Ladner Community Garden

June is here and all of our gardens are planted. Thanks to all of our allotment gardeners for doing such a fine job getting their seedlings in. The gardens are full of vegetables almost ready to harvest. I know I am having lettuce envy over some of the gardeners. Lettuce just won't grow well back in the children's garden. I use the same seed at home and its fine. Lets take a walk through the garden today.     The rockery which borders the front of the community garden is full of blooms. The Sweet William or Dianthus barbatus is stunning, isn't it? This plant attracts butterflies and bees to the garden.  Next to it is Limnanthes douglasii or poached egg flower. This cute as a button flower is easy to grow from seed. Let it self sow to have it year after year in your garden. This flower attracts hoverflies to the garden and they eat aphids.  The Campanula rambles nicely over the rock wall. This spark of blue in June is a welcome sight. There a...

Its hard to believe this garden was just built and planted on the long weekend in May. Look how great it is growing! I cant wait to start getting some of the flower beds in so that we have lots of colour. We plan to have 120 feet of flowers all the way across the front of the garden. It will be a welcome site for the neighbours. This is a shot of the food bank garden. I have just used manure tea on the garden. I am sure the plants are loving me right now. Most of the vegetable seedlings are just starting to grow. With the wind exposure it set them back at first but I see new leaves on all the plants. The above photo was taken on May 30. I was a bit worried about the bush beans we planted but its been a cold wet spring. Here they don't look too happy. Finally summer has arrived and look how the beans have grown! Lets hope summer continues right in to October. Adding the bark chips to the garden has made it look so tidy. It will help to keep the weeds down as we get busy in our gar...

I am so happy to announce that our children's garden is built! It wouldn't have been possible without Jayson and his crew of volunteers from Ladner Baptist . It turns out some of our local churches were looking to help out in the community on June 11. Jayson, the youth pastor, approached me a few weeks ago and wondered if there was some way they could help us. Thats how the children's garden was born. Now these volunteers didn't just build our garden, some held a car wash, some did street cleanups and some did yard work for others. There are lots of ways to extend a helping hand in our community. Isn't that what community is all about? I greeted the lumber arrival and thought I could take a shot of it rolling off the truck. Oh no, it went way too fast for my little point and shoot camera. Jayson and his volunteers wearing their 'Love South Delta" T-shirts quickly got to work cutting the boards for the raised beds. They even brought all the tools needed for ...

Our community garden is really growing! Everyone has seeds sprouting and it looks like the combination of compost and manure is working well. Today I thought I would share with you what your gardens are going to look like. These photos were taken yesterday at the grade one children's garden at Kirkland House in Ladner. The grade one students come every two weeks to do a class in the garden. This is the radish I harvested yesterday. Its is pretty big and there are lots of them. These are broad beans. The children planted seeds in early March and the plants are just coming in to bloom. They are a bit behind due to our cool spring weather. In the above photo, from left to right, are radishes, spinach and green onions. All the fixings for salad which the children will make on their picnic day in two weeks.Yes, the children not only harvest, but wash the salad greens and spin them in a spinner. They love the spinning! This is the same salad bed where you can see carrots, red romaine le...