I love growing food in containers as it allows for earlier growth. Also, you can take advantage of some sunny spots where you can’t have a garden bed, and some containers can be moved into the garage or house when an early fall frost threatens.
For containers, we can’t use garden soil because it’s heavy and hard. Potting mix is made from peat moss, vermiculite and perlite. While it’s light and holds water quite well, peat moss comes from our precious wetlands that are drained for harvest. Coconut choir is an option but it comes from very far away and has its own challenges. Therefore, I like to reuse my potting mix for as long as possible.
In the fall, I remove the plants, let the mix dry out and place the containers in a shed or under the waterproof deck. This is important for containers that might crack when the potting mix freezes.
In the spring, I dump all the containers out onto a tarp on the lawn (some grass is a useful work surface…). Then I usually mix in compost, up to about 20-30% of the total volume, and I re-moisten the dry mix.
This spring, I found that my potting mix seemed very dense and heavy. Since I also add compost, some worm castings and I use organic fertilizer, I think all kinds of microbes are happy in my containers. They are composting organic materials, which means that some good soil building is going on. This is a bit of speculation on my part as I don’t have the tools or skill to prove it.
I decided to purchase some perlite, a volcanic rock rich in silicon that is heated to expand the particles (see white perlite in photo). This creates important air spaces in the potting mix. Perlite also holds water, but less than vermiculite, another mineral that's part of most potting mixes. I used a shovel to mix the perlite thoroughly into the reused potting mix before watering and adding the growing medium back into my containers. Since the mix does not contain a lot of nutrients (other than what’s in the compost), I add a granular organic fertilizer to each planter at transplanting time.

Growing vegetables and fruit successfully requires the hard work from pollinators. Wild bees need nectar and pollen to feed and reproduce from flowering plants throughout the entire season. Here are some great plants for your landscape. The information is based on an article published in the Winter 2017 issue of the Nature Alberta magazine and confirms what I’ve observed in my own and other Edmonton yards. I have also added some other plants that are great for wild bees. Last year I wrote a bit of info on wild bee homes.

Perennial Plants:
Giant Hyssop – Agastache foeniculum: This native plant is stellar! It is a very easy plant to grow in sun and part shade. The flowers are light purple and produce nectar all day long from July to late August. The leaves and flowers also make a nice tea. This plant is available from the Edmonton Native Plant Group, Clark Ecoscience and even some garden centres, though you won’t know for sure in the last case that it’s a true Alberta native.
 
Globe Thistle – Echinops ritro: If you don’t mind something prickly, this drought tolerant plant is also a bee magnet from early summer to fall. It is available in garden centres.
 
Chives: While I love chives, they can seed themselves around very readily. Yes, they are great for bees but you may need to cut the flowers before they go to seed or be prepared to dig out seedlings. A great “green onion” plant is Welsh Onion. It is also perennial and eventually makes a large white flower that the bees love. It also likes to spread but it’s a bit easier to remove than chives.
If you don’t want to deal with a prolific self-seeder, you can also plant the native Nodding Onion and let it spread. It is a small plant that’s hardly noticeable but provides early season flowers. This plant is also available from the Edmonton Native Plant Group.
 
Spirea japonica: You may already have this small shrub. It flowers in late May.
 
Annuals
Borage: This annual has a blue star-shaped flower that looks great in salads. It blooms all summer long into fall and the bees visit it all day long. It self-seeds, but it’s easy to pull extra plants and compost them.
 
Rocky Mountain Bee Plant – Cleome serrulata: This annual flowers for a very long time.
 
Other Plants I like for Wild Bees:
Spring
Dandelions: Yes, they are great for the bees! They flower very early, which is important for the wild bees hatched in April and May.
Moss Phlox: This gorgeous ground cover plant blooms most of May.
Canada Violet: Another fabulous native. This plant has edible flowers in early May and all through the summer. It spreads slowly but it’s a low plant and I don’t mind it between other plants.
White Clover: You can seed white clover into your lawn if it’s a bit patchy and you don’t want to mow, water and fertilize it regularly. Clover spreads by the roots, so if you don’t want it in your flowerbeds or garden, edging is important.
 
Summer and Fall
Garden Hyssop – Hyssopus officinalis: Another bee magnet that does well in sun or part shade and is drought tolerant. Available in garden centres.
Stiff Goldenrod – Solidago rigida: A great native fall bloomer that is well behaved but easy to divide. Available from the Edmonton Native Plant Group or Clark Ecoscience.
Easy annuals: Sunflowers, Zinnias, Cosmos, Calendula and Dill
Herbs: Lemon Balm and Oregano. Both perennials are great for people and pollinators.

Alberta has a stunning diversity of birds that enrich our lives. Birds clean up pest insects, disperse seeds, fertilize our plants and are part of the food chain for other wildlife. Birds also signal the arrival of spring and delight us with their song.
 
Chickadees are year-round residents in Edmonton and not shy around humans. They start looking for nesting sites in March and April.
 
Black-capped Chickadees are cavity nesters and therefore, they look for holes in trees or rotten areas they can excavate. In cities, they also use nesting boxes attached to a fence post or tree 1 to 3 m above ground. The key to their success is a small enough entrance hole to keep out invasive House Sparrows. The entrance hole should be 29 mm or 1 1/8 inch diameter maximum.
 
By late April, the female is ready to lay eggs, usually 6-8. She incubates the eggs for periods of 20-30 minutes, and the entire night, for about two weeks. Between incubation periods, she goes looking for food and the male also feeds her while she’s on the nest.
 
Chickadees are a very important pest control in our yards. They are voracious predators of caterpillars and other insects, mostly on trees and shrubs. They pick off insects from the bark and leaves. They seem to use leaf damage as clues to where pests are hiding. How cool is that?!

Animal matter provides them with about 80% of their diet. Fruit and seeds are also important, especially during the winter and breeding season, when they need lots of calories. Putting out sunflowers seeds and growing sunflowers attract them to your yard.
 
You can get excellent advice and supplies at Wildbird General Store or Wild Birds Unlimited. Be sure to purchase a box that has a small hole that excludes House Sparrows because these invaders will take over and eat your prized veggie seedlings.
To build your own box, you can find plans here.
Find more info about the importance of birds in organic food production.
And here are more facts on Black-Capped Chickadees and other Canadian wildlife.

It's pruning time and you need sharp tools for the job. The best pruners for cutting small branches on trees and shrubs are by-pass pruners, which means they are a bit like scissors in that the blades pass each other.

Making a clean cut helps the the plant "heal" the wound and it's easier on your hand. I finally purchased a sharpening tool that works like a charm! With a few strokes along the blade, the pruners cut through wood very smoothly. I purchased the Corona Sharpening Tool at a local garden centre, but there are other brands that do the trick. Here are some easy instructions on how to use the tool and my blog post about cleaning your pruners.

Home-made compost is the best way to cycle kitchen waste back into your landscape to enrich your soil with nutrients and beneficial microbes. It’s also the best way to ensure it’s free of plastics and other unsavory materials. Composting does not have to be complicated (you can certainly become rather sophisticated at it eventually!).
Here are some basic suggestions to encourage you to start now and to continue throughout the winter.
In urban yards, an enclosed compost bin to collect materials is best, as opposed to throwing kitchen waste onto a heap.
Step 1: Make a wooden bin or purchase a large plastic bin. Make sure you get a bin that is wider than 24 inches and not too tall, otherwise it’s very difficult to turn the contents. (Note: Most people find the “Garden Gourmet too tall and narrow, which makes it difficult to turn and it also dries out too quickly).

Step 2: Place the bin on a fairly level surface in your yard. Make sure it’s fairly easy to get to your bin through snow and in cold weather. Ideally, the bin is placed in part sun to help speed up the decomposition. It’s also helpful to place it near a source of water during the summer, such as a rainbarrel. Avoid placing your compost bin on concrete.

Step 3: Collect your kitchen waste in a nice bucket. Lee Valley has conveniently sized metal buckets. Collect veggies and fruit, eggshells, tea and coffee grounds. Avoid dairy products, fat, meat, eggs and pet waste in this kind of open, aerobic composting method.

Step 4: Throw the kitchen waste into your compost bin every few days. Ideally, you should balance all these “greens” (fresh materials that contain lots of nitrogen) with “browns” (dry leaves, straw, and shredded paper that contain lots of carbon). In the winter, if you didn’t save your leaves, you can shred some newspaper and mix it with your green material. If you have storage space, you can purchase a square bale of straw at a local garden centre. (Straw is also fabulous to mulch your veggie beds in the summer.) Next fall, be sure to collect bags of dry leaves and store them near your compost.
For every 1 bucket of “greens”, add 1-2 buckets of “browns”. This is more important during the warm season when the microbes become active.

Step 5: If your bin is full, you may want to add a temporary bin, such as a wire cage (line it with cardboard to retain moisture and prevent materials from falling out). I have recently purchased a roll of plastic, a “Geobin” from Lee Valley, as an extension to my regular bin. It’s easy to set up and I’m hoping it will retain more humidity and keep in the small bits.

Step 6: From December to March, your compost is likely not very active, so you can just keep adding materials. In April, use a fork to turn the compost and if necessary, add some water. The materials should be like a wrung out sponge. Turn the compost every couple of weeks or so. Ideally, you will not add any new materials to this bin to allow the microbes to decompose everything by fall. Set up a second compost bin for all your summer kitchen waste and garden clean up materials.

Step 7: In the fall, sift the materials from your first bin and add the finished compost to your garden. Any materials that have not decomposed to your satisfaction can be added to your fall pile (see next step).

Step 8: In October, it’s fall cleanup and compost mixing time. Empty out the summer compost bin, mix it with plenty of fall leaves, fresh kitchen waste and the yard waste from fall cleanup. Ideally, you will combine 2 parts of loose, dry leaves or straw with 1 part green materials from the garden. Mix and add water to the point where the materials resemble a wrung out sponge. Place all the materials into one of your bins and turn them every 5 days until everything is frozen. Now we’re back to Step 4 – add your kitchen waste all winter long!

Protecting your trees from wildlife damage is an important fall activity but what you might not realize is that trees can also get damage from winter sun and fluctuating temperatures.

Intense winter sun warms up the tree trunk, especially on the southwest side. The sun warms the bark and apparently the living tissue called cambium is fooled into waking up. When the temperature drops again suddenly, this tissue dies and we notice dry, ridged areas or cracks. While this doesn’t kill the tree, the area is weakened and the tree is more susceptible to disease.

What can you do to prevent sunscald? Purchase pieces of white tree wrap and cover the trunk, especially the lower southwest side. You can do this even now and remove the wrap once the snow is gone.
For more info and photos, check out this link.

In June I had the pleasure of visiting two permaculture-inspired farms. I’ve lived away from the farm and in a city for about 25 years now, but I still feel a strong connection to farming. Therefore, I love having a chance to spend a day at a farm once in a while.
 
My first visit was Stony Creek Farms near Rochester, about an hour north of the city. There was a call out to help with chores after one of the owners was injured. I carpooled with Stefan, and the two of us arrived just in time to feed and water the pigs, impressive Berkshire/Tamworth sows and cute piglets. I got the job of milling wheat and peas, then mixing that with water and some milk to create a healthy mash. It was dusty, noisy work, but I stuck Kleenex in my ears and was happy to grind away. Then I spent some time helping Stefan with building frames for a chicken coop – I love sawing and drilling to build useful stuff! Next came the sheep, as they needed some hoof trimming before being sold to a new owner. In teams of three, we managed to flip each sheep on its back and hold it while the more or less willing animal got a pedicure. Soon a few hours had slipped by and it was time for a nice roast, salad and some pasta. We were all dirty and tired, but happy to dig in and lend a helping hand.
Stony Creek Farms offers “beyond organic” meat and veggie shares, and you can learn more about the farm here: http://stoneycreekfarm.ca/
 
Another fascinating visit was an organized tour of Grassroots Family Farm. Takota Coen and his parents run this organic farm and CSA. Takota explained how permaculture is about creating connectivity to increase the health and productivity of people, plants and animals. We saw how the Jersey cow and her calf grazed under rows of fruit and nut trees, reducing competitive grasses and fertilizing the plants. Sophie’s milk is added to the pig mash as a pro-biotic and to pre-ferment it. The free roaming chickens get some of this healthy grain mix while cleaning up what the pigs drop or do not eat. Animal manure is composted right along with straw bedding in the spacious, wind-protected pig corral. Both pigs and chickens help this process and reduce pests with their natural tendency to dig and scratch.

Out in the fields, we also got a tour of an extensive water harvesting system and swales that provide moisture to long rows of fruit trees and berry bushes. Melt and rainwater collects at the lowest point of the farm in a dugout. Water is pumped to the highest point on the farm with a solar powered pump. A small pond at the top of the hill holds this transported water. Takota can lower a standing pipe in the pond to direct pond water into a series of swales. These are ditches that follow the contour lines on the hillsides. Water will spread out in the swales and then slowly percolate downhill, feeding the pasture grasses and growing food forest. A direct pipe from the pond also provides enough pressure for some direct irrigation of field crops and gardens closer to the farm buildings.

The Coen family has spent time learning about permaculture and from like-minded farmers, taking risks to experiment and making changes as needed. It was a pleasure learning about how they take pride in growing healthy animals, soil and plants for our benefit. You can learn more about this farm here: www.grassrootsfamilyfarm.ca

For a long list of other fabulous and fascinating Alberta farms that offer direct sales or CSA shares, you can visit http://www.csaalberta.com/

I’ve been fascinated with wild bees for a few years, and I have played around with creating pollinator homes and encouraging others to do the same.
 
This spring, I had a wonderful experience showing my garden club kids at Windsor Park School how to tie together dry sunflower stalks to make bundles and hang them in protected areas for the pollinators. While inspecting some older stick bundles back at home, I found one with two cells, presumably with wild bee larvae. I took this stick to the school and showed the children. A week later, I realized I had forgotten to put that stick with the larvae back in my yard, and it was still in my garden club box when I gathered the children for another session. To our surprise and delight, the bees had just hatched and two tiny, black bees were sitting on the stick and then flew away into the school garden.
 
If you want to make your own stick bundles for pollinators, you will need to save stalks in the fall from sunflowers or perennials that have thick stems. The sticks should be at least 6 inches long, tied together and hung under an overhang, ideally facing east. Wild bees will create cells to lay eggs, provision them with food and then seal them off for protection.
 
The same idea applies to deep holes drilled in wood. You can drill holes in stumps or untreated wood beams. The holes can range in size from 1/8" to 5/16" in diameter, and as deep as the drill bit will allow, but 6 inches would be ideal.
 
Another option is to roll paper around a thin stick and close off one end. Remove the stick, and place bundles of these paper tubes inside a water proof container, then secure it in an east-facing location that is protected from rain.
 
For information on more elaborate pollinator homes, you can visit the Edmonton and Area Land Trust website and download instructions and plans.
 
I have several pollinator homes in my yard, and I also have many kinds of native and non-native flowering plants that provide a source of nectar and pollen for the bees. The combination of flowers, a source of water and wooden homes or stick bundles create the right conditions for pollinators to stick around. The benefit is more beneficial insects and better plant pollination.

Every garden and edible landscape evolves and follows the patterns of succession, a natural change in the biological community over time. As trees and shrubs grow, the amount of light on the ground decreases. The herbaceous layer or ground cover plants may thin out or if they self-seed, the seedlings may pop up in sunnier spaces. More shade-loving species will start to grow more vigorously. The amount of rain and heat is also an important factor in how productive the plants are.

What I love about a natural and edible landscape is the experimentation it allows us to do and the observation, learning and pleasure we derive from interacting with an evolving ecosystem. When you spend some time observing the changes and taking stock of what’s happening in your yard, you can make some interesting discoveries. Here are some things that have captured my interest in my yard this summer.
 
Arctic Beauty Kiwi is Growing Fruit!
I purchased a pot with a male and female kiwi and planted it in a fairly dry spot in almost full sun about 7 years ago. Some sources recommend that it be grown in part shade, in well-drained soil that should not be allowed to completely dry out. My kiwi certainly does not have the benefit of perfect conditions and while it has grown a little bit every year, it’s still only about 4 feet high. It now receives a little bit more shade from spruce trees in the area, and in April the temperature barely dipped below freezing. These conditions were favourable and for the first time, the vine is growing a few kiwis. They are still very small and I don't think there is more than a handful, but it’s exciting to see this exotic fruit develop into a berry-sized treat in our cold climate! Scroll down for a photo.
 
Wild Strawberry Bounty
Another sweet little treat is the wild strawberries that have been producing with abundance this early summer. I dug them up in a quarter of land that was being developed. Over the years, they have spread to cover bare soil, moving to sunnier spots but also doing well under the apple tree and other partially shaded areas. For many years, I rarely saw any fruit, especially in very dry areas. However, in the last couple of years, maybe due to warmer weather in April, I have been able to pick small handfuls of what I call “edible sunshine”.
 
Sea Kale Here to Stay?
Permaculture aficionados love to find unusual edible plants, especially when they are a perennial, reducing the amount of work it takes to plant every year. Sea Kale is an edible perennial listed in “Perennial Vegetables” by Eric Toensmeier and other sources. Many years ago, I met some friendly folks from the Devonian Botanic Garden who were selling seeds, and I was excited to discover sea kale. I planted the seeds but only a couple of them grew. Outdoors, they did not thrive and I lost one to a pest. After moving the remaining plant once, it seemed to be doing better, but the plant was small and I almost forgot about it. However, to my delight, it has almost doubled in size this year! Sea kale is listed in some sources as a Zone 5 or Zone 4 plant. So that’s a bit of a stretch for our gardens, but with a warming climate, we should be able to grow it in Edmonton. My spot in my Edmonton front yard is proving to be pretty good. It receives almost full sun and in winter, the plant is under a pile of snow from the driveway. I have renewed hope that it’s here to stay, and next year I may be able to harvest some leaves in early spring. For more info, visit this online info.

To grow your own sea kale, you can contact a local garden centre to ask if seeds or plants can be ordered in. Apache Seeds had some seeds this spring from Sutton (UK), but you’ll have to put this on the list and make some calls for 2017. If you want to order your own, this Canadian company has it listed.