Some garden news!

Well the season of spring will soon be here so it is time to pay attention to new things! It will still be a long time till we are clear of frost here north of Saskatoon, Saskatchewan! For me this is the best of times and the worst of times! On one hand the snow is going and many things will begin to show through the snow. And on the other hand it remains too cold to really get excited about plants and planting. The snow is sinking so there will be the reappearing of earth in days ahead.

It was very sad this week to hear that a favourite Gardening site was closed down. Gardenbuddies was a site I connected on at least 20 years ago but in the last number of years  people had migrated over to Facebook gardening Groups and there was very little activity. I kept posting as I could for the sake of a few of the people who I knew did not do Facebook for whatever reason. A special friend was Roelie from Germany who had an amazing Clematis collection and I even received an embroidered C for my birthday from her one year! I will miss her.

I did find a new to me gardening/small farm Blog site from Bedfordshire, England ,which looks very good and is still posting so that is nice. Slip over to The Garden Smallholder blog!

Here at home, as we are buttoned down by Covid restrictions, I have been working with my collection of seedling Clematis! There are about 75 or so pots of seedlings and several have been blooming now for weeks since Christmas. There have been some to pot up as time has gone on and others to prune or repot or stake or spray for bugs!

One of my discoveries last year was the florist water buckets which are about 12 - 15 liters and are just being sent to recycle. They are excellent for potting up 2 year old seedlings! Most of my seedlings are up to this size and growing beautiful plants under lights. 

Now I am spreading them out into another space as the temperatures get better. It still takes extra heat to keep them from freezing! 

Sadly I have a number of collected seed packets but I did not start any as our property will go back up for sale April 1st and we have no idea where we are going to live yet or what kind of space we will have!

Here is a seedling bud which has me quite curious to see it open. There are more but I will save some for another post!

A walk in the workshop!

 

It's February already!

 The New Year - Happy New Year - just came and went with very pleasant weather and carried us into February! Now the winter has decided to hit hard as we are in the week of strong cold and winds. 

-36 C here has happened several nights! It makes for bone chilling times feeding the birds and checking on my Clematis seedlings in the woodwork shop in the barn!

This was a near the middle of January and the evidence of the big snow in November is still here! Thankfully we have not had to blow snow yet in February as it has been much to cold to run small engines!

We have had some amazing sundogs at the end of January as well! I missed the best part of this set over our house! But I did get the start of another set from out in the country another day!

Nature produces some of the most spectacular sights in winter! As much as the cold is a little tough the older we get it is still one of the purest times of the year!

I was very surprised to have a Plumcot seedling bloom this year in the workshop. This is a Plumcot seed from a store bought fruit and I suspect not hardy here. It is too bad there were no pollinators around to bring pollen from to see if it would produce fruit! This little tree is now nearly 4 years old and must have gotten just the right amount of cold to set flower buds this past fall! The flowers have a mild sweet scent so it could be a nice shrub/tree to have blooming near the house if it were hardy!

I have pruned it to keep the height under control and it has produced many new shoots so I think one could try some cuttings as well!

Winter is also the time to go photo shooting for Snowy Owls so we try to go about once a week or so! This year we are not seeing many on our drives of a regular route we have followed for several years. We have found at least one on nearly every trip! They are majestic to say the least. 

Lighting is a big factor and some days are better than others for sure. This one in the tree was the first time we had one fly away from the power line poles and land in a bluff of trees in full site, although some distance away! We don't have long lenses so there is always some cropping to do to get a little closer look! The photo on the right is one my wife took on another trip.   

Earlier at the beginning of winter we were fortunate on another drive to see several herds of mule deer. There were several big bucks in the one group of about 12 to 15 animals. 

Quite a site when you are just out driving! Again a strange day for the light. I try not to meddle with whatever my camera catches so these are as is!

Finally a few shots from the workshop and the Clematis seedlings growing there.

A new seedling with green to yellow coloring. Waiting to see this one outside!

Clematis crispa seedling.

 

New lighting. 6 LED 4ft. strips. Very nice light!

Update

  My seedlings are moved into the barn! Cold season is here! Here are a few pictures taken in the last month! There are about 70 pots or so to be stored for winter. I will likely try to find a way to keep heat at about +5 to =15 C if I can along with artificial light!

This is a seedling from a hybrid Clematis crispa developed by Deborah Hardwick!

Here is another seedling still blooming. This is from seed is from a Cross Clematis crispa X Gazelle. It is a non climber so far. Produced so many flowers this late summer. I had 11 survivors so that was good for testing for hardiness if I can get them in the ground next year!

This is a very favourite Clematis crispa from the commercial nursery Clearview in British Columbia. The only flower type out of 5 plants like this! Much brighter than the others in the same group grown from cuttings. They obviously have more than one source plant for their cuttings or I got very lucky!

I was very fortunate to get a bunch more florist buckets to transplant more of these seedlings so now to get organized. I really need an all season greenhouse but here it is already showing -11 C nights so stuck here for now!

Summer begins.....

Well the weather has shifted to the summer smell, heat and rain!  For me it began June 27th as I could smell summer on the wind! This is a strange start as we have rain many days and high winds. It is very hard on some plants but everything is growing well! The irises have bloomed out here and daylilies are blooming as well as roses and others.

Along with these are the roadside flowers so I made a little movie about the roadside flowers west of us! Even the roses are variable and unique in many ways!

Of course the rains also bring weeds and extra work! Here are some of the spring flowers!

Spring has sprung and the plants are growing again!

This is just a little picture update about what is happening here north of Saskatoon! Spring really did show up and there was greenery but we had to have a little taste of winter to end. It all melted quickly and no damage was done.

 First a late snow!

 

Still blooming in the shop! Clematis crispa hybrid!

 First birdhouse build this year!

 Out on the Bluebird Trail north of Langham, SK.

 What are you saying? Curlew maybe!

Spring blossoms on single flowering plum!

 Pincherry in full bloom!

The neighbours on the move!

One of my favourite places to visit!

Google Maps

More neighbours!

Caught this hawk coming in from the top corner and did not even see it at the time!

Some more birdhouses!

More next time!