Strathcona Park - Cottonwood Community Gardens

Today I went to my first Work Party at the largest local community garden in Vancouver. Apparently there are actually two - Strathcona and Cottonwood.  Strathcona is located West of Strathcona Park and Cottonwood is at the South-Eastern corner in the park itself.  I'll be spending most of my time in Cottonwood where I have a plot.

The work parties are the last Sunday of every month. Attending these work parties allows you to be placed on a waiting list for the next available open plot. I'm not sure how long I'll have to go to actual get a space but I'll keep going until I do.

I spent the first half hour or so moving potted plants to get them ready for dividing, cleaning up and sale. Then I was on compost duty. I turned a good sized pile of compost and then went on to sift another. I finished up with some horse manure turning. Fortunately it was well decomposed and didn't smell anymore. I also ended up buying some honey, apparently from bees right in the garden area (left over from last year).  I purchased the summer variety which apparently has the most sophisticated taste.  It was the same price as the others.  I would never have splurged on such an item. ;)

I've been relatively sedentary since I got to Vancouver (excluding walks). I'm a little sore now and think I may have over done it. It's worth it though.  I can eat more food.

The pictures at the beginning are from the new area. They had to finish bordering a large number of the new plots with wooden boards. A lot of people aren't visible in this photo (60 to 80 total in the gardens).   I was there from 10am to about 2pm. I would have stayed longer but I have some part time work that I had to have finished for 9pm tonight. It was done just after 8pm so I'm glad I left when I did.

Stevie from Garden Therapy was also there. We didn't end up formally meeting. There were a tonne of people and sometimes it's hard to recognize people from their blog/twitter photos. Especially when they have big sunglasses. :)

Cold Hardy Palm: Chamaerops humilis var cerifera (Blue Mediterranean Fan Palm)

The next palm that I desperately want is Chamaerops humilis var cerifera. It may also be known as var 'argentea'. This is a blue/grey variety of the species and is slightly more robust. It appears to be able to tolerate more moisture and lower temperatures than the standard variety. I may however be a bit slower growing.

The image below is from a site offering a huge selection of palm seeds.  The prices are about average but they are a good quality supplier.  You can visit it here.  As you can see, this palm is gorgeous!

This is a small clumping palm that grows to a maximum height of between 2.5m and 5m. Some sources say up to 6m depending on conditions (and likely if suckers are removed) The overall height often depends on the growing zone. This palm is rated from USDA zone 7b to past 11. Absolute minimum temperatures are about -15C (5F) but it may prove to be hardier. The lower the zone, the lower the final height of the palm (as a general rule for all species).

It is a great palm for a Mediterranean type climate as the name suggests. Full sun is best as well good drainage. In a climate like Vancouver, the crown may need to be protected in the winter to prevent any risk of rot. This is as simple as a bit of plastic over the top of the plant. Don't wrap too tightly as it needs room to breathe. A tent-like structure may be best. In the summer it is drought tolerant and a great plant for xeriscaping.

Now for a warning. This plant has two rows of spines along each leaf stem. As long as you pay attention you'll be fine. I wouldn't suggest it for anyone with young kids or pets unless you can ensure appropriate protection.

Hopefully I'll be getting a few seeds over the next week or so. Then maybe they'll be a decent size by the time I actually own a place! Still no full time job but I've found some small projects that will keep us going. At least until I can become a starship captain and explore the galaxy, leading the terraforming effort of uninhabited worlds across the cosmos. :)

Cold Hardy Palm: Jubaea chilensis (Chilean Wine Palm)

Since arriving in Vancouver about two weeks ago I've begun extensively researching cold hardy palms.  I've always been a fan of hardy tropical looking plants so I'm unbelievably excited!  I've seen two common varieties here; Trachycarpus fortunei and Chamaerops humilis.  Although I've already grabbed seeds from a Trachy and started soaking them (only about 50), I've come up with a list of nearly 20 other hardy or potentially hardy candidates.

The one I am most interested in now is Jubaea chilensis or the Chilean Wine Palm.  The name comes from the sweet sap that can be boiled into something similar to corn syrup or fermented into alcohol (unfortunately the tree is often cut down to gather it).  It also produces orange fruits known as coquitos.  These can be eaten fresh or turned into jam.

The seeds themselves are also edible.  Apparently they taste almost identical to coconuts.  The image below is from Dave's Garden, a very informative site worth a look.  There is a reference in the upper left hand corner of the image but it is difficult to see.  Can you believe this can grown unprotected in Canada?

This palm is considered a giant by many.  It may grow taller than 25m (82ft).  The growth rate is apparently slow for the first 15 years or so but it then moderate under good conditions.  Adult trunks may be 1m (3ft) in diameter and I've seen 2m monsters mentioned while searching.

This lovely giant is marked for USDA zones 8/9 (up to 10b depending on the source, also one person in 7b).  I know of at least one person growing it on Vancouver Island (not to be confused with Vancouver the city).  It has had no special protection and has grown fine.  I have seen many cases of the plant surviving -15C (5F).  To add to this cold hardiness, Jubaea chilensis also prefers a cooler climate and doesn't mind moisture (perfect for Vancouver).  It does however hate salt spray and must be located away from the coast.  Good drainage is also a necessity.

All that being said, I want one.  I'll keep an eye open for the fruit in stores.  Every supplier I've seen either has ridiculous prices, won't ship to Canada or has a minimal order value.  I say nay!  If anyone knows a good supplier please let me know.  Although they are native to Chile, some have been planted in California and that is where the majority of the seeds appear to come from.  I may have found a good Canadian source I'm just waiting for an email response.  Thanks to anyone that can help!

Wordless Wednesday (Vancouver Aquarium)

I also grabbed some Trachycarpus fortunei seeds from a chained off area.  :)

Pygmy Date Palm (Phoenix roebelenii)

For those of you that haven't heard of the Pygmy Date Palm, it is a really gorgeous fine leaved palm and definitely worth a look.  It seems to generally be rated as hardy above USDA zone 9a.  I've seen several instances of it being grown in 8b.

I came across the seeds in Edmonton at the Muttart Conservatory.  When no one was looking, I climbed up a few stones and grabbed about a dozen seeds.  Last night I removed the thoroughly dry flesh and began soaking the seeds.  They should be soaked for about three days.  It can take a whopping three months for germination!  I'll try and reduce this by soaking them a bit longer and providing high temperatures.

These palms tend to appreciate a little shade.  I'm thinking if they are planted is a relatively sunny understory or and overhang along a warm wall they should survive here.  I like to push things.  Worst case they die.  Best case I have some lovely palms!  I probably won't put them outside the first winter or two.  It is the case for most hardy palms that they are much more likely to survive with age (particularly size).

I have also started some more Moringa stenopetala seeds.  I've recently discovered that it may be possible to grow them like a tuber.  They can be planted out in the garden each spring and should provide and abundance of extremely healthy fresh greens.  In the fall they can be dug up and stored somewhere dry and cool.  They should then be perfectly fine when planted next spring.

Hopefully both of these little experiments work out!  By the way, I found this interesting tulip while walking yesterday.  I've never seen a combination of a black tulip and highly frilled edges before.  I just wish the picture turned out a little better.  I also saw the largest Monkey Puzzle (Araucaria araucana) of my life!  Which is an odd statement given that just over a week ago I had never seen one before...

Bloom Day May - Strathcona Plots

Today I went to Strathcona Park and to see the community garden plots.  They seem like a good size.  They were brought to my attention by Stevie from Garden Therapy.  It's only $10/year to become a member plus $5/year for a plot.  This includes water and overhead costs.  I'm interested but might wait a few more weeks until I have things straightened around.

They have started a new triangle of plots to keep up with the demand.  You can see some volunteers hard at work setting things up below.

Seeing as I have nothing blooming, I also nabbed some photos.  The older portion is filled with a mixture of vegetables and flowers.  It's really nice even just to walk through.  Now I need to continue with the job search!

Update

 The last week has been great!  We've visited a lot of the free sites around Vancouver.  We officially restarted our job search yesterday.  We have enough money for about two months but are a little stressed out regardless.  The structure below is Bloedel Conservatory.  It was $7 each to get in so we skipped it.  We'll save it for the winter.  :)

It really is beautiful here.  Every day since we've arrived there has been nothing but sun.  We've visited Burnaby Mountain Park, Queen Elizabeth Park, Simon Fraser University, the Science Centre, the Athlete's Village, and many other areas.  Apparently Vancouver's nickname is Hollywood North because it has the biggest movie industry in Canada.  We've seen several areas were Battlestar Galactica, Caprica and Stargate have been filmed.  We're Sci-Fi fans so it was super exciting!

Seeing as we have limited funds and are in a basement, I'm thinking my posts for the next month or two will be mostly of things I see during walks.  There are many plants I don't recognize and this will help me learn and introduce you to new ones as well.  Take this spiny thing below for example.  I have no idea what it is other than a holly of some kind...

Today we went to Queen Elizabeth Park (all the pictures, it's on a hill) and a Home Depot Garden Centre.  The prices for plants like Japanese Maples are half what they are in London!  You can buy a palm with a 1m (3ft) trunk for $85.  I thought they'd be around $150.  There are baby ones for only $10.  It was difficult for me to resist, but I have to for now!  I also want this huge Gunnera mericata below.

I also updated the background seeing as I no longer work at a greenhouse.  Feedback would be appreciated!  I took the photo of the Japanese Maple today and I think it works well.  I had to darken the text a little because I noticed some readability issues.  The page bar also looks a little out of place.  I might need to make a new one.  Please note I didn't make the paper texture.  It can be found here free for use.  I'll leave you with a last photo of Queen Elizabeth Park and will upload some of our others over the next few days.  I'll also try and comment more, I promise!

PS.  I'm having trouble decided what I want to do with my life.  Any thoughts?  I'm thinking I should design vertical urban farms.  It's a little niche at this point though, plus no capital to invest...  :(

Mouse & Trowel Awards Nominee!

I found out a few days ago that I had been nominated for the Mouse & Trowel Awards!  I have never heard of these before but I've only been blogging for about 10 months.  There are many different sections and I'm in the 'best indoor gardening blog' portion.  If you enjoy this blog, please take a look and vote for me.  Also look through the other categories and vote for your favourites there.  Voting is open until 11:59 on May 17th and the winners will be announced on May 18th.

On another note, Vancouver is incredible!  Walking through the streets is like being in a garden.  There are palm trees, bananas, rhododendrons, camellias, monkey puzzle trees, and vegetable gardens everywhere.  It's simply amazing.  I'll take some photos when I get more settled in.  I honestly only recognize about half of the plants I see.  This is really odd for me.  I used to know just about everything.  I've got a lot of learning to do!

Happy Mother's Day!

To all the mothers out there, have a great mother's day!  I wish you all the love you deserve!

Operation Relocation - Day 6 - Jasper to Kamloops to Vancouver

Today we started out in Jasper.  From the picture it may be hard to tell, but the Rockies are basically two chains with some large hills dividing them in the centre.  Our plan was to stop in Kamloops but we ended up going all the way to Vancouver.  We're finally here!

The journey to Kamloops was filled with beautiful scenery and some really tall mountains.  The mountain in the third picture is Mount Robson which is one of the highest points in the Canadian Rockies at 3954m.  You can't even see the top because it is covered with clouds.  As we got closer to Kamloops, the sky began to clear.

Kamloops is one of the oddest places I have ever been.  It looks like some Mediterranean area approaching desert.  Although we went through the city it was very commercialized and seemed somewhat cookie-cutter.  There were major brands and big box stores everywhere with little in the way of a local culture.  The most interesting part of the city was the scenery surrounding it, visible in the picture below.

We continued on to Vancouver on what was the craziest drive of our lives.  Each valley and portion of the journey was completely different.  It could be any combination of sun, rain, snow, coniferous trees and deciduous trees with or without leaves.  The experience was surreal.  At one point we were surrounded by snow banks as deep as 3m (10ft).  As we got closer the trees became much larger than I had ever seen before and vibrantly green.  The picture below looks like something from an inspirational quote.

We ended up going through Surrey, New Westminster and Burnaby before ended in Vancouver.  Below you can see a picture of part Surrey.  I was on map duty so I didn't end up taking any more.  This city is like a botanical garden.  There are flowers and unique trees everywhere.  One this street I have seen many different species of bamboo, palm trees, and plants I can't even identify.  I'm excited to get out and see more of the city!

I'm a little exhausted and we need to get settled in.  At this point we don't even know where to buy groceries.  Thanks for following along and there will be much more to come!  I have a plant collection to rebuild!

Operation Relocation - Day 5 - Saskatoon to Edmonton to Jasper

The original plan for today was to go to Edmonton and stay there for the night.  You can see from our route today that we ended up in Jasper.  I think this may have been the most eventful day of my life!

Once again, we spent most of our journey under clouds.  As we continued driving we started to notice accumulated snow on the ground.

Operation Relocation - Day 4 - Winnipeg to Regina to Saskatoon

The original plan for today was to only go as far as Regina.  We felt industrious so we ended up in Saskatoon.  This will shorten our trip to Edmonton tomorrow so we can spend some more time at the greenhouses there and in the West Edmonton Mall!

The day started out with partial clouds in Winnipeg.  This quickly became rain which stayed with us for most of the drive to Regina.  For some reason when people said this area was flat, I envisioned a plane stretching on to infinite.  This isn't the case and there are some slight contours to the area.  That van in the last pictures is just plain impressive.  There were actually several vehicles like this along the drive.

In Regina the rain stopped but clouds remained.  There were a few sunny breaks and we visited the Legislative Park area downtown.  All of these prairie cities have had Dutch Elm.  I had no idea how great these trees looked because they have been more or less wiped out in South-Western Ontario.  There is much more after the page break to click 'Delve Deeper'.

Operation Relocation - Day 3 - Thunder Bay to Winnipeg

Today we finally left Ontario and made it to Winnipeg in Manitoba!  This is actually a great city and stole the show for the day.  It is well planned and we moved through downtown during rush hour with no trouble at all.  For a city with over 633 000 people, this is quite the feat.  Below you can see the route we took for the day.

The trip to Winnipeg was surprisingly uneventful.  The scenery was relatively nice but it rained most of the time.  This area is dotted with hundreds of lakes.  Below you can see a few of the more interesting sites.  We've both decided that we are thoroughly city people and although small town are fine to visit, we need our urbanity.

Within a few minutes of crossing the border it the rocks were gone and the landscape was entirely flat.  It was almost uncomfortable.  The 50/50 split coniferous and deciduous gave way to nearly entirely deciduous forests.  In Winnipeg we went through downtown.  There were large trees everywhere!  It was really delightful.  We also saw the Royal Canadian Mint but it was too small in the picture so I didn't upload it.

Next we decided to take a look at Assiniboine Park.  This is a great area that includes many different gardens and activities.  Below are some photos of the park including the sculpture garden and zoo.  These areas would be simply gorgeous in the summer!  The first picture below is a large building in the centre of the park.

Leo Mol Sculpture Garden & English Garden (there must have been over 50 sculptures in total)

Zoo.  A peacock in Winnipeg?  Apparently.  Too charming.

Tomorrow we're not entirely sure what's happening.  We're either going to Regina, Saskatoon or both.  It depends on the sites in each city and we'll figure it out later tonight.  This is by far the funnest day this far!