What to do this week This time of year many people are starting to move their seedlings from the house or greenhouse to the garden. Even if you have decided to run the risk of frost, your seedlings will need a gradual introduction to the outdoors. It is important notRead More

What to do this week This week is the perfect time to plant squash seeds, and hopefully you will consider starting them in soil blocks. I like using soil blocks for almost everything anyway, but for squash plants it is particularly important because they really, really don’t like their rootsRead More

What to do this week This week is a good time to talk about spraying fruit trees because now is the time to do that. There are a couple of reasons that even an organic grower might want to spray. One would be to rid the trees of pests beforeRead More

A recent conversation with a relative set me to researching chickens and ticks and what a long, strange trip it’s been. The conversation was about the efficacy of chickens in controlling tick populations. It struck a chord with me because I’ve been thinking of the advantages of backyard chickens latelyRead More

What to do this week This week,  I have been trying to get a jump on the perennial weeds. My soil has dried up a bit with the sun and warmth we have had these past few days, so I have been able to walk about. Your soil should beRead...

What to do this week This is a great time of year to talk about soil structure. Whatever you have in your backyard, if it is in Cape Breton it is quite likely to be clay, sorry to say, unless you have been building it for a while. Clay predominatesRead...

I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw, “Reinstatement of the Blossoming Program” on the agenda for the 27 March 2018 CBRM council meeting. Had Deputy Mayor Eldon MacDonald, who put the issue on the agenda, temporarily lost his mind? I think the short answer is, “Yes.” During the meeting,Read More

What to do this week Well, perhaps you noticed that it snowed this week, so maybe we have to go back to garden planning. You can’t keep a gardener down, so we will take advantage of this time to talk about organizing your crops for seed-saving purposes. If you wantRead...

What to do this week I took a walk in my back field this week. Now that the snow is pretty well gone, I was able to notice that my raspberry bushes need a bit of tending. This is a good week to thin out your raspberry patch. It seemsRead More

What to do this week If you have a greenhouse, that perfect place that will be housing some of those seedlings from the crowded windowsills very soon, this week is a great time to get it cleaned up and organized. You may have done that in the fall. I didn’t.Read More