Despite the colder and wetter than normal weather, the garden is coming along well. Potatoes are hilled. Garlic thickening up nicely. Picking green onions already! Have eaten our first 3 cucumbers from the new greenhouse. Tomatoes are formed and ripening.
It was a great help to have our second woofer, Emma, from Devon in the UK, helping us. She fit in like a second daughter!


The whole garden is scented by lilac at the moment - wish this could go on for the whole summer! It is so lovely to catch wafts of scent as you move around the garden.

Having spent the last two weeks traveling, first to Courtenay on Vancouver Island and to Gabriola Island, and then to Calgary, it has been interesting to see how the weather varies by region. I was disappointed how far behind our spring was compared to the Island, but we are so far ahead of southern Alberta!
It is odd how we are behind with weather in March but catch up and surpass very quickly, usually in April.
The mandeville we succesfully over-wintered for the first time is flowering! Cucumber and tomato plants we started from seed are now 12-18" tall, and the cucumbers are flowering. The lettuce is bolting and going to seed already in the greenhouse. Lots of new leaves on the banana plants, and also on the taro. Almost time to put them outside, but there could still be the odd frost so we must restrain ourselves!

A  woofer is a member of the WWOOF organization (World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms) - commonly known as a Willing Worker On Organic Farms! Room and board is traded for some work time. We had our first woofers last year and really enjoyed getting to know them - we had a gal from England, a gal and a couple from Germany.
We are looking forward to the arrival of our first woofer for 2011 at the begining of April. It will be Isabelle from France with her dog, Omega, also from France!
Now we know she is coming, we can plan one more thing we'd love to get done but don't have time to get done by ourselves. 

 A movable chicken run would be perfect. They would slowly mow the cherry orchard, organically fertilising as they go! They would love the shade too. 

We will be increasing the "bulk area" this year with a new area for the potatoes to work over, and a new area for the squash to beat out the weeds. Rotational farming almost imposes itself on you. Turning and combing the compost needs to be done soon too.


Hopefully we will have some weather soon to entice me into the garden with a notebook and pencil to build a good "to-do" list for the regular chores!

I was hoping for a more mixed crop of lettuce but the fact that we are producing enough lettuce to take it off our shopping list is awesome. Next sowing will have more red leaves and some more peppery varieties. I am interested in finding ground cress seeds, which are available in UK. Tastes like water cress but grows on land. Pepper, tomato and cucumber seedlings are coming right along too. Maybe a bit cool and early even in the new upstairs greenhouse, but we are going to give it a try.

Seed potatoes ordered - ordered 4 varieties this year, all different to last year. 
Our earlies will be Carlton and Norland. Carlton is an oval, white skinned potato with shallow eyes. Norland are also oval, with white flesh but red skin. The combination should be pleasing in potato salads and boiled. Agria will be our mid-season crop. Apparently Agria are a great all round potato that holds well for roasting, great for mashing, do not hold too much water and have an "old fashioned" potato flavour.  German Butterball will be the late season crop. German Butterball is an heirloom variety known as a “butterless” potato; because it’s so good, you don’t need butter. Apparently hey store exceptionally well, and possess a deep yellow flesh and flaky texture. We are still eating last years crop so we have conquered winter storage! 

Just got back from 2 weeks in the UK, so haven't been very active on the blog.
What a great trip. Visited friends in Hampshire who have an organic small holding with chickens, ducks, bees and pigs. Every meal revolved around their pork! Lovely sausage casserole, stuffed loin of pork and a brunch with their own bacon and eggs! Lovely to sample some of their late season "ivy" honey too. Quite a different flavour.
Up in Malvern we visited our first Woofer from last year, Gil. Lovely to see her allotment, and her organic gardening in action.
Noticed that none of the folok we visited use a dryer for their laundry. All have outdoor clothes lines and indoor drying racks. This is not an economy measure, it is ecological and a practice built on lifetimes of experience. Felt good to be able to get a load dry outside here yesterday!

Dug carrots in the garden this afternoon - tough going as the ground was semi-frozen down about 3" but up they came. Kharimha (horse) and Chibi (dog) were both happy, and there are even enough left for dinner. Very satisfying.

As we sat in the hot tub this morning, with a breeze and blue skies, feeling the winter warmth of the sun, we were regaled by the sound of about 50 sparrows that seem to have taken up residence this year, having discovered the plenty of daily chicken food. Not sure how to solve this one yet, but don't want to chase all the other birds away with sparrows. And layer pellets are too expensive!