Our fruitful fig

Some of you reading here will remember the purchase we made last spring (2009) of a Chicago Hardy Fig.  We bought this tiny seedling from Richters Herbs, and were told we were guarunteed to see it bearing fruit by the second season.  True to their word, this summer our fig has been sprouting numerous fruits, and this past week the first ones finally ripened to a deep gorgeous purple skin, and were soft and sweet enough to eat!  I've never had a fresh fig before, given that they are not a common tree in these parts of North America.  Dried figs are already a delicacy in my books, but fresh ones are a whole other story!  Granted, we didn't have enough to make fig jam or preserves for the winter, but we have savoured every little bite.  Hopefully our fig will survive another winter, buried under mounds of straw in our greenhouse, and we'll see another crop of fresh beautiful figs next season.

Lovely fig tree

Our Chicago Hardy Fig is bearing fruit!  We can't believe the gorgeous figs sprouting all over the little lovely tree, and hopefully, if the squirrels don't discover them, we'll be enjoying fresh figs in a few weeks!  This was the tree we bought as a wee seedling from Richters Herbs last spring (it's now about 4 feet tall).

* Note about the fig tree - we wrote about this tree last year and talked about how to care for it during the winter months.  To recap, these trees are not winter hardy outdoors - they lose all they leaves in the fall and need to be brought indoors, in our case into the greenhouse, and covered with a thick layer of straw mulch until spring.  

Herbs planted, flowers, and more to grow!

Someone had requested a list of herbs that I've started from seed indoors in mid-February, so here it is. So far, I've planted flats of rosemary, lavender, sage, thyme, mint, lemon balm, basil, chamomile, bergamot, oregano, hyssop which will all be growing under lights until they are strong enough to head out to our unheated greenhouse in early April. I think I may have overdone the herbs this year, and hope by the time we transplant all of them into larger containers, that we still have enough space for our hordes of tomatoes and other vegetables...ahh, the bane of the urban farmer, never enough growing space to get all the starts going.

I also have some rosehips saved from two massive wild rose bushes that came up as volunteer plants in our yard, and I hope to germinate a few of these as well. I was so pleased to see wild rose finding ideal soil conditions here and just choosing to root and grow, as rosehips are such a rich source of vitamin C when made into a tea during the winter months. What a fortunate resource to have right here on site! It amazes me how seeds know their time and place to germinate - the same happened with a small patch of red trillium, as well as bloodroot, which just came up unexpectedly and unannounced, in a woodland area of our yard. Beautiful, and auspicious!

Back to herbs for this year - parsley, dill, coriander, fennel, and calendula don't need the long germination period, and will be started from seed later in March, as well more varieties of basil (lemon, thai, purple), and some flowers that can be transplanted (e.g. marigolds, lupines). Most of the flowers I grow (for cut flowers) are just direct seeded (e.g. sunflowers, cosmos, zinnias, snapdragons). I already have loads of echinacea, black-eyed susan/rudbeckia, hollyhocks, red & white yarrow, New England asters, some sweet william, baby's breath, and shasta daisies (and of course goldenrod, and our sweet old-fashioned lilac bush, plus enough forsythia around the neighbourhood to glean bouquets from in the spring!) in our yard, which continue to come up abundantly each year and are beautiful as cut flowers. I love flowers, but have not focussed on them too much in the past because many of these tend not to be perennial or native. However, flower bouquets are so lovely in the house and for our B&B rooms, and who is to say annual sunflowers can't be mixed with perennial wild lupines anyway?

I'll be planting successive rounds of more genovese basil so that I have a constant crop for fresh pesto throughout the growing season. One new herb I'm planning to try growing fenugreek this year, though it will surely just be an annual in our cold climate.

I placed my annual herb order from Richters Herbs last week. This year it included a flat of alpine strawberries that fruit all season long, Russian sage, white sage, stevia (to use an herbal sugar replacement), lemongrass, and some other medicinal herbs which I don't have seeds for starting myself.

Start your seedlings - planting guide

It's mid February, and that means time to start planting seeds that need a long germination (like many herbs), reorganizing the greenhouse, cleaning trays, buying more starter soil, and also planning out the garden.

I have had requests again, to re-post the seedling starting guide which we posted here before. I have compiled this information from several books - including The Organic Growers Complete Guide to Vegetables and Fruits, by Rodale; The Harrowsmith Northern Gardener, by Jennifer Bennett, and Eliot Coleman's books. There is also lots of useful information (and gorgeous botanical photography!) on the You Grow Girl website, plus their simple but handy planting guide here: http://www.yougrowgirl.com/grow/seedstart_chart.pdf

Here is the planting guide we use, based on our frost-free date being May 24 (for our Zone 5 here in southern Ontario).

A quick note on starting herb seedlings. Most perennial herbs, for example, culinary herbs like lavender, thyme, sage, rosemary, lemon balm, oregano, parsley, hyssop, marjoram, winter savory, and most other medicinal herbs, take a long time to germinate. These tiny seeds need patience - often taking 6-8 weeks just to germinate and then many more weeks before they are ready to plant out. These should be started now, mid February. Of course, once you have these herbs in your garden the perennial ones will not need to be started again - and many herbs can also be propogated by cuttings or division in the spring or summer (like oregano). Since herbs can be time consuming and sometimes difficult to start from seed, there are good herb suppliers like Richters Herbs in Goodwood, Ontario, where you can mail order seedlings in early spring. Richters has a huge assortment of herbs - annual and perennials, plus interesting heirloom vegetables, greens, flowers and also even some berries/fruit - we purchased our Chicago Hardy Fig tree from Richters last year and hope to have figs to harvest from it this year!

Annual herbs, like basil varieties, chives and cilantro, don't take nearly as long to get started. Basil is started around the same time as tomatoes, and although dill and cilantro can be transplanted, they grow quickly and can simply be planted directly in the warm garden soil several times over the growing season.

PLANTING GUIDE (based on frost-free date of May 24):
FEBRUARY (the greens listed here can continue to be planted throughout the growing season of course)

Start lettuce, chard, other greens in greenhouse or in flats indoors (to be planted out to greenhouse). Start selected medicinal and culinary herbs by middle of February. Some take 6-8 weeks to germinate!

10 WEEKS TO LAST FROST (aprox. March 15)
Start seeds of celery, eggplant, leeks, onion, pepper and flowers like impatiens, lobelia, verbena and perennials indoors.

8 WEEKS TO LAST FROST (aprox. March 29)
Start seeds of early head lettuce and flowers like begonia, coleus, nicotiana, petunia and salvia indoors.

7 WEEKS TO LAST FROST (aprox. April 5)
Start seeds of tomatoes, hot peppers, and early basil indoors.

6 WEEKS TO LAST FROST(aprox. April 12)
Start seeds of early left lettuce, early cabbages including cauliflower, broccoli, brussels sprouts, kohlrabi and kale, and small seeded annuals indoors. DIRECT SEED broad beans, carrots, peas, spinach, leaf lettuce, turnips, dill, parsley, and hardy flowers such as alyssum, candytuft, pansies, poppies, snapdragons, stocks, sunflowers and sweet peas. Plant onion sets or transplant onion seedlings outdoors.

4 WEEKS TO LAST FROST (aprox. April 26)
Start melon seeds indoors. If desired, start seeds of late basil, cucumber, squash, pumpkin, large-seeded annuals, and flowering vines indoors in peat pots. DIRECT SEED radishes, beets, cabbages, chard, head lettuce, and flowers such as godetia, hollyhock, and mallow. Plant potato eyes and transplant seedlings of early cabbages, except cauliflower.

2 WEEKS TO LAST FROST (aprox. May 10)
DIRECT SEED corn, tender bulbs such as glads, and annual vines such as morning glory. Transplant early lettuce seedlings.

WEEK OF LAST FROST (aprox. May 17-24)
Around the last frost date you can finally direct seed beans, cauliflower, cucumber, squashes, heat-loving flowers such as zinnias, marigold, and lavatera. Transplant your tomaotes. If you've got them, transplant cauliflower, squash and cucumber seedlings.

1-2 WEEKS AFTER FROST (aprox. May 31-June 7)
Wait for a couple of weeks after the last frost before direct seedling lima benas, soybeans, melons and herbs such as basil, summer savory and sweet marjoram. Transplant celery, melon, peppers, eggplant seedlings when the night temperatures stay well above 10 degrees C. Plant sweet potato slips. Start second crop of kale seedlings, and reseed spinach and peas for second crop.

Hardy Chicago Fig Tree arrives!

We received a long-awaited parcel in the mail today...plants from Richters Herbs. It's planting day tomorrow!

Various plants we had ordered from Richters Herbs (www.richters.com - near Goodwood, Ontario), included a wide selection of mints for my new mint tasting garden (apple mint, chocolate mint, ginger mint, and more), alpine strawberries (a ground cover that's going in our front yard and is said to bear the sweetest tiny berries, and be cold weather hardy), intensely fragrant creeping thyme for the front yard, and the most dearly awaited, our new Hardy Chicago Fig tree! We continue to expand our fruit & nut tree selection for this urban homestead, in the hopes that one day we, or future owners, will have an abundant harvest enough to last through the winter months. We have several apples, pears, an Italian blue plum, three cherries, a hazelnut, of course the black walnuts, and now this fig.

When we read about the Hardy Chicago Fig (ficus carica) we knew we needed to plant at least one. The fruits are described as a gorgeous brown-purple with a luscious strawberry-sweet flesh. The thought of eating local figs, let alone growing them in our own yard, was so tantalizing. Eating our own organically grown sun-ripened figs straight off the tree in late summer or savouring carefully dried figs with wine, honey and cheese in the winter, while we cozy up next to the woodstove. Mmmm, what a treat!

The Hardy Chicago Fig is one of the best for flavour and hardiness. It was said to have been brought to Chicago by Sicilians from Mount Etna many years ago, and has been grown in Chicago and elsewhere by dedicated fig fans ever since. Many people assume it can't be grown in North America, but with protection it can grow well as low as Zone 4. It is a perennial in Zones 8-11. It is hardly a tree, and can also be grown easily indoors, in an apartment or house, or in a container outdoors (and either protected for the winter, or taken indoors). We plan to grow ours in a container outside and then take it into the greenhouse over the winter months where it will be more sheltered, but hopefully not die back as much as it would if left outdoors. We have read accounts of fig harvests in the second year, and massive harvests by the fifth or sixth season. These trees can bear abundant fruit for upto 30 years if taken care of properly, so definitely worth the investment. This small 1-year old seedling cost us about $7.

By the way, there is a lot of information on the internet regarding care of the Hardy Chicago Fig (people LOVE this fig tree!). Garden Web also has useful posts on their "Fig Forum" discussion forum (www.gardenweb.com).