This Moment

{This moment} - This moment - an end of week ritual, no words, just a special photo to remember, savour, enjoy. 

Wild Apple Jelly Part 2

The story of our wild apple harvest continues...over the weekend we did in fact make apple jelly and apple sauce - lots of it!   A reader sent me the tip (thank you!) that our unnamed wild apple might in fact be an old Gravensteiner, a type of apple tree that is still commonly found in old orchards though is seldom grown in commercial production due to a short shelf life and variable harvesting period.  I love learning the histories of our food and how it originated, so I did a little more research into the Gravenstein apple.  It turns out the description and photos seem to match - a small apple with sweet tart flavour, lightly yellowish flesh, and red striped skin, that ripens from July-August.  It was used mainly as a cooking apple for sauces and apple cider.  This apple is native to Denmark, found and named in the mid 1600's, although it may well have been brought there from Italy at an earlier time.  In Canada it was brought to Nova Scotia in the early 19th century, and today is still widely grown across the country, mainly on old farmsteads, or in backyards just like the tree we found.  It is considered to be a prized apple, of which was once said "if the Gravenstein could be had throughout the year, no other apple would be needed".  In fact, Slow Food USA has declared it a heritage apple and added it to the Ark of Taste, an international catalogue of heritage foods that are in danger of extinction.  Wow!  This apple jelly will taste all the sweeter, knowing the story of this special apple.

Wild apple harvest - Apple Jelly Part 1

We have said many a time how we can't pass up foraging for wild foods when we come across them.  We were visiting a friend's house today and saw a huge old apple tree, just laden with apples and the ground around covered completely with small semi-ripened mottled apples.  We have our own large old wild apple tree that is ready for harvest later this summer, but we couldn't resist these apples.  Not blemish-free (as no real food should be), but we tasted a few bites, quite tart yet delicious and perfect for a not-to-sweet jelly or applesauce.  There was far too much for one household to use, so we gladly filled our bags with these little apples and started the process of apple jelly making - to be continued tomorrow.  Today we washed, chopped, and cooked the apples, mashed them, and strained the juice through a cheesecloth.  Tomorrow the jelly gets cooked with pectin (Pumona's low sugar variety) and sugar, then processed in clean jars and stacked on the shelf for winter enjoyment.

Fruit Tree Workshop

Thanks to those who braved the rain two weekends ago, and attended our fruit tree workshop.  We started outdoors, but with the heavy cold rain decided to move inside for the second part of the session.  As this resulted in our group spontaneously sitting around our large dining room table, drinking tea to warm up, we had a much more relaxed conversational workshop atmosphere where participants could ask loads of questions about their own fruit trees (as well as berries and grapes, which everyone seemed very eager to learn more about, as we all seem to be trying to grow the whole gamut of what is possible in this climate).

Our facilitator had brought a wide selection of fruit trees - including apple, cherry, kiwi, lime, pomegranate, fig, pineapple guava - and talked about organic methods for helping fruit trees flourish, such as attracting pollinators, planting herbs below the fruit trees (e.g. chives, onions, lavender, garlic, thyme, dill, fennel), planting cover crops such as vetch and clover to help fix nitrogen, proper careful pruning, spraying basics (like horsetail tea, garlic, and seaweed, or neem oil sprays for certian diseases), and then emphasized that prevention is of course the best way to maintain a healthy tree.  The favourite fruits our facilitator likes to grow in this zone are pawpaw, asian pears (disease resistant, prolific fruiting, and long shelf life of fruit); berries (especially elderberries, current and blueberries); and sour cherries.  She also talked about pruning, grafting, and starting trees from cuttings and seed.

She also recommended a nursery near Montreal called Green Barn Nursery, whose focus is to sell "functional trees" with at least one food or environmental use, and who also offer workshops on urban farming and tree crops. 

These past days - herb harvesting, first strawberries!

The humid warm weather and long damp rainy days has led to our earliest strawberries ever!  We've been enjoying them all week already - though our strawberry patches are small, planted as a kind of perennial permaculture-style edible groundcover under our fruit trees, they are abundant this year.  The apples on our old erab apple tree are also quickly ripening, and I shared the first red cherry off our tree with our daughter this morning.  We've also been eating garlic scapes, sorrel, spinach, lettuce greens, wild grape leaves (mmm), and fresh bunching onions from the garden.  Peas are shooting up, wee baby carrots are slivering their way through the soil, and of course copious amounts of wonderful rhubarb has made it's way into crisps, crumbles and cordials.  The herb harvest has begun for this season - including raspberry leaves, nettle, red clover, dandelion root, parsley, chives, oregano, mints, lemon balm, yarrow, feverfew, sage...It's amazing that it's only early June, we've barely planted the seedlings into the ground, and already so much abundance is all around us. It's been a busy stretch as we've reworked our entire garden, adding new raised beds, new mulch for paths, keyhole beds, and redigging and organizing the herb sections!  Whew!

Greenhouse back in action

We posted a request for a power washer a few weeks ago on this blog, and were incredibly grateful to one of our local readers for loaning us one - in exchange for some chickenkeeping advice, and fresh eggs from our hens! What a deal! The greenhouse panels, as well as the interior of the chicken coop, have been given a thorough spring cleaning, and are hospitable again. We can actually get maximum solar gain in the greenhouse again, just in time for seedling season.

It seems like all my seedling photos recently have been basil, but we are certainly growing a lot of basil, amidst everything else! I transplanted 50 basil today and they are having their first night out in the greenhouse, hopefully not in too much shock. It is actually quite warm in there, and the heat of the sunny mid-day (over 35C if the door does not get opened) will probably be worse for the basil at first then the cold evenings. We have two solar-powered fans that run when the sun is out, and help to ventilate the greenhouse a little. Greg likes the synergy of this arrangement - they are small RV fans, hooked directly to the solar panel on our southern exposure barn roof - when the greenhouse is hottest and needs air movement, they will surely be running. Very efficient and convenient.

Here's also a photo of our Chicago Hardy Fig, which is indeed proving to be hardy as it's over-wintered the first year in the greenhouse having been buried in a mound of straw. We've unearthed it, and it's sprouting many new shoots and leaves. We were told we would have our first harvest of figs this second year, and we are eagerly awaiting to see if this will really be the case! Our hazelnut tree, and the pear tree that was damaged last year (by a falling branch), are making amazing comebacks - both in full leaf already. We noticed one of our apple trees is not doing well, no leaves or buds at all, and it may have gotten a blight last year (I remember the leaves withering and falling off, just after apple season but too early for regular fall season). We were planning to plant a few more fruit trees this year anyway, but may have to look at replacing this one too. Sadly, this apple was actually already bearing nice fruit for a few years - it's about seven years old. There's so much more to learn about fruit trees.

Then there is the wild fruit harvest, which we are anticipating again this year. What a joy to discover forgotten gems of berry bushes, abandoned fruit trees, and wild greens all across the city (many in our own neighbourhood). Nettles are ready for harvest, as are dandelion greens of course. Wild leeks have almost come and gone, and soon it's time for other wonderful wild foods like mulberries...

The fig tree!

No figs...yet

This is our Chicago Hardy Fig which we purchased as a small seedling from Richters Herbs back in early spring. Now it's grown to about 4 feet tall and if we can overwinter it in our greenhouse, they say it will bear figs next season! For size comparison see earlier post photos, and here our daughter stands beside the little tree.

All About Fruit Trees Workshop

Today's workshop was so inspiring! Entitled "all about fruit trees" we really did cover a huge range of information about fruit (and nut) trees - including:
* planting (e.g. from seed, from bareroot, from root-burlap ball, from container, from graft, from rooting it ourselves, from cuttings);
* pruning (e.g. when, where, how, what tools to use, how to shape the tree - for example stone fruits like cherries or peach need a more open centre, whereas apple or pear trees have a central leading main branch);
* where to plant; when to plant;
* how to prepare the soil (e.g. adding good compost, planting a cover crop like clover the year before and tilling that in, adding rock dust or just covering the soil around the roots with rocks);
*organic pest & fungal control (e.g. planting lavender under the tree, spraying neem oil under the tree upto the drip line, or spraying the entire tree with kaolin clay).

I think what I was most excited about was the diversity of fruit trees that are possible in our zone - and the encouragement we were given to just experiment, even if it means growing indoors in pots or taking them in for the winter. With patience and care, we can grow many varieties of apricots, peaches, pears, asian pears, quince, apples, crab apples, fig, plum, cherry, also (indoors) persimmon, pomegranate, possibly citrus, many kinds of berries, and also chestnuts, hazelnuts, heartnuts, walnuts. Our facilitator had even grown enough tiny pineapple guava seedling for each participant to take one home. She stressed the importance of healthy soil over the quality of tree, and also emphasized finding hardy varieties for our zone. Resources she mentioned for finding heirloom varieties included Green Barn Farm in Quebec (www.greenbarnnursery.ca), The 2009 Ethnobotanical Catalog of Seeds (www.JLHudsonseeds.net), and Seed Savers Exchange in Iowa (also Seeds of Diversity in Canada). I'm ready to go start some more fruit trees!

KW Urban Harvest (fruit harvest network)

A new website has been launched locally - KW Urban Harvest - a group of volunteers dedicated to caring for and harvesting the vast amounts of forgotten bounty in our urban area. The KW Urban Harvest group is looking for both tree stewards and volunteers, and possibly have someone working on mapping out the trees in our cities. See their website: www.kwurbanharvest.org. Here's their statement:

We are urban dwellers who try to appreciate and share in the bounty of nature. We are learners, researchers, explorers, and harvesters. And we are just beginning. Please join us.

We are looking for tree stewards. If you own land on which a fruit tree or bush grows, we are hoping you will share the harvest. After your tree blossoms, a group of volunteers will come to pick the fruit. The bounty will be shared by thirds between the tree steward (you), the volunteers and a local charity. Please contact us through this website. And thank you for your generosity.

In addition, we are looking for volunteers. If you are interested in joining us for a fun hour of gathering and picking, please contact us through this website. Thank you for your interest in urban fruit harvesting.

Urban Fruit Harvest

As urban homesteaders, with limited growing space on our own property, we can also include wildcrafting, and finding other edible resources or growing spaces that are available around the city to produce what we need. For example, we know of urban farmers who "rent" growing space from neighbours and friends, and produce enough food to feed themselves, run a small CSA, plus fill a market stall each week. They exchange fresh produce for the land to grow on. The possibilities of this are endless, as the city has vast amounts of unused growing space in it's rooftops, parks, private properties, residential front & backyards, school yards, vacant lots, church green space, etc.

Over the past few years we have also been sourcing out wild and forgotten fruit trees and berry bushes around the city. We've found treasures of wild raspberries, mulberries, saskatoon berries, grapes, plus endless pear, cherry and apple varieties with ripe fruit falling to the ground. We've been able to harvest only a small fraction at each location, and supply ourselves with jams, sauces, juice, chutney, wine (mmm, sour cherry wine) and fruit for eating.

Upon reading about Portland, Oregon's "Fruit Tree Project", and Victoria, BC's similar venture organized by "Life Cycles" - we decided we needed to do something likewise. The Fruit Tree Project is an amazing concept where local fruit trees (private and public) which are available for picking are registered on a city map. Volunteer harvesters get to collect 1/3 of what they pick; 1/3 is donated to the homeowner, and the remaining 1/3 goes to the local food bank. The group also hosts harvest parties, and canning/preserving workshops. An astounding concept, building community spirit, tapping into surplus underutilized food resources, providing healthy food to those who may not have access to it, and all for free! I would like to see a fruit tree map in every city. Very inspiring to say the least.

As Kitchener-Waterloo does not yet have a fruit tree map, we took it upon ourselves to put the word out another way and organize the first annual fruit tree project locally. We placed an ad in our local newspaper, saying "we'll pick your fruit - 1/3 goes to homeowner, 1/3 donated, and 1/3 to the volunteer harvesters". So far we've had one great response - a household which boasts cherry, apple and pear trees. We'll be heading over this week Thursday with our ladder and picking baskets, and look forward to what we will find.

Anyone local reading this who wants to join in the fruit harvesting, just send us an email!

Here's the link for the Portland "Fruit Tree Project":
http://www.growing-gardens.org/portland-gardening-resources/fruit-tree-project.php

Here's the link for the Life Cycles "Fruit Tree Project":
http://www.lifecyclesproject.ca/initiatives/fruit_tree/