I don't know if it's officially spring, but nature sure seems to think so. My official sign of spring in southern Michigan is the arrival of the turkey vultures and they showed up three days ago. I'm taking their cue and have added compost to all my fruit trees and raised beds. Today I start clearing the winter garden.
We thought the same thing in March. We decided to get seeds started inside a bit early, then it snowed several days this week and is supposed to snow all week next week…
It’s great to see you back in the feed and to get a late-winter tour of the garden! I’m not sure I’ll plant annuals early this year without cover. Even with the weird warm year, we might still have frost in to late April or May. We’ve had surprise frosts in past warm years and I don’t think I’m quite ready to adjust planting dates more than a few days.
You mention planting comfrey in areas the dogs run. We have one dog how has taken a fancy to eating the comfrey leaves and let me tell you, they make her have a terrible stomach ache every time, and of course, she doesn't learn and comes back every day for a snack. . We ended up fencing off the comfrey.
We’re having 20+ acres of pine harvested. I am turning this into a food forest. I’ve saved every seed from fruit since last fall and have been stratifying them. As they root I’ve potted them up. To date there about 200 trees under grow lights plus over 200 waiting to sprout. That plus all my berry cuttings are going to be a wonderful replacement for the scrubby pines. I am following your technique to leave it all a little wild. I realize that not all of the trees will survive our winters. Zone 4 b. But I’m super pumped about trying. If you are ever interested in showcasing a different person’s garden you might find mine unique.
Send me an email to permaculturelegacy@gmail.com and tell me where you are located, and some photos of your place. If you are somewhat close to me I would love to come visit.
I love seeing what it all looks like after winter when it’s not all lush and green! I battle with myself all the time over having my garden look beautiful and perfect with borders and no weeds or grass and all lined up in rows and sections, vs having just a wild food jungle. I love both, but it’s always a fight with myself over perfection.
Great tour! If you are interested why Rosie is eating your trees, I have the answer, and a solution to the problem. Usually it's because the dog is bored, so she entertains herself with whatever she has access to. Dogs need both physical and mental stimulation, and actually mental stimulation exhausts the dog more than running around, or chasing a ball. One quick exercise for just 5 minutes, after which she is not gonna be interested in chewing your trees. On a leash find stairs, but instead of letting her run fast up, stop on every step and wait for 5 seconds, then another step, after 10 steps she will be tired, then go down with stops. That works like a charm, probably an equivalent of a 30 minute walk. Now that you know the reason, look up more mental stimulation exercises for the dogs, and your garden will thank you!
For sure. They are also Aussies, so they need a ton of mental stimulation. We do lots of little drills like that with her. For example, they can already both chase/catch frizbees because we find they really enjoy doing that to use up their energy/attention. She is just an endless well of energy at this age still. I like the stair drill, I will try that out. It takes some time to get that deep bond with a dog where they will be that attentive and listen in a drill like that, but I think she's at that age now, and she's hyper bonded to me.
I believe that the U.P. has something like a 90" snow deficit this year. This is my first year in the new house. I'm not sure I will plant earlier than recommended, but I'm going to take advantage of the snow-free state of my yard to start putting in swales. I have some drainage issues that definitely need addressing.
This is a good point.... the best season to get work done is when the ground is thawed but it's not super hot outside yet. We may get an extended work-season this year, so it's a wonderful year to get some infrastructure projects done.
@@CanadianPermacultureLegacy The sunniest part of my back yard, where I'd love to put in my raised beds for annuals, is also the lowest point (by a long shot). I'm still grappling with how, exactly, I'm going to deal with that. In the meantime, I've put in a request for a chip drop (do they have Chip Drop in Canada?) because I'm going to need a ton of mulch for everything I'm planning to do.
You'll have to be careful with Rosie and the grapes this year. My daughter had an Aussie that ate the grapes (he would eat anything) at a rental she was at years ago and he got very sick, she didn't know that they could be so bad for dogs. Glad to hear about your journey away from factory-farmed meat - we are eating mostly plant-based now and feeling great - sustainable meat, grown humanely and nearby or hunted (the deer population is unsustainable if not predated in some way) is the way to go. Yes, the winter is crazy. I am pruning my apple trees today and hoping it's not too late.
Indeed! We've been very conscious to only plant grapes in areas that the dogs cannot access. The grapes in the annual garden is just outside the dog fence. The grapes in the chicken run will be blocked by the chicken fence. And the grapes in the front gardens are also just outside the dog fence. Most people don't know that grapes are toxic to dogs, but it's true.
Hot chili oil on the tree protectors. You have to reapply after rain. I grow a dozen Cayenne Peppers and and make the oil in the microwave. Great video.
Good thing she is cute and you love her! The needs of the beings living in the space do need to take priority. We are in our false spring here as well but we have a snow and ice storm predicted tomorrow. I am building season extending spaces and stratisfying seeds for nut trees and persimmons. Hoping they can cope with our short season and high winds here.
@@chaparra71puppies need entertainment and something to chew to keep those shark teeth under control. High energy dogs need lots of space to run and enrichment. So yes, needs.
@@julie-annepineau4022 nope. No dog of mine would be allowed to destroy my valuable trees/landscape. I’d VERY QUICKLY restrict their space. It’s ridiculous the pedestal that western people have put cats and dogs on. But hey, if you want your dogs destroying your plantings, by all means, have at it. I’m just saying no one is going to convince me to let mine do the same.
I wonder if it's a bit if jealousy. My old dog would watch me plant something and the minute I left it, he would lay on it or lean purposefully against it until he pushed it over or broke it. He crushed loads of stuff and I couldn't really afford the damage. Now he's gone, I've been able to do a lot of planting (had a lot of cuttings I was keeping back). Yes, we have quite a lot of deer now we don't have the dog. They're not eating all that much at the moment, but they will scrape their antlers up and down stems, shredding the bark. So, tree guards are fairly effective. I am trying to put off the deer with shiny paper (works for a few weeks), throwing human urine everywhere (works if you reapply daily), shouting and chasing whenever possible, netting, and I'm trying longish sticks in the ground surrounding each of the important plants or close groups of plants. I'm hoping they scrape their antlers on the sticks instead, and then move on. I have to keep checking to straighten sticks (esp after a storm). Mint doesn't take over if it has lots of other plants to compete against. I picked my mint plant from a cutting in a meadow. It was hard to find in this meadow, and that was hundreds of years old, plenty of time to take over. The mint cutting is somewhere, I don't know where I planted it now, but I haven't found it and so it's not taking over.
Love the start of garden season, always exciting ~ great video! Any thoughts on composting thorny material? In with other compost? Biochar? (I have lots of it)
Yeah, I put my thorny stuff into my biochar pile, because I stomp it constantly during the biochar process so it helps break down the thorns so that I don't stab myself with it.
Oh, those little "devil dogs!" I'm thinking it might be worth it to just buy a large roll of hardware cloth and cut lengths of about five or six feet to wrap around the trees. Once you have them, you'll have them forever. The holes are small enough that it will keep small critters out as well as the bigger ones. With three or four long metal staples, they should remain in place. It's funny how hard it is to wait to get going on clean up this time of year. I want to get out there and start cutting down last year's plant debris, but I hold off, and instead, do some pruning of the fruit trees. The early warmth is such a tease. Last year, there was that very late cold snap that wiped out apple orchards all over the state. It was the year that I thought I might finally get some peaches and cherries...maybe this year?!
It's always fun to wonder what trees will start producing each year. I really love this first phase of a food forest (the first decade or so). There's always something new that kicks in each year.
What are the tubes for in your raised beds? Also in your food forest do you have to do anything to maintain the garlic year to year or will it self seed? I absolutely love planting out perennial or self-seeding stuff in my tree guilds. Oh and do you eat your fish from your pond or is it supportive in another way? I keep coming up with more questions as you wander around and talk 😅 I love hearing the things you're able to grow in your Canadian garden. I'm in the upper midwest so our winters don't get as bad as yours but they are generally pretty similar. It really does feel like spring in the garden though. I'm already planting out my greens and starting more perennial natives for my tree guilds. I'm just worried that if I lean to hard into an early spring I'll get caught up by the volatility that seems to be inherent in climate change. I'm just trying to stay flexible and adaptive.
Fish in the pond are koi. I went with Koi at the advice of the pond builder, because they are riverfish and will clean the rocks. I was going to go tilapia for a food source. I may transition at some point, and use the koi as a financial investment to help repay some of the pond.
Are you still planning on putting up the fencing around the chicken area? With the new dog it probably will keep her out, chickens safer from doggie chaos. Hawthorne bushes grow well there? Yes, they've got nasty spikes, but the berries are supposedly tasty, don't know myself, used them to keep anything out.
Yes. It may not happen this year because we have to make sure we have our finances ready for 3 kids in university (looking to cost us roughly half a million dollars in the next few years). We've been saving since the day they were born, but we should still really be careful how much money we spend in the next while. So I'll see what free stuff I can rummage up.
Maybe your dog.Rosie is ripping out your trees and trunk protectors because she needs some more fiber in her diet possibly. She may be sending you a sign that she needs something more in her diet that she isn't getting. Maybe something to chew on or some kind of fiber in her food. Good luck!
Great video and information, as always. I'm based in southern Ohio (Zone 6a) and in the very early stages of cultivating a smaller-scale urban food forest - less than an acre; so a lot of my planning will have to factor in that land limitation. Specifically, almost half of that land is covered by a small forest, and I was wondering if you had any experience with shade-tolerant (maybe even shade-loving) perennials. I've researched around and have always been led to the same handful of plants - namely Lindera benzoin (spicebush), Apios americana (American groundnut), among others. Strawberries also come to mind, but maybe less so. If you have any recommendations as far as what could be useful to plant in these conditions, that would be awesome. Either way, thanks for putting out these videos.
Hostas do well in shade (most people know this, but what most people don't know is that they are edible. You eat the leaves when they come up and before they unravel, kind of like asparagus). Currants and elderberry can do great in the shade. They will crop lighter though. Another thing you can think of doing is a controlled thinning, or the creation of small openenings or glades in the forest. You can also of course crop mushrooms really well in a high shade environment.
@@CanadianPermacultureLegacyAll great suggestions! I actually had the idea to create small openings in the canopy a while ago, but the majority of that canopy is occupied by a very large and old black walnut tree that grows on a slope (and generally doesn't impact the soil above it.) I get such a large harvest from this tree that I feel it's probably best to keep it all there. I didn't know that about hostas! I might try them sometime, as well as the elderberries. Mushrooms have also been on my mind for a while, and I actually have a box elder that's already been inoculated with a variety of different mushrooms - so I'll definitely be growing some this year. Thanks!
is there concern that the wood you showed that you're going to be using for raised beds could be pressure treated with toxic chemicals? im wanting to expand my garden more towards my wooden privacy fence but im concerned that its pressure treated with CCA which has arsenic in it because its from 1994 and i guess that method wasnt banned until 2003. i assume growing a garden near an arsenic fence is bad right lol? also i have another concern about growing in my front yard which is like 10ft away from a suburban road with fairly low traffic, but still idk if i should worry about asphalt, lead etc runoff from the road, and exhaust particles getting on plants? that being said i regularly see massive industrial corn farms like 20 yards off of the major interstate highways, so idk.
It's all stamped "HT" for heat treated. It's definitely a concern, but if you see the HT stamp, it's good. I would say to be careful with the wood fence if it's CCA treated. For the road, you can put a buffer of wildflowers that will block contaminants from the road. Ideally you can have some kind of ditch and put something like reeds in the ditch. Also, see my video on "growing in contaminated soils" as I discuss this in more detail.
@@CanadianPermacultureLegacy awesome, thanks for the info. im so exited to get back into gardening season. im going to be growing a bunch of semi rare peppers that you dont find in supermarkets
I will tell you once I get one to survive long enough to produce fruit. But many American varieties should grow here, because they grow in northern areas of the US. We also have some hybrid crosses like Nikitas gift.
Like Jerusalem artichokes, burdock root contains inulin, which causes intestinal distress in a subset of the population, so not on the menu here! It may have another use, although I won't vouch for it: while thru-hiking the AT decades back, a ragged hiker pulled into camp with us in the Shenandoah and began digging up a mess of burdock in the clearing around the shelter. He proceeded to boil the roots for dinner and insisted quite vehemently that eating burdock protected him from mosquito bites. I'll take a few mosquito bites with my mac and cheese, thanks! (I believe burdock is actually introduced, not native.)
That's good to know, I didn't know that about the inulin. Also, I just looked it up and you are completely right, I've been told burdock is native here but it's not, it was introduced by European settlers. Thanks for that!
Yeah - Aussies are lovely animals - but way too high energy - for a simiar dog that is actually a helpmate for small farms - try an English Shepherd - they look like border collies - come in all colors and are CALM !!!! :)
My friends always say I'm TOO laid back. I'm laid back to a fault. Nothing gets me upset. Sometimes it means that I allow people to walk all over me and take advantage of me. But I'd rather be this way than to take life too seriously. I love my dogs, and Rosie is such a loving animal. She eats my trees, but she'll stop that eventually and she makes our lives better in so many ways :)
Here in southern Europe it's been crazy, spring weather since mid-January, not even a frost, the trees are waking up, it's really not ideal, a late cold snap is still entirely possible and would destroy any fruit that sets early. Hoping "winter" comes again soon, if it's planning to at all.
Prince George, BC, "zone 4", normally a 120 day frost free season. While we're still having nearly nightly frosts, I suspect that the ground frost here is going to break quite soon, and it's going to be very British - marshy, wet, just eugh, until drought sets in if drought sets in. In terms of advanced planting, I'm likely to only do this for things that are likely to survive or even benefit from mid-season frost - so maize or sorghum, if I get them, are going out weeks 16 through 18 as usual for here, and not week 12 or 13.
I found the deer loving my lemon tree but not the orange tree when they nocked down some fence boards and i chassed them out more than once before fixing the fence.
We (East Idaho) had an unusually warm Feb, & then got snowed in deep, in early March this year. Not good. Pretty sure this is why the ornamental trees, that the previous owner planted in the front yard, are cracking open along their trunks & slowly dying. Probably time to rip out all that ornamental stuff, & forage for native species for birds & pollinators like I've been meaning to.
Thanks for the show. Do you think with climate change this is a sign of things to come in Southern Ontario? An extended growing season would be nice, but at what expense?
Yeah, I think it's definitely a sign of things to come. It doesn't just come as an overall warming though, it comes with extremes. I think random 1-2 day polar vortex blasts in May will also be more frequent. Last year we had a crazy snow storm on May 15th which killed all the buds on the peaches and pears. But just looking at the recent sea surface temps, it's pretty clear that we're departing from the mean.
Science has shown that plants scream at levels that cats can hear, so, if I were one of our cats, I could listen to my plants scream as they die. Maybe your dogs can see or hear something you can't lol!
I will not be tricked by false spring. It’s supposed to be +15 today and the snow is almost gone but it is going down to -17 over night in a couple of days. However, I am going to buy some potting soil and look through my seeds.
Have you tried growing skirret? It seems to be super high in natural sugar and carbohydrates, pretty interesting resiliency and self-sufficiency wise... The thing is, the nutrition content analysis can't be found anywhere online.
Nice to hear from you. Thanks for checking in. Spring is still a little while away here in Portland. But there are some hints of it. Getting my garden beds ready. Getting ready to compost. Looking forward to the new season. Hope all is well.
What hascap varieties do you grow? I’m just learning about them and see there are many varieties and you need at least 2 to get berries. When do they start producing if I buy 1 year old plants?
Yay! I am so excited for this season!!! I spent soooo much time in the garden last summer, establishing my food forest. Time to reap the rewards 🤩 Looking forward to seeing more of you ❤
It's always so exciting to see how much it changes. As long as you add stuff every year, there's always this "Christmas time" feeling of being thrilled to see what new presents you get! I have many many serviceberry trees that I added, and I'm always excited to see if this is the year they "leap"
2 weeks from now the forecast is now saying we'll hit -4C. About a week ago it was saying 2C. We'll see. I definitely won't be starting annuals now, but I think I'll likely put some of them out a week or two early this year. Our normal planting date is the May 24 weekend. I have a feeling even something as early as April 24th will be fine this year. I definitely won't be putting all my starts out that early, but I think I can do them in waves each week starting end of april.
I 100% like unedited videos, and peeks into “messy” part of the yard, make yiu more relatable. I don’t think of it as lazy gardening to leave the gardens wild over winter if no dig/ no till has taught us anything it is what a delicate care soil needs to do its job best. My Lab puppy likes to eat big chunks of kelp when we go to beach, figure she knows best and I let her at it.
I’m very happy to hear you’re reducing your meat consumption. Hopefully one day you’ll completely cut out meat from your diet. Whether it’s conventional or regenerative, animal agriculture is unsustainable. Eating a plant based diet is the single most effective way to reduce your carbon footprint.
Thank you! Love to see your land in all seasons. Could you explain how to use chickens in the composting process? I stopped eating meat, but then ended up with iron deficiencies that seemed to only go away with meat consumption. I’m now at a loss for how to stay healthy without some meat. When my kids don’t have meat, they carb load. It’s a tricky balance to find.
I just feed all kitchen scraps to the chickens. They are little garbage disposals. Then every few months I clean out their pen and coop (we use deep little method, so this is plenty), then we mix that into the compost pile.
We train her tons. Aussies have a LOT of energy. We are pretty used to it, and our method works great I think. Lucy for example is such an amazing dog. Rosie will get there, and she's already very obedient for most things, listens to commands well, and I have a very deep bond with her (which is required to train). She's just an untapped well of energy at this age, and being an Aussie it's even a deeper well than most dogs. Understanding of that is important when training Aussies.
You may try feeding your dog a raw die. For me, this resulted in excellent behaviour and completely avoids their unconscious desire to consume things like scarfs, hats, socks, and... trees perhaps. When we feed them dog food they desire additional nutrients and cant resist.
Hey Keith! I've slowly been catching up on all of your videos, thank you so much for all of the information! I was wondering if you've ever spoken about any recommendations/tips and tricks for people who can't start a food forest yet (due to renting, or maybe knowing that they're selling their house and moving in the next couple of years), but still want to get a headstart on their food forest? Otherwise it could maybe be a potential video topic? I was maybe thinking things like what plants or types of plants make sense to grow now exclusively for seed collecting purposes so you have plenty for the eventual food forest. Other ideas could be growing bushes in pots so you have a "mother plant" you can bring with you and use for a lot of cuttings/propagation, etc etc. Basically, if you had 1-3 years to prepare before you could start a food forest, what would you do? Greetings from Denmark 🇩🇰
Get started learning to start plants, save seeds, etc. You can also learn to prune on trees around you in the wild, just make sure they aren't someone's property. Also, start looking at properties you drive/walk by, and think of how you would design it. Sun aspect, where does water flow, how can you hold and store water high in the land, how can you carefully channel that water throughout the rest of the land, etc. These are all great things you can do when you don't have your land yet. Skills that you'll want.
I’m glad to see my puppy isn’t the only one who was destroying my new plants. I love your laid back attitude about it.
I don't know if it's officially spring, but nature sure seems to think so. My official sign of spring in southern Michigan is the arrival of the turkey vultures and they showed up three days ago. I'm taking their cue and have added compost to all my fruit trees and raised beds. Today I start clearing the winter garden.
February is often a warm month in California then March brings back the rain but this year was different. We had a lot of february rain.
We thought the same thing in March. We decided to get seeds started inside a bit early, then it snowed several days this week and is supposed to snow all week next week…
Minus 30 here in Edmonton this morning. At least we got snow first!
It’s great to see you back in the feed and to get a late-winter tour of the garden!
I’m not sure I’ll plant annuals early this year without cover. Even with the weird warm year, we might still have frost in to late April or May. We’ve had surprise frosts in past warm years and I don’t think I’m quite ready to adjust planting dates more than a few days.
It started 2 months early here too
You mention planting comfrey in areas the dogs run. We have one dog how has taken a fancy to eating the comfrey leaves and let me tell you, they make her have a terrible stomach ache every time, and of course, she doesn't learn and comes back every day for a snack. . We ended up fencing off the comfrey.
We’re having 20+ acres of pine harvested. I am turning this into a food forest. I’ve saved every seed from fruit since last fall and have been stratifying them. As they root I’ve potted them up. To date there about 200 trees under grow lights plus over 200 waiting to sprout. That plus all my berry cuttings are going to be a wonderful replacement for the scrubby pines. I am following your technique to leave it all a little wild. I realize that not all of the trees will survive our winters. Zone 4 b. But I’m super pumped about trying.
If you are ever interested in showcasing a different person’s garden you might find mine unique.
Send me an email to permaculturelegacy@gmail.com and tell me where you are located, and some photos of your place. If you are somewhat close to me I would love to come visit.
I love seeing what it all looks like after winter when it’s not all lush and green! I battle with myself all the time over having my garden look beautiful and perfect with borders and no weeds or grass and all lined up in rows and sections, vs having just a wild food jungle. I love both, but it’s always a fight with myself over perfection.
Great tour! If you are interested why Rosie is eating your trees, I have the answer, and a solution to the problem. Usually it's because the dog is bored, so she entertains herself with whatever she has access to. Dogs need both physical and mental stimulation, and actually mental stimulation exhausts the dog more than running around, or chasing a ball. One quick exercise for just 5 minutes, after which she is not gonna be interested in chewing your trees. On a leash find stairs, but instead of letting her run fast up, stop on every step and wait for 5 seconds, then another step, after 10 steps she will be tired, then go down with stops. That works like a charm, probably an equivalent of a 30 minute walk. Now that you know the reason, look up more mental stimulation exercises for the dogs, and your garden will thank you!
For sure. They are also Aussies, so they need a ton of mental stimulation. We do lots of little drills like that with her. For example, they can already both chase/catch frizbees because we find they really enjoy doing that to use up their energy/attention. She is just an endless well of energy at this age still. I like the stair drill, I will try that out. It takes some time to get that deep bond with a dog where they will be that attentive and listen in a drill like that, but I think she's at that age now, and she's hyper bonded to me.
Now of only we could grind climate change to a halt and keep these "mild" winters.
I believe that the U.P. has something like a 90" snow deficit this year.
This is my first year in the new house. I'm not sure I will plant earlier than recommended, but I'm going to take advantage of the snow-free state of my yard to start putting in swales. I have some drainage issues that definitely need addressing.
This is a good point.... the best season to get work done is when the ground is thawed but it's not super hot outside yet. We may get an extended work-season this year, so it's a wonderful year to get some infrastructure projects done.
@@CanadianPermacultureLegacy The sunniest part of my back yard, where I'd love to put in my raised beds for annuals, is also the lowest point (by a long shot). I'm still grappling with how, exactly, I'm going to deal with that. In the meantime, I've put in a request for a chip drop (do they have Chip Drop in Canada?) because I'm going to need a ton of mulch for everything I'm planning to do.
Yep, kids and dogs will ruin everything you own 😂 ! Can’t wait to see how Rosie likes chickens !
Kids, dogs and now grandchildren lol!
Have you tried finding some sort of chewy toy or tougher rawhide chew
Always love to see your videos come up
6:51
Yeah, they have some rawhide to chew on.
You'll have to be careful with Rosie and the grapes this year. My daughter had an Aussie that ate the grapes (he would eat anything) at a rental she was at years ago and he got very sick, she didn't know that they could be so bad for dogs. Glad to hear about your journey away from factory-farmed meat - we are eating mostly plant-based now and feeling great - sustainable meat, grown humanely and nearby or hunted (the deer population is unsustainable if not predated in some way) is the way to go. Yes, the winter is crazy. I am pruning my apple trees today and hoping it's not too late.
Indeed! We've been very conscious to only plant grapes in areas that the dogs cannot access. The grapes in the annual garden is just outside the dog fence. The grapes in the chicken run will be blocked by the chicken fence. And the grapes in the front gardens are also just outside the dog fence. Most people don't know that grapes are toxic to dogs, but it's true.
Hot chili oil on the tree protectors. You have to reapply after rain. I grow a dozen Cayenne Peppers and and make the oil in the microwave. Great video.
Good thing she is cute and you love her! The needs of the beings living in the space do need to take priority. We are in our false spring here as well but we have a snow and ice storm predicted tomorrow. I am building season extending spaces and stratisfying seeds for nut trees and persimmons. Hoping they can cope with our short season and high winds here.
“Needs”? Lol!! I don’t consider destructive tendencies as “needs”.
@@chaparra71puppies need entertainment and something to chew to keep those shark teeth under control. High energy dogs need lots of space to run and enrichment. So yes, needs.
Have you ever seen such damage to trees from wolves? Even a moose is not capable of this. 😁 In my opinion, the dog’s behavior is inappropriate.
@Ni-dk7ni 🤦🏼♀️🤦🏼♀️🤦🏼♀️
@@julie-annepineau4022 nope. No dog of mine would be allowed to destroy my valuable trees/landscape. I’d VERY QUICKLY restrict their space. It’s ridiculous the pedestal that western people have put cats and dogs on. But hey, if you want your dogs destroying your plantings, by all means, have at it. I’m just saying no one is going to convince me to let mine do the same.
I wonder if it's a bit if jealousy. My old dog would watch me plant something and the minute I left it, he would lay on it or lean purposefully against it until he pushed it over or broke it.
He crushed loads of stuff and I couldn't really afford the damage.
Now he's gone, I've been able to do a lot of planting (had a lot of cuttings I was keeping back).
Yes, we have quite a lot of deer now we don't have the dog. They're not eating all that much at the moment, but they will scrape their antlers up and down stems, shredding the bark.
So, tree guards are fairly effective.
I am trying to put off the deer with shiny paper (works for a few weeks), throwing human urine everywhere (works if you reapply daily), shouting and chasing whenever possible, netting, and I'm trying longish sticks in the ground surrounding each of the important plants or close groups of plants. I'm hoping they scrape their antlers on the sticks instead, and then move on. I have to keep checking to straighten sticks (esp after a storm).
Mint doesn't take over if it has lots of other plants to compete against. I picked my mint plant from a cutting in a meadow. It was hard to find in this meadow, and that was hundreds of years old, plenty of time to take over. The mint cutting is somewhere, I don't know where I planted it now, but I haven't found it and so it's not taking over.
Great infomercial for Aussie Shepard’s lol
LOL
chicken wonderland, love to see it
Love the start of garden season, always exciting ~ great video!
Any thoughts on composting thorny material? In with other compost? Biochar? (I have lots of it)
Yeah, I put my thorny stuff into my biochar pile, because I stomp it constantly during the biochar process so it helps break down the thorns so that I don't stab myself with it.
Awesome, thanks so much! @@CanadianPermacultureLegacy
Oh, those little "devil dogs!" I'm thinking it might be worth it to just buy a large roll of hardware cloth and cut lengths of about five or six feet to wrap around the trees. Once you have them, you'll have them forever. The holes are small enough that it will keep small critters out as well as the bigger ones. With three or four long metal staples, they should remain in place.
It's funny how hard it is to wait to get going on clean up this time of year. I want to get out there and start cutting down last year's plant debris, but I hold off, and instead, do some pruning of the fruit trees. The early warmth is such a tease. Last year, there was that very late cold snap that wiped out apple orchards all over the state. It was the year that I thought I might finally get some peaches and cherries...maybe this year?!
It's always fun to wonder what trees will start producing each year. I really love this first phase of a food forest (the first decade or so). There's always something new that kicks in each year.
What are the tubes for in your raised beds? Also in your food forest do you have to do anything to maintain the garlic year to year or will it self seed? I absolutely love planting out perennial or self-seeding stuff in my tree guilds. Oh and do you eat your fish from your pond or is it supportive in another way? I keep coming up with more questions as you wander around and talk 😅 I love hearing the things you're able to grow in your Canadian garden. I'm in the upper midwest so our winters don't get as bad as yours but they are generally pretty similar. It really does feel like spring in the garden though. I'm already planting out my greens and starting more perennial natives for my tree guilds. I'm just worried that if I lean to hard into an early spring I'll get caught up by the volatility that seems to be inherent in climate change. I'm just trying to stay flexible and adaptive.
Fish in the pond are koi. I went with Koi at the advice of the pond builder, because they are riverfish and will clean the rocks. I was going to go tilapia for a food source. I may transition at some point, and use the koi as a financial investment to help repay some of the pond.
Are you still planning on putting up the fencing around the chicken area? With the new dog it probably will keep her out, chickens safer from doggie chaos.
Hawthorne bushes grow well there? Yes, they've got nasty spikes, but the berries are supposedly tasty, don't know myself, used them to keep anything out.
Yes. It may not happen this year because we have to make sure we have our finances ready for 3 kids in university (looking to cost us roughly half a million dollars in the next few years). We've been saving since the day they were born, but we should still really be careful how much money we spend in the next while. So I'll see what free stuff I can rummage up.
Maybe your dog.Rosie is ripping out your trees and trunk protectors because she needs some more fiber in her diet possibly. She may be sending you a sign that she needs something more in her diet that she isn't getting. Maybe something to chew on or some kind of fiber in her food. Good luck!
Wow Keith, pretty amazing how calm you can stay about your dog eating your trees! Good for you!
Great video and information, as always. I'm based in southern Ohio (Zone 6a) and in the very early stages of cultivating a smaller-scale urban food forest - less than an acre; so a lot of my planning will have to factor in that land limitation. Specifically, almost half of that land is covered by a small forest, and I was wondering if you had any experience with shade-tolerant (maybe even shade-loving) perennials. I've researched around and have always been led to the same handful of plants - namely Lindera benzoin (spicebush), Apios americana (American groundnut), among others. Strawberries also come to mind, but maybe less so.
If you have any recommendations as far as what could be useful to plant in these conditions, that would be awesome. Either way, thanks for putting out these videos.
Hostas do well in shade (most people know this, but what most people don't know is that they are edible. You eat the leaves when they come up and before they unravel, kind of like asparagus). Currants and elderberry can do great in the shade. They will crop lighter though.
Another thing you can think of doing is a controlled thinning, or the creation of small openenings or glades in the forest. You can also of course crop mushrooms really well in a high shade environment.
@@CanadianPermacultureLegacyAll great suggestions! I actually had the idea to create small openings in the canopy a while ago, but the majority of that canopy is occupied by a very large and old black walnut tree that grows on a slope (and generally doesn't impact the soil above it.) I get such a large harvest from this tree that I feel it's probably best to keep it all there.
I didn't know that about hostas! I might try them sometime, as well as the elderberries. Mushrooms have also been on my mind for a while, and I actually have a box elder that's already been inoculated with a variety of different mushrooms - so I'll definitely be growing some this year. Thanks!
Are you worried at all about you pup getting into the grapes?
No, they are all in spots the dogs can't reach. Just outside the dog fence, or in the chicken run that is also fenced.
is there concern that the wood you showed that you're going to be using for raised beds could be pressure treated with toxic chemicals? im wanting to expand my garden more towards my wooden privacy fence but im concerned that its pressure treated with CCA which has arsenic in it because its from 1994 and i guess that method wasnt banned until 2003. i assume growing a garden near an arsenic fence is bad right lol? also i have another concern about growing in my front yard which is like 10ft away from a suburban road with fairly low traffic, but still idk if i should worry about asphalt, lead etc runoff from the road, and exhaust particles getting on plants? that being said i regularly see massive industrial corn farms like 20 yards off of the major interstate highways, so idk.
It's all stamped "HT" for heat treated. It's definitely a concern, but if you see the HT stamp, it's good. I would say to be careful with the wood fence if it's CCA treated. For the road, you can put a buffer of wildflowers that will block contaminants from the road. Ideally you can have some kind of ditch and put something like reeds in the ditch. Also, see my video on "growing in contaminated soils" as I discuss this in more detail.
@@CanadianPermacultureLegacy awesome, thanks for the info. im so exited to get back into gardening season. im going to be growing a bunch of semi rare peppers that you dont find in supermarkets
What type of persimmon tree grows in canada?
I will tell you once I get one to survive long enough to produce fruit. But many American varieties should grow here, because they grow in northern areas of the US. We also have some hybrid crosses like Nikitas gift.
Thanks for answering. I live in central Wisconsin and would like to grow these for deer but as far as I know, I'm still to far north.
Like Jerusalem artichokes, burdock root contains inulin, which causes intestinal distress in a subset of the population, so not on the menu here! It may have another use, although I won't vouch for it: while thru-hiking the AT decades back, a ragged hiker pulled into camp with us in the Shenandoah and began digging up a mess of burdock in the clearing around the shelter. He proceeded to boil the roots for dinner and insisted quite vehemently that eating burdock protected him from mosquito bites. I'll take a few mosquito bites with my mac and cheese, thanks! (I believe burdock is actually introduced, not native.)
That's good to know, I didn't know that about the inulin. Also, I just looked it up and you are completely right, I've been told burdock is native here but it's not, it was introduced by European settlers. Thanks for that!
Yeah - Aussies are lovely animals - but way too high energy - for a simiar dog that is actually a helpmate for small farms - try an English Shepherd - they look like border collies - come in all colors and are CALM !!!! :)
The damage is greater than from hares or goats. It's easier to give the dog to someone than to constantly lose trees.
Not a chance! :)
I’m glad to see my puppy isn’t the only one who was destroying my new plants. I love your laid back attitude about it.
My friends always say I'm TOO laid back. I'm laid back to a fault. Nothing gets me upset. Sometimes it means that I allow people to walk all over me and take advantage of me. But I'd rather be this way than to take life too seriously. I love my dogs, and Rosie is such a loving animal. She eats my trees, but she'll stop that eventually and she makes our lives better in so many ways :)
@@CanadianPermacultureLegacy I feel the same way.
Great job with your videos.
Here in southern Europe it's been crazy, spring weather since mid-January, not even a frost, the trees are waking up, it's really not ideal, a late cold snap is still entirely possible and would destroy any fruit that sets early. Hoping "winter" comes again soon, if it's planning to at all.
Someone has spring fever. I guarantee you have more frost coming. don't plant anything you don't have backup start of ;)
Prince George, BC, "zone 4", normally a 120 day frost free season. While we're still having nearly nightly frosts, I suspect that the ground frost here is going to break quite soon, and it's going to be very British - marshy, wet, just eugh, until drought sets in if drought sets in.
In terms of advanced planting, I'm likely to only do this for things that are likely to survive or even benefit from mid-season frost - so maize or sorghum, if I get them, are going out weeks 16 through 18 as usual for here, and not week 12 or 13.
Maybe time for a ring of hardware cloth aroumd your trees? I agree with the post above that places humans over all.
I found the deer loving my lemon tree but not the orange tree when they nocked down some fence boards and i chassed them out more than once before fixing the fence.
Always enjoy your videos. Thank you!
Thaks for the update I love early spring tours!
We (East Idaho) had an unusually warm Feb, & then got snowed in deep, in early March this year. Not good. Pretty sure this is why the ornamental trees, that the previous owner planted in the front yard, are cracking open along their trunks & slowly dying. Probably time to rip out all that ornamental stuff, & forage for native species for birds & pollinators like I've been meaning to.
Haha! That's a great way to look at it. Every problem is a solution :)
Thanks for the show. Do you think with climate change this is a sign of things to come in Southern Ontario? An extended growing season would be nice, but at what expense?
Yeah, I think it's definitely a sign of things to come. It doesn't just come as an overall warming though, it comes with extremes. I think random 1-2 day polar vortex blasts in May will also be more frequent. Last year we had a crazy snow storm on May 15th which killed all the buds on the peaches and pears. But just looking at the recent sea surface temps, it's pretty clear that we're departing from the mean.
My Australian shepherd did that when he was young. He is over a year and has stopped, is the good news.
What kind of garlic is that coming up everywhere? I've struggled growing garlic here quite a bit
Soft neck. Not sure what variety, I bought it about 7 years ago when I first started and just keep spreading it.
@@CanadianPermacultureLegacy thank you! I'll have to try that
Science has shown that plants scream at levels that cats can hear, so, if I were one of our cats, I could listen to my plants scream as they die. Maybe your dogs can see or hear something you can't lol!
Im going to start clearing and amending the clay soil in my garden today in North Texas. Will plant next week
I will not be tricked by false spring. It’s supposed to be +15 today and the snow is almost gone but it is going down to -17 over night in a couple of days. However, I am going to buy some potting soil and look through my seeds.
Have you tried growing skirret? It seems to be super high in natural sugar and carbohydrates, pretty interesting resiliency and self-sufficiency wise... The thing is, the nutrition content analysis can't be found anywhere online.
I've been keeping my eye out for it. I'd love to grow some. I just haven't been able to find it anywhere.
Nice to hear from you. Thanks for checking in. Spring is still a little while away here in Portland. But there are some hints of it. Getting my garden beds ready. Getting ready to compost. Looking forward to the new season. Hope all is well.
What hascap varieties do you grow? I’m just learning about them and see there are many varieties and you need at least 2 to get berries. When do they start producing if I buy 1 year old plants?
Love a garden walk...Enjoyed the video.
We basically haven’t had any snow the entire winter in zone 4, extremely warm…it has been very unsettling.
Yay! I am so excited for this season!!! I spent soooo much time in the garden last summer, establishing my food forest. Time to reap the rewards 🤩 Looking forward to seeing more of you ❤
It's always so exciting to see how much it changes. As long as you add stuff every year, there's always this "Christmas time" feeling of being thrilled to see what new presents you get! I have many many serviceberry trees that I added, and I'm always excited to see if this is the year they "leap"
It’s good to see your place again. I’m loving this early spring!
Wonderful tour! It's crazy here too. Still have snow but a lot less than usual and warmer temps. I'm afraid that it is an early false spring.
2 weeks from now the forecast is now saying we'll hit -4C. About a week ago it was saying 2C. We'll see. I definitely won't be starting annuals now, but I think I'll likely put some of them out a week or two early this year. Our normal planting date is the May 24 weekend. I have a feeling even something as early as April 24th will be fine this year.
I definitely won't be putting all my starts out that early, but I think I can do them in waves each week starting end of april.
I 100% like unedited videos, and peeks into “messy” part of the yard, make yiu more relatable. I don’t think of it as lazy gardening to leave the gardens wild over winter if no dig/ no till has taught us anything it is what a delicate care soil needs to do its job best. My Lab puppy likes to eat big chunks of kelp when we go to beach, figure she knows best and I let her at it.
100% :)
One of my dogs just chewed my orange tree in half lol. They can be quite aggravating sometimes, but gotta love em
Yeah haha, they are wonderful I love them so much. They just come with a little chaos !! :)
I’m very happy to hear you’re reducing your meat consumption. Hopefully one day you’ll completely cut out meat from your diet. Whether it’s conventional or regenerative, animal agriculture is unsustainable. Eating a plant based diet is the single most effective way to reduce your carbon footprint.
For me, I only eat meat now if I visit someone and they make it for me.
Thank you! Love to see your land in all seasons. Could you explain how to use chickens in the composting process? I stopped eating meat, but then ended up with iron deficiencies that seemed to only go away with meat consumption. I’m now at a loss for how to stay healthy without some meat. When my kids don’t have meat, they carb load. It’s a tricky balance to find.
I just feed all kitchen scraps to the chickens. They are little garbage disposals. Then every few months I clean out their pen and coop (we use deep little method, so this is plenty), then we mix that into the compost pile.
Pupp Needs training 😮
We train her tons. Aussies have a LOT of energy. We are pretty used to it, and our method works great I think. Lucy for example is such an amazing dog. Rosie will get there, and she's already very obedient for most things, listens to commands well, and I have a very deep bond with her (which is required to train). She's just an untapped well of energy at this age, and being an Aussie it's even a deeper well than most dogs. Understanding of that is important when training Aussies.
I do training and grooming lots with animals. I'm glad you have a great relationship with them both 😊. Yes they do he a tun of energy agreed.
You may try feeding your dog a raw die. For me, this resulted in excellent behaviour and completely avoids their unconscious desire to consume things like scarfs, hats, socks, and... trees perhaps. When we feed them dog food they desire additional nutrients and cant resist.
Hey Keith! I've slowly been catching up on all of your videos, thank you so much for all of the information! I was wondering if you've ever spoken about any recommendations/tips and tricks for people who can't start a food forest yet (due to renting, or maybe knowing that they're selling their house and moving in the next couple of years), but still want to get a headstart on their food forest?
Otherwise it could maybe be a potential video topic? I was maybe thinking things like what plants or types of plants make sense to grow now exclusively for seed collecting purposes so you have plenty for the eventual food forest. Other ideas could be growing bushes in pots so you have a "mother plant" you can bring with you and use for a lot of cuttings/propagation, etc etc.
Basically, if you had 1-3 years to prepare before you could start a food forest, what would you do?
Greetings from Denmark 🇩🇰
Get started learning to start plants, save seeds, etc. You can also learn to prune on trees around you in the wild, just make sure they aren't someone's property. Also, start looking at properties you drive/walk by, and think of how you would design it. Sun aspect, where does water flow, how can you hold and store water high in the land, how can you carefully channel that water throughout the rest of the land, etc. These are all great things you can do when you don't have your land yet. Skills that you'll want.
@@CanadianPermacultureLegacy Thank you so much for the response :D