by Donna Balzer | Jul 31, 2018 | Bugs & Buggers, Food, Gadgets, Greenhouse, VIDEOS
Here is the Little Jobs in the Garden video about my new drip system. I have been adjusting the system so that I water twice a day. I find the timers easy to set and right now I water at 5 Am and at the peak of the heat at 1 PM. The system runs for 10 minutes now each time.
The second video is all about how plants in the cabbage family are not good companions for my tomatoes. Did you know some plants like cabbage and sunflowers are allelopaths? They can slow down or damage other plants.
by Donna Balzer | Jul 11, 2018 | Bugs & Buggers, Food, GARDENING, Greenhouse, Soil, VIDEOS
Last year my cauliflowers killed my tomatoes. But I am a sucker for punishment so this year I wanted to see if the cabbages would do the same thing. So it is the first full week of July and the verdict is in. I think my cabbages are killing my tomatoes.
by Donna Balzer | Apr 17, 2018 | Food, GARDENING, Greenhouse, Trees & Shrubs
This spring we are expanding into the “back 40” as my dad used to call the back pasture on the farm. This is an area we recently had to fence because we joined the lot behind us with our main house lot. In doing that we had to clear out the branches and brambles and big stumps that were in the way. And so we were left with a field. A new planting opportunity. This post looks at edible shrubs and will be of special interest to green-thumb gardeners or farmers on a budget.
by Donna Balzer | Mar 7, 2018 | Bugs & Buggers, Flowers & Alpines, Food, Gadgets, Greenhouse, Soil, Trees & Shrubs
I was asked to mentor youth as part of the Goodseeds program earlier this winter and I wondered what two students and I would do together for a week once my shed was clean and shears sharpened. It was snowy outdoors so we couldn’t attack my unlimited weeding. I had to get more creative….
by Donna Balzer | Mar 7, 2018 | Food, Greenhouse, Soil
So recently there was some humble pie served in our kitchen. My Helpful Husband did a price check and found out butternut squash costs more than ten dollars each last week. I am bad with numbers so it might have been 12 dollars or 17 dollars – I can’t remember exactly. What I do remember is that when we first discussed Helpful Husband’s cost-efficient, engineered solution to gardening it was fall and squash were falling off trucks and being virtually given away by farmers. He couldn’t see why I bothered to grow them…. I understand the trend where farmers grow only the most cost-efficient crops on their land and I see where Helpful Husband was going with his gentle suggestion. He wants me to be a farmer. But then again he wouldn’t let me cash in the house to buy that small farm
by Donna Balzer | Feb 25, 2018 | ARTICLES, Food, Gadgets, Greenhouse, In the Media, past appearance, Soil
What a thrill to go into downtown Vancouver to the big CBC building and meet NXNW host Sheryl Mackay in person this weekend! I have loved and followed her show for years and I have had some interviews with her over the phone and in the Victoria studio. But this time we met face to face.
