Garden Update July 11
- Tipi Creek Farm
- Jul 11
- 2 min read
Updated: Jul 21
The healthiest way to gamble is with a packet of seeds and a bit of soil! Might be the healthiest gamble but a gamble nonetheless and its hard on our hearts and brains trying to navigate our way through this one! In light of the current weather conditions, you must be wondering what is really happening at the farm. Overall, we have fared well. Last week the Sturgeon River flooded throughout its basin. Here at the farm, it looked like a mini-North Saskatchewan River, rising around 6 ft above the pre-rain level. We pulled our irrigation pump out just in time otherwise it would have been submerged. We have 2 lowlands in our 2nd field; these were completely flooded. There is standing water in places we've never seen before. The garden though, is on high land and has suffered from the extreme rainfall not flooding. A cool, dry May followed by heavy rains and lack of sunshine in June and July have negatively affected our crops. We (mostly Nicolette with Ron and I helping as we can) have been working diligently, seeking and applying every possible solution to get the vegetables to grow. Working in the mosquito infestation to reseed struggling crops, transplanting vegetables, putting on row cover or shade cloth to encourage or protect some crops and kelp applications on the entire garden. By Mid-July, we are typically revving up for a full assortment of vegetables; plenty of lettuce, spinach, cabbage greens, little onions, a taste of young peas. This year the germination has been so inexplicably sporadic on the seedings. Peas, for example, are a bit delayed but giving us much hope for a beautiful crop. Then right smack in the middle of these beautiful rows is a 10 ft stretch of puny struggling plants. Carrots, another example, 3 double rows seeded same day, same seed packet. Five of the 6 rows are growing well and one is missing completely. There is a track from the seeder but nothing growing. What's with that??? We are not the only ones in this situation; you are likely experiencing similar challenges in your own yards. One market garden in Sturgeon County has recently declared a total crop failure and another claiming 70 - 80% loss with no foreseeable opening date this season. In light of these disappointments, there is so much hope for a good harvest at Tipi Creek Farm this season, only not on the usual timeline. We need to give the vegetables time to grow. If our past experience growing vegetables in this beautiful soil is any indication, there will be plenty coming your way!
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