Tales from an Ottawa backyard veggie garden
Adventures in growing edibles veganically in a small townhouse backyard in Ottawa, Canada. (veganic since ~2021)
Monday, June 23, 2025
GA: SQUASH BUGS!!!!!! MATING AND LAYING EGGS ON EXPOSED ZUKE AND ADULTS FOUND ON NETTING!
Sunday, June 22, 2025
Where are the scapes?!?!? Garlic not looking very healthy
Tuesday, June 10, 2025
GA: Yikes! Even compost layer is like concrete over the recently planted bean seeds!! I hope they can push through!
Argh!! I was hoping to avoid the concrete surface issue by putting compost as the top most layer! I wonder if the compost layer maybe wasn't thick enough (was running low on it)... Hopefully the beans will be able to push through eventually!
GA: Another carrot patch sowed today using basic method (no gel, no holes)
Sunday, June 8, 2025
Unfrosted the freezer for the first time
It was very easy. Put everything into the fridge freezer, took out the baskets, unplugged it, let it thaw, drained it out the bottom (first unscrew the inner plug, then unscrew the outer plug). Let it dry totally off, then plugged it back in the next day. It cooled down quickly.
Saturday, June 7, 2025
GA: Sweet corn soaked in bowl for ~ an hour, now into PT. Once germinated, will sow.
Thursday, June 5, 2025
GA: PT-started popcorn seeds have now been transplanted
GA: Oh no! Half the watermelon kaput already!! Too windy/hot?
Wednesday, June 4, 2025
GA: Using frost cover with clothespins worked well to give some shade to recent transplants
GA: FOY Colorado Potato Beetle!!
Yard almost all planted! Tomatoes, zukes, cukes, zinnias
Yard carrots a total flop -- won't do another round, will just put something else there
GA: Transplanted lots of things. ~80% done. Still a few seedlings and seeds to plant.
All seedlings are now transplanted at GA, except for:
- basil (will wait for a few 12-13 degree nights to pass)
- a few more zinnias / coreopsis / f-m-ns
- cucumbers (waiting for the straw arrival this weekend because the cukes will go in that landing spot)
Here are the seeds left to sow:
- beets round 2 (R1 is looking pretty darn sparse)
- bush beans
- pole beans
- buckwheat
- I think that will be it?
(Sowed round 2 carrots today. Round 1 carrots actually look decent, but still definitely some gaps in coverage. But way better than the yard which had zero germination rate!!)