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Perennial Edible Plant Sale:  Same place, same time – Sunday 10am – 2pm at 3295 Compton Road in the East Highlands, Victoria. Feel free to come on out and have a peek around…no purchase required. Beautiful photo of our new sign and Eco-Hut taken by our friend Josh of Integrated Living Landscapes. Their company has been busy designing and planting edible landscapes all over town.

Lots more plants available.  Check out our online plant list with our listed stock and prices.  All prices include GST.  Any plants that have been started by us or repotted have had a mycorrhizal inoculant added.  We also blend all of our own soils here on site.

Ginger shoots coming up beside lemon plant. Example of utilizing micro climates.  No lemon or ginger plants for sale – yet.

Perennial Leek that has been going strong for months. We have planted lots of these. One big leaf goes a long ways in soups, stews, omelettes, and stir fries.

Our special apple tree has been grafted with 4 other types of apples. Lots of bulbs and onions in the guild at the base. Shooting stars in full bloom…and yes, that’s Ann’s finger.

Spreading lingonberry. Sold out for the season. Flowering red current in the background is Ann’s favourite plant. Ann started it from seed about 15 years ago.

Elderberries in the nursery

Dwarf sour cherries – well stocked with 4 types. These have been specially bread to be sweet…don’t be fooled by the name.

Red currents, white currents, and pink currents. Black currents coming in a few weeks.  Spot the duck.

We have 3 types of kiwis; fuzzy, hardy, and arctic

Japanese pepper plant…a beautiful plant with edible leaves as well as spicy little pepper corns.

Hosta’s. Two types…only 4 left of each. Specially selected for edibility.

Crosne. Sweet little juicy crunchy tubers. Very unique ground cover…looks like mint. Small pots for only $5 will get you started. One of the first plants up in the spring.

Echinacea. Purple cone flower. Beautiful and medicinal.

Yarrow…spreading ground cover. Excellent for tea, highly medicinal both internally and externally. Fennel…everyone needs 1 fennel. Sweet yummy leaves for garden nibbles and salads.

Four types of figs for sale: Desert King, Dwarf bush fig, black negrone fig, and Peter’s Honey Fig.

Nodding onion. Native wild flower – beautiful and edible. Excellent in fruit tree guilds to help out compete grasses. Also 2 logan berries left – these berries grow quickly, are prolific, large and sweet, and NO thorns.

A new type of rhubarb. Strawberry rhubarb. Looking forward to trying this type.

We planted out over 100 of these  strawberries as ground cover…hopeful the birds will be so full we will get some too. Both types are ever-berring. We have used them for ground cover and to hold a steep slow together by preventing erosion. $3 per plant (we potted up the bare root plants and they are already growing like crazy)

Post coming soon on Gord’s Rant (with Ann’s edit) on Hierarchy.

Two adjacent properties beside Eco-Sense are going up for sale in the coming weeks.  The first property is so IDEAL for permaculture that we drool over it, complete with very gentle south facing slope of flat land, great solar exposure, no tree removal required, great pond, established veggie garden, and seasonal stream perfect for micro-hydro. Already two chestnut trees 20 years old and producing. Two acres of potential food forest and lots of existing soil. If we had the funds, we would buy it up… could actually make a living doing food production on this rare jewel. The second property, which would be suited for nook and cranny type permaculture – suitable for hazelnuts and apples, chickens etc.

2770 Bukin Dr W
$753,000 BC Assessment. About 5 acres with house. http://evaluebc.bcassessment.ca/Property.aspx

2850 Bukin Dr W
$564,000 BC Assessment: about 2 acres with house. http://evaluebc.bcassessment.ca/Property.aspx

This first piece of land backs up to our land behind our chicken coop…we could visit with a short trail through the forest.
The second property is also adjacent to us and beside the first property and can be reached via a short forest trail.

Map of two adjacent properties soon to hit the market.

We live in a community (The Highlands) where 40% of it’s land base is world class parks and hiking…unbelievable natural beauty and biodiversity. Only 10 minutes from Victoria General hospital, and only 12 minute to the Galloping goose…a walking/biking network of trails for the entire region. Only 15 minute to downtown Victoria, the capital of British Columbia. Our region is home to Canada’s first Green MP (Elizabeth May), and British Columbia’s first Green MLA (Andrew Weaver…nobel prize winning climate scientist). Southern Vancouver Island is surrounded by oceans and located in an area where vegetables can grow YEAR ROUND. Just sayin…
Lets take over the neighbourhood with community and permaculture. Sad to loose our existing neighbours, but hoping to find some more great people.

What a week…first the nursery update and then a few photos from our week.  Sunday open house for perennial edible plants (or just looking around).  10am – 2pm.  3295 Compton Road, East Highlands, Victoria.  Plant list with prices here:

Three weeks ago we were unsure what the nursery would bring … stress from no activity, or stress from selling out ?  Well it seems that it has been very busy, and have sold out of items, and furiously had to re-stock.  In restocking, it means that Gord has had to research and order in plants… by the truck load.  As with all of our new stock, we are planting out two of everything…yup, kind of ark like.

New additions include Evergreen Huckle berry (only one left), 12 foot tall Jujube (Chinese Date) trees, the best and most useful plums including Stanley, Santa Rosa and Methley, Sweet dwarf self fertile Lapins cherry, Morello cherry, edible crab apples (Red Sentinel and Whitney) to cross pollinate all the triploid apple trees, Aronia ‘Viking’ (Aronia melanocarpa), and more tea.

Link for info on Aronia melanocarpa:    Aronia
Link for info on Jujube ziziphous:  Chinese Date

We also were able to find some Toona Sinensis and Japanese pepper trees (Zanthoxylum piperitum).  The pepper tree is beautiful, it smells great and the leaves can be added into salads!

The dwarf sour cherries (Romeo, Juliet, Cupid and Valentine) arrived as well,   Though called a sour cherry due to the genetics, the first three are sweet and Valentine is a pie cherry.  Growing 6-8 feet and all self fertile, they are a nice tree to fit into an urban food forest.

Some good deals this week.

• We had lots of Red “Captivator” jumbo almost thornless Gooseberries arrive… bare root…with massive roots.  Potted up in 3 gal pots.  Very good price at $26.
• Asparagus (sweet purple).  We planted ours yesterday, but our remaining stock NEEDS TO GET PLANTED ASAP.  Only a few bundles of 10 left selling for $15.

Citrus

Our lemons we started here are doing great!   We’ll have home grown from Eco-Sense lemon trees next season.

Grafting trees

It is that time of year and Gord has been grafting stone fruits, pears, apples and cherries.  Due to the early spring, even T bud grafting is happening, rather than having to wait for May or June, the bark is slipping beautifully.

Closing early

If sales continue the way they have the first three weekends, we may have to close before June.  We have had customers from Courtney, Nanaimo, Gabriola, Duncan and Saltspring make the trek to find the items they have not been able to source elsewhere.

Here are a few photos from our week:

Nettle leaf. Finally finished all the drying. Can now be used for tea or soups.

Ginger beer brewing, home made cheese aging on counter, oats and brown rice fermenting on counter.

Gord made a trip to Vancouver to pick up some plants.

creative stacking of plants in our small pickup. worked very well.

Hardy kiwi looking good with leaves coming out. Shades house from hot western sun. Passive cooling.

Winter veggies right out side the front door.

Flowering red current and shooting stars…love the native plants.

Winter veggies…can you say brassica? Mild winter, so we have lots of brassica shoots.

More brassicas and greenhouse in the background.

Spot the fava beans, nettles, garlic, and my leek starts.

Sea kale coming up. Looking forward to feasting on this perennial vegetable for many years to come.

Burbank plum and daffodils. Bulbs or onions/leeks work well around fruit trees.

Eat the weeds…yup kale everywhere. Dandelions are also a favourite. Can eat the flower buds or the open flowers or the leaves. Roots are also good for tea/coffee. Medicinal plant as well.

Another busy and exciting week has passed.  Our days have been full and rewarding with work and visits from friends.  Here are some of the things we have been up to in our life, our 3-Thirds lifestyle, as we prepare for our Sunday open house for Perennial Edible Plants (10am -2pm):

• Potting up bare root shipments of some new food forestry plants.  We also have had great success starting Meyer lemons from cuttings.  Good news as we just sold our last lemon plant.
• For those that have already purchased their blight resistant hazelnuts – LUCKY YOU.  We tried to order some more and there is 2 year waiting list.  Thankfully we still have a few left in stock.
• 

  Gord with an impressive asparagus crown on his head

  Planning on where to plant our 2 asparagus beds (50 crowns for us) and lots of ever-bearing strawberries for ground cover.  We have lots of bare root Sweet Purple Asparagus crowns for sale as our shipment had an extra 100 plants.  $2 each.  Here is an excellent article on planting and growing asparagus.

• Gord spent a great deal of time this week sourcing out replacement stock for the items we have not yet propagated (or are too small to sell).  Holy smokes these plants are hard to find…especially since we are trying to source from Canadian sources.  Importing plants is too expensive with the low Can $, the shipping, duty, and customs.  We have been busy learning all about some new plants too:  Dwarf Bush fig, Strawberry Red Rhubarb, Black Monukka Grape, Peters Honey Fig, Quinal and Tristar strawberries, Sweet Purple Asparagus, and more dwarf sour cherry’s, fuzzy kiwi’s, Arbequina Olives, Gooseberries, etc.  Plant list and prices here:  All prices include GST.
• 

  Gord grafting last year.  Boo is helping.

  Gord wrote two articles for the BC Fruit Tester’s Association, one on Greywater and one on Food Forestry.  Saturday (March 21) is the BC Fruit Testers Association sale at the Saanch Fair Grounds… Gord’s excited to go again this year and will be busy grafting more trees here on Tuesday.

• Our Municipal council meeting this week focused on fire protection in the Highlands.  We spoke about how climate change is predicted to cause longer, hotter, dryer summers, which translates into greater fire risk.
• We are leaving some eggs in the chickens nesting boxes hoping that a chicken will go broody.  Last year the ladies hatched 13 chicks…half were roosters.  The roosters  were very good quality even thought they grow much slower than “meat” birds.  We are hoping to have three batches this year to add hens to our flock and produce healthy well treated roosters for eating.  Seems to make more sense then buying and raising ‘meat birds’. Let nature do what nature does.  Chicken eggs ($5/dozen)
• 

  Our ducks when they were little. Dog TV.

  Sweet Pea and Angie have started laying duck eggs again (as opposed to chicken eggs), after taking the winter off.  We will have 12 duck eggs for sale on sunday.  ($4/half dozen).

• 

  Dried nettle leaf tea.

  We harvested lots of nettles at our neighbours farm.  We were very grateful for this opportunity so as a thank-you we offered our neighbours a gift certificate to our nursery to buy some perennial edible plants.  Ann has been busy drying nettles for tea.  We have two 1/2 pint jars of nettle leaf tea for sale (no big stems).  ($8)

• We pulled 43 ticks out of the dog last week and another 15 last night.  We have a vial of black legged ticks ready to send in to the lab for analysis.  Worst tick year ever.  Poor Boo.  Ann even had a council packaged delivered and when she opened it up there was a tick inside.  Ack!
• 

  Bruising and rolling the tea leaves

  Ann has been REALLY enjoying her home grown and processed black tea. Leaves were bruised, oxidized, fermented and then dried. SO GOOD. Tea plants have been our biggest sellers lately. We currently have 2 types with a third type coming next week.

• We’ve been fermenting all kinds of food.  Gord made some cut off glass bottoms that are perfect to put into the jar to hold down the fermenting veggies under the brine.  This works awesome in both the jar types.
• Sweet potatoes have been very popular so far this year.  We have 4 types for sale.  Just yesterday we heard Brian Minter on the CBC talking about Georgia Jet Sweet Potatoes and how well they can do in our climate.  We have certainly had bumper crops.  Here’s a photo of how I start my slips.  Once they get going I pluck off the shoot with roots and plant in soil.  The slips are $4 each.

And finally, links that we found interesting this past week:
the-surprising-reason-why-some-people-become-environmentalists-and-others-dont/

This video interview as well worth the hour. Brilliant and strait forward. Filmed 10 years ago. It’s unusual to hear such clarity. Many people may not share these opinions at the state of the earth and the human predicament but for those who do…this is a so real. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s-E71lCH6Ow&feature=share

Thanks for reading,

Ann and Gord

A Dry Spell

It has been a long dry spell…both with the weather and our cash flow.

• Our winter has been short, warm and dry.  Welcome to climate chaos.  There’s no snow pack and not much rain and all we can think about is the salmon and the cedars.  Last sunday’s open house at Eco-Sense, it was the trending topic.  There seems to be quite the unease and angst among those people that are paying attention to how fast the climate shit is hitting the fan, locally and globally.  The good news is…it’s raining today.  Short video  to explain the latest in climate science…better sit down for this one.  Or article in the Ecologist here.
• Last fall, starting with our mostly self financed tiny campaign to run for municipal office, and then combined with not earning much income for 3 months, we experienced a significant decrease in our personal cash flow.  So now we are back at it and finding that balance with our 3-thirds lifestyle that most people have heard us speak about.  Last Sunday’s open house for perennial edible plants was EXTREMELY successful both with selling some plants (financial capital) and lots of people just coming by to hang out, chat, and wander around our gardens (social capital).  Gord and I are thinking we might be able to go to the dentist.  woohoo!!!! Emily will likely have to wait another year or two for braces though.    Remember, we are making these choices to live with less money, so please don’t worry about us…our health is excellent…we just need a bit of minor dental work (health capital).

Chicks being raised in JA forest.

Farm Gate Sales of Perennial Edible Plants:  Sunday March 15th from 10am – 2pm.  We have excellent stock and everything is just starting to leaf out.  Our updated plant list is here.  Prices include GST.  Gift certificates also available.  We only take cash, cheque or a bank (email) transfer if arranged ahead of time.  Something not on our list is Jerusalem artichokes which are awesome to plant in your chicken area especially for your young chicks.  We have tubers by the bag full.  See last weeks post to learn more about this permaculture technique for raising young chickens.  Here is an excellent article on why regenerative farming is so important.

Gord in his second home

We have been busy with all kinds of spring activities in the gardens.  Gord has propagated LOTS of plants in the new recycled solarium greenhouse (man cave).   We have also been starting seeds and therefor reducing our requirement to bring in outside plants.  Some of these are ready now, but most of these efforts will pay off next season.

Tea leaves. Camelia sinensis.

We had a big tea plant die due to a rat eating the root.  Sad, but great opportunity to make LOTS of cuttings.  Ann kept all the leaves and has made a fantastic black tea by bruising and mashing the leaves, oxidizing and fermenting, and then drying.  YUMMY!

Roof top garden will have a hoop cover. Right now we have tones of kale here that we have been feasting on ALL WINTER.

We have also been expanding our roof top solar gardens.  Last year we produced lots of squash and water melons up there, but this year we will do even more in this incredibly HOT microclimate.  Yup, we are going to grow turmeric and more melons and MORE squash and sweet potatoes.

Little Eco-Hut surrounded by perennial edible plants.

And finally, a couple days back we did a presentation up in Duncan on Tiny Homes: Ecological and regenerative Design – covering systems, philosophy, and policy.  There is a group in the Duncan area led by Joy Emmanuel that is looking to create a legal tiny home community.  They are looking for land from 5-10 acres cooperatively owned with tiny eco-homes individually owned.  Tiny homes are less than 500 sqft, and can be built out of many different materials or in some cases, even on trailers (although that may be a zoning/building code issue).  If you are interested in learning more about this contact Joy Emmanuel <joye@telus.net>

Another “Want to Be Our Neighbour?” opportunity is fast approaching, not just with our home, but with a neighbour whom is sadly moving.    The home will be listed in two weeks… stay tuned.   Ian will be missed.

Last but not least in this short update is a reminder that spring is fast approaching?  At least the BC Fruit Testers Association spring sale on March 21st has been a sign of such, but with spring here, all the better reason to attend the sale, pick up scion wood, rootstock and plants.   Gord is writing a series of articles for the Cider Press, so read if you dare.  If you have any trees that you wish to have grafted but are not wanting to experiment, Gord can do it for you.

Thanks for reading,

Ann and Gord