The News from Kenabeek

May 21: Woke up this morning to see snow! And not just a little – we got a good (or bad) half inch before it turned into ordinary drizzle. Two hours later, it’s almost gone. Of course, I had left my seedlings (pumpkin, squash and cucumbers) and pansies on the porch – I’ve been hardening them off for the past week. So I rushed out in my jammies and brought them in. I’m now fairly confident they will all survive, and happy that I didn’t plant them all yesterday as I had initially planned.

It remains to be seen what effect this will have on the sugar plum and wild cherry trees. I’ve enjoyed their blossoms, of course, but I like to have the fruit, too. More seriously, the blueberry bushes were beginning to blossom … quite a few people are dependent on me for blueberry jam, and, on occasion, pie, so a poor berry crop this summer would be a disappointment to more than just me.

MAY 28: It’s been busy! The windows for the sunroom/greenhouse finally arrived and are installed – as are my tomato and pepper seedlings. It will be interesting to see what kind of yield we get; despite having a couple of years advance notice, I never did research growing them in containers inside. I’ve put three plants to a 16″ square container, two of them combining tomatoes and peppers, and I suspect we might do better with one to a pot … we’ll see.

My other seedlings have been in the ground for at least a week – two colours of morning glories, at the trellises in front of the little cabin, and the pumpkin and squash in huge containers on the concrete pad next to the vegetable garden (where the original owners put a henhouse). The vegetable garden is in, of course (peas, beans, lettuce, spinach, and carrots) – actually a few days before the traditional Victoria Day weekend. The black flies were thick, so I figured it was time. I’ve never had a frost after the blackflies come, so I generally go by that. They’ve thinned out some now, but I still get bitten if I’m out working in one place for any length of time; once we’ve had several days in a row of really hot weather they’ll be down to virtually nothing. Some years we’ve had them only for a few days, when we had an early hot spell, other years it’s several weeks; apparently we’ve got some hot weather coming next week so I hope that will do it.

The blueberries, sugarplums and wild cherries were not discouraged by the snow, and have all set fruit. We should have a good harvest this year, and it looks they’ll be a couple of weeks early.

The spring perfume is in the air. One of the first trips we took north, when we were still living down south in Toronto, was at this time of year, and the fragrance was amazing. Some combination of growing things in the clean air makes a strong, spicy-sweet perfume which is positively intoxicating. If there were some way to re-create it we’d be millionaires. As it is I feel so fortunate to be able to live here! There is so much beauty in every season … which I will try to share. It won’t always be about gardening!