A New Year, A New Life

Mulberry Farms is a dream I had last year. A dream I planned on creating slowly, over time, but due to recent circumstances it appears the time is now. I'm ready to jump in. I barely know what I'm doing but I don't care. I'm done with the stress and angst that my old life held and ready to be in the fresh air and take control.

I've been growing fruits and vegetables organically for a few years now. If you're interested as to how those years progressed, you can see my previous blog: http://atlanticgardener.blogspot.ca/

My wife and I currently live on 4/5 an acre in Northern New Brunswick. It's pretty rural here. It's considered a city, but well... it's pretty rural here. We live on a busy highway, perfect really for a roadside veggie stand. We'll likely do that next summer. This summer I am off work so it's the perfect time to really amp up building everything, getting more trees in and really see how much we can grow and preserve. The garden has grown exponentially each year, adding raised beds, a number of perennials and fruit trees. We started with an in-ground garden of 864 square feet and this year, with the addition of a new garden and another 15-20 raised beds, we should be over 3000 square feet. We also started our fruit/nut orchard last year, planting two heartnut, two mulberry, three cherry and two elderberry trees. I'm hoping to add several additional trees this year. Once all orchard trees are in, I'll start planting perennials throughout the orchard, including mostly edibles, but some medicinal and decorative plants as well. The hope is to develop a food forest throughout our yard, and to see just how much produce we can grow on just 4/5 of an acre.

Currently it's May 14 and we've been well underway starting seeds for a few months now. Living in such a northern zone with such a short growing season, seed starting indoors becomes even more imperative. I start members of the allium family as well as peppers and tomatoes, around mid-February. In mid-March, I planted petunias, dahlias, asters, lavender and marigolds. I also started most of my herbs. I should have thyme, oregano, parsley, and chives come back this year, but wanted to start more along with marjoram, sage, and savory. Everything is growing well thus far, with the exception of the onion family. The first day I set them out to start hardening them off, I completely forgot them. Fried every one. I'm going to try starting some late seeds and planting directly as soon as they arrive. We'll see how that goes. Still hoping for some smaller onions, shallots and leeks, fingers crossed.


This year I tried a new seed seller, migardener.com. Seed packets are only .99 USD and most packets have a comparable amount in them, if not more, than most seed companies offer. Plus, I've been watching the young fellow, Luke, that owns it, develop his channel and business for some time now. It felt good to support him. I purchased probably 45% from him, another 45% from Pinetree Seeds in Maine. Their seed packets usually cost from $1.50 to $2.00 each. I've ordered from them for three years I think now and find them very reliable. I ordered a few packets of varieties that I could not get from these two suppliers from Johnny's Selected Seeds (excellent quality and selection, but pricey), Vesey's, and William Dam Seeds.

I used the same potato seed supplier as previous years, Eagle Creek Seed Potatoes and New Brunswick's own Mapple Farm for sweet potato slips as well as some Chinese artichokes I decided to plant this year. The Chinese artichokes came last week and they are very strange little things, almost bug-like.

Chinese Artichokes aka Crosnes

Drilling holes in birch logs for inoculation with shiitake spores.

We recently took a day trip to Fredericton, which is about 2 hours away, to participate in a mushroom growing workshop. We learned how to inoculate logs with mushroom spawn and each got to take an inoculated log home with us. We also had the opportunity to purchase additional logs at cost, for $20 each, so we took advantage of that and got five additional logs. In total we came home with 4 shiitake and 3 oyster mushroom logs for $225, but the workshop by Backyard Mushrooms was invaluable. The oyster mushrooms are supposed to fruit in fall and then every 2 weeks (not including winter). Shiitakes will fruit next spring and every 4 weeks from then on.

Four shiitake logs on left (birch), three oyster logs on left (poplar).

We're planning a trip to Cornhill Nursery outside of St. John, NB, to get some more fruit trees and bushes, as well as a second order to Greenbarn Nursery in Ontario for some harder-to-get varieties. We'll be adding Asian pears, apples, pears, chums, cherry and pecan trees as well as gooseberry and goji bushes and arctic kiwi vines.

I have a new 4' Jump Start grow light, so I'll be planting squashes and melons soon. The weather has been dreadfully cold off and on, still dropping below freezing on some nights so I've just started hardening off the cabbages, broccoli, cauliflower and kale.

The rain has been a challenge but it's supposed to let up for two days, so let's see what we can get done. Hopefully the nicer weather is on the way and warm summer nights will soon replace these horrid, rainy ones. Fingers crossed!