Greenhouse Tour

We conducted a tour late yesterday afternoon for the second year Engineering Energy Systems Technology students from St. Lawrence College.

The professor is Ian Kilbourn. Ian has organized this group on a couple of occasions to have a visit and have us yak away at these poor unsuspecting souls!

Since it was such a large group we split them into two groups and Alex toured the biomass heating system while I toured the greenhouse heating system in the greenhouses and the back beds.

It is always fun to give people tours and especially fun and easy when you have a bright interested bunch like these folks were. Everyone seemed to be paying attention and many had questions that made the tour that much more interesting.

….. and many thanks to Ian and his class for coming to visit us!

29 December, 20106 October, 2019

Fall Gardening

The fall tends to be a bit more relaxed for us. We spend our time thinking about the following year and getting things cleaned up from this year. Customers are normally not part of the equation. One exception is customers asking about what they should do with a plant that they bring in the house from the garden.

Many people put out large house plants in the spring to let them grow outdoors during the summer. An example of this might be Hibiscus. It is a great strategy. It allows the plant to be exposed to maximum light levels that can help it a great deal especially if you are trying to shape it. If the pot is sunken in the soil it can mean that the maintenance of the plant is less demanding over the summer especially if you go on vacation.

A challenge to this plan is in the fall when you try to bring the plant back in the house and discover it is invested with harmful insects. This challenge is not nearly as bad as it may look a first glance. Many insects are no where to be found in the cool temperatures of the fall. An example are spider mites. Spider mites thrive during the hot temperatures of the summer and their populations wain as it gets cool and rainy in the fall.

What do you do if you have something like aphids covering a plant? The aphids populations are likely starting to lag a bit but it is very common to see them still on plants they like such as Hibiscus. The key to handling them is multi-faceted. The first is to try and reduce the numbers on the plant. By hosing off the plant with a strong jet of water you can knock many of them off before you move them into the house. In fact anytime you have an excess of harmful insects on a plant you can hose it off and greatly reduce the load. This works well in the shower in the winter. Some of the most difficult to control aphids such as foxglove aphids respond very well to this since they tend to drop off the plant when disturbed. It is also a good time to do any pruning of bad foliage hopefully further reducing numbers of insects.

After to have physically reduced the number of insects it is time to think about how to deal with the balance. Most people tend to make a basic mistake here by treating the plant once and then seeing that 2 weeks later the plant is the same or worse. The problem is that the treatment may have worked on adults but perhaps not as well on immatures or eggs. With time those juveniles turn into adults, lay eggs and start the cycle over again. Sounds a bit like a lost cause but that is not so. If you think about it you just have to go back and repeat the treatment before the juveniles mature and become reproductive. This often takes several treatments (I would recommend at least 3) spaced 3 to 4 days apart. The key is to keep scouting the plant to try and treat before any adults mature.

For most insects treating with a 2% insecticidal or dish soap solution is the one to use. I usually recommend spraying thoroughly making sure you cover the bottoms of the leaves and growing tips and then about 1 hour later going back in with a plain water spray to rinse the detergent off. The soap can be a bit phyto-toxic and has no residual insecticidal effect after it dries so you get the good effects of the soap while reducing damage to a minimum.

12 September, 20106 October, 2019

Lovely

Lovely last two days. Last night we went to the harvest supper at Mill Street Café. It was a tasty dinner shared with good friends. They act as an art gallery for local artists. I was trying to figure out how I could afford a couple of the pieces that were on display. I wonder if they garden?

Today we presented a workshop for the NFU New Farm project. We dealt with how we do things at the greenhouse generally and how we grow sweet potatoes specifically. We harvested some sweet potatoes The yield looks good and should be quite good when we do our main harvest in October.

It was well attended by a nice group of who were full of questions.

2010-09-12

29 April, 20096 October, 2019

Hallie’s Insight

We have often felt guilty about the attention we were able to give our children in the busy spring season. Here is something that Hallie wrote about the experience and adult insight into that experience after her recent visit.

“I write this after having spent a few weeks working and living with my parents. I am heading back to Toronto to continue in an intensive theatre program. It has been such a pleasure and extremely educational for me to come home, especially during this busy time of year. Basically what I want to share with you is a small peek into the minds of Brian and Ruth (muhaha!)

Spring in our home has always meant work, stress, and problem solving. As a child I have to admit I was often annoyed with the constant talk of work during April and May. But being home these past few weeks I have learned some valuable life lessons from my folks. What amazes me about my parents is their ability to see problems as a natural part of work and life. Day to day they work constantly to manage every part of the business. They continuously work to improve systems, address concerns of customers and staff. They understand that some things will inevitably go “wrong” and they get on with it. Most importantly, they laugh! It can be the most intense week of the season with technical glitches, staffing dilemmas, and lack of sleep and you will still hear the booming laughter coming from the kitchen, living room or office. They allow themselves to take as much humour out of their days as possible and it makes the days more manageable and even fun! So thanks Mom and Dad – I am going back to school for the summer term with a knowledge of hard work, problem solving and LAUGHTER!”