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Via EnjoyGardening)
Posted by admin to Jim's Notebook on 2007-11-01, 12:24:46
Hits & Misses: The pumpkin patch & a haunting in the orchard
Question of the Week: How do I care for my older trees?
It’s been an exciting week at the greenhouse. After years of behind the scenes planning, my brother Bill, his wife, Valerie and I revealed our plans to relocate our business to South Riel on a 10-acre parcel of land directly east of the future site of the Interpretive Centre in the Lois Hole Centennial Provincial Park in St. Albert.
The view of the Lois Hole Centennial Provincial Park from the new site of Hole’s
Those of you who visited us in our present location know what a beautiful site it is right on the banks of the Sturgeon River. Unfortunately, this piece of treasured land just couldn’t support our dream of building a unique, efficient, innovative and sustainable greenhouse environment. So, we’ve chosen to relocate to a site that will allow the creation of a state-of-the-art building that houses not only a greenhouse but a new model for business that focuses on enjoyment. We want to create an environment that encourages our staff, customers and patrons to reflect, relax, and reconnect and we’re so excited to be next to the park named in our mother’s honour.
Construction begins in early 2008 and we will move into the new facility in 2009—just in time to celebrate our 30-year anniversary of the establishment of our ‘new’ greenhouse business back in 1979. We’ve come a long way from selling vegetables next to the old red barn and I’m looking forward to sharing our new adventure with all of you as it unfolds.
Hits & Misses
Hit: The Pumpkin Patch
Well, Halloween has come and gone for another year and it’s time to take down our pumpkin patch in the tree and shrub greenhouse. The creativity of our staff was, quite frankly, a little scary again this year; flying witches, tables overflowing with pumpkins—and detached legs—as well as skeletons reading gardening books while nestled in flowering fall mums, and of course, a children’s playground area were all highlights that drew customers out in droves. This type of interactive display is a great way to introduce the concept of decorating your yard for fall and to get a sneak peek at the latest costumes as parents bring their kids in for the perfect photo opportunity.
Miss: A visitor to the orchard
(Or is that near miss?) Talk about scary Halloween stories…my brother Bill was out walking his dog Callie in his apple orchard early one morning last week. Suddenly, Callie began barking frantically at something in an apple tree. In the faint morning light, Bill looked into the tree boughs and saw a large, black “apparition” reaching for his head. Well, of course it wasn’t a Halloween goblin, but rather a large porcupine that was happily dining on some Halloween apples until Bill and the dog happened by. According to Bill, this is the fifth apple-eating porcupine this year and, just like all of its predecessors, it suffered the same fate; each was lured into cages with salted apples and taken for a ride to a forest about thirty kilometers away. No more of Bill’s Halloween apples for that apparition…hopefully.
Porcupines love to dine on fruit, but as the cold weather progresses they’ll feed on bark, often causing irreparable damage to trees and shrubs.
Question of the Week
How do I care for my older trees?
I suppose, in some respects, it is natural to think of old trees as scaled-up versions of young ones. But as nice and as tidy an assumption as that is, it’s not quite accurate. In fact, if I were to compare older trees to anything, I’d compare them to older people: both have needs that change significantly with advancing age…both suffer dearly when those needs are ignored. So if you want your 120-year-old maple tree to retain its beauty and have the same vigor and exuberance as it did when it was a wild 80 year old, here are five things to keep in mind:
• Protect the root zone; don’t compact the soil.
• Protect the trunk; take care when mowing.
• Prune judiciously; remove diseased, broken or dead branches immediately.
• Water well; older trees can’t handle water stress.
• Fertilize sparingly: older trees need to sip, not guzzle, nutrients.
Did You Know?
Biblical law (Shimta) in Israel dictates that farmers must let their land ‘rest and lie fallow’ every seven years. Israeli farmers have devised some creative ways of circumventing this law by constructing raised platforms above their fields or by selling their land to a non Jew for a year (a transaction called “heter mechira”). Of course, others have adopted the ultimate solution; build greenhouses on their land, which are exempt from Shimta law.
Quote
“For man, autumn is a time of harvest, of gathering together. For nature, it is a time of sowing, of scattering abroad.”
—Edwin Way Teale
