at a rate that exceeds 2500 beats per minute, that’s more than 40 beats per second and can increase to 75 beats per second in rapid flight and courtship dives. That figure 8 action holds them very still and makes it possible for them to fly very quickly, change direction on a dime and even fly backwards. It’s this rapid beating of the wings that makes the distinctive hum sound that we hear when they are nearby.

Hummingbirds live for about 4 years and are very habitual. They have a route or preferred sequence of flowers that they visit, they learn and repeat where the best food is. It may just be a loop around your backyard or it may be a full circuit of the neighborhood. Either way the lovely little hummingbird is assisting us greatly in helping preserve our food supply, even if it happens as a by product of the little guys feeding for their own survival.

They have the largest brain of all birds, at 4.2% of its’ total body weight with their average whole body weight being in the range of .08-.7 ounces. They are the smallest animal to have a backbone. The benefits of having hummingbirds around are numerous, I encourage you to plant their favorite flowers in the summer and feed them in the winter. This will ensure greater numbers of birds, we can have a great impact when we all do our part in helping this species survive.

I encourage everyone to learn about these interesting little birds, and help them as much as we can in their very busy short lives.

By Stacydee