What's Growing in May Gardens

Some of you may be curious to know what is growing or can be planted. Leah let me know what was happening in her garden. What's happening in yours? Fire over an email or leave a comment.

In Leah's Garden, she and Jonathan have:

"Direct seeded carrots (nantes, baby finger and danvers ....didn't use row cover and found that some of the birds were pulling out the little carrot sprigs. weve got tons of seeds so re-planted and will hope for the best.

Planted onions (that I had pre-grown inside the house) and onion sets that we bought. Planting onions around the carrots is a way to prevent the carrot rust fly.

Planted early potatoes...yukon gold.

Planted peas (sweet and shelling), once, twice, three times....birds love the little spoutlets....they look like little worms. They're netted now and seem to be coming up slowly but surely.

Last week we put out the leeks (grown inside first) as well as planted celery seed. I usually buy celery starts but have seen good results here in Tofino using seed so thought I'd try it out. Celery takes a long time to germinate and there are so many adversities ....birds, slugs, etc that starts are desirable. However, the very fragile tap root can be damaged while transplanting starts so direct sowing seemed like a good idea.

Planted lots of edible flowers...calendula, borage, nasturtium. Some parsley and cilantro too.

Transplanted some sunflower seed sprouts. I sprout seeds and grains in the winter/spring and these sunflower sprouts were some that didn't get eaten and just kept growing.

Transplanted another bed of strawberries. Also, planted 3 blueberries this spring.

Planted swiss chard (rainbow and a white stemmed variety ...can't remember the name). We have some pre-sprouted red russian kale babies that we will be transplanting with the chard. The kale sprouts came from a plant that exploded with seeds ....some of the seeds landed inside the greenhouse and started growing on a piece of wet wood. Kale grows anywhere and is the best edible for Tofino!!

In the next week, will be transplanting artichokes (greenglobe & imperial star). Also, we'll be planting under row cover, broccoli (including gai lan, a chinese variety), cauliflower and cabbage. We had terrible army worms and a few cabbage worms last year so hope to prevent with the lightweight row cover.

We've got tomatoes (mostly early varieties and cherries), eggplant, peppers (including jalapeno) & basil inside the house and some in the greenhouse.

In pots I have baby finger carrots and onions and tons of lettuce blends. Can't get enough of them!!

Later this month....gold rush zucchini, gold nugget squash and queensland blue squash (seeds from a friend in Duncan) as well as cucumbers and a cantaloupe (in the greenhouse).

We are going to be intensively growing a number of plants in the greenhouse so will be feeding them heavily (lots of fish fertilizer!!), EM and aerated compost tea."

Here's a short report from my garden:

- Two pots of potatoes are growing well. I can't add any more dirt so once the plant dies back, I'll have an early crop. I also planted two varieties in potato bags and put some directly into the garden. (Can you tell we like potatoes?)

- The leeks, broccoli, artichoke, lettuce starts I began inside are in the garden now.

- Carrots, parsnips, beets seeds sown and I'll keep this up every two weeks for awhile.

- Peas are up and growing well, as are fava beans.

- Other bean varieties (filet beans, for example) are planted inside so they'll be ready to transplant out when the soil warms up.

- The nine-square garden I started over a month ago worked really well and I have great arugula, mizuna, radishes, spinach, lettuce and other greens in that garden.

- Herb garden is sprouting nicely and I planted some parsley and creeping rosemary into that garden.

- The strawberries, blueberries, apples and plums all have/had lots of flowers so I'm hoping for the best. The apple tree has never really produced despite all the flowers so we did get out there this year with a Q-tip, and transferred pollen (we hope) between the two trees. Will report back in the fall! We did put in Mason bees this year, but you certainly can't tether them to your yard and they were released before the flowers were out in force.

All for now. Let us know what you're up to in your garden. Many new (and old ones, too) wet coast gardeners are keen to know what to plant and when as well as what grows well here.