Spring seems to be having a hard time showing up this year... Despite the clouds and the cold, a few of us gathered this evening to get the garden ready for the season. We cleared the snow fence and tree covers, took down some solar lights and put up sweet pea towers (formerly bean towers) and picked up some weeds and garbage. We also added compost to each of the remaining beds that had not yet been amended. Please spread the compost and work it into the soil of your bed by digging down and turning it under.  This should be done for the beds that we amended last fall, as well as the ones that were just amended today. Also, in some of the beds you will notice that there is some winter rye growing. This is a green compost crop that can be turned under when you are ready to plant your box. It will add nitrogen to your soil. However, please remember some of you may have planted red and white bulbs in the fall, so you may want to wait a bit until you see what is about to come up!

We also gathered all the rocks from around the bean towers and trees and placed them bottom side up on a tarp beside the shed. These will be repainted by grade 9 art students as well as by grade 1 students this year. 

We finished off the evening with some hot coffee and rice krispie squares.
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Hopefully the weather will shape up and spring will be here soon! Even the ladybugs are not ready to wake up!

Tonight we had the spring blessing in the garden, our spring potluck and preseason garden meeting. It was great to see everyone again after the winter months. We first gathered in the garden to talk about our hopes for the coming season, and remembered our first spring blessing 2 years ago, where in the open empty field we symbolically turned over the soil with compost, as a sign of renewal and new things to come for this land. Tonight we used compost again, this time from our very own compost pile, to amend and renew one of the garden beds.

At the potluck I was amazed at all the interesting and wonderful dishes that people brought, it was delicious! Look as one of the creative desserts!

At our meeting we allocated garden plots, signed Garden Contracts and signed up some more Friends of the Garden. 

Welcome to the third season of the Sunshine Garden!

Last fall we discussed the idea of trying to make a Fulton Place Garden Local Brew.  So we decided to grow our own barley (knowing we have various neighbours with hops and honey bees), well, we've finally gotten some malting barley seed, so the project is on!  Our end goal is to have the beer ready for our year end potluck so we can all share in the goodness!

We had a fair amount of difficulty finding an Edmonton supplier for malting barley, but thanks to a retired farmer passing over the Alberta Seed Guide, we found a local seed grower, Galloway Seeds Ltd. by Fort Saskatchewan that had malting barley seed, CDC Copeland variety.

Galloway Seeds was kind enough to donate the seed we needed, so we now have sufficient seed for our community beds and the donated back yard beds.  Thank you very much Jim!

Next steps are to turn the beds, take out any weeds that have started already, seed out the Barley, then watch the barley grow and keep up on weeding and watering to keep them happy. Please drop us an email if you want to get more involved in this project or have any brewing experience you are willing to pass on!

See you all at the pre-season meeting on the 20th, and enjoy the spring season :)
Reminder for the 20th meeting:
5:30 pm is the Spring Blessing in the Garden - led by Rector Jonathan Crane
6:00 pm is the Spring Potluck - all are welcome, bring a friend
7:00 pm is the Pre-Season Garden Meeting - all gardeners must attend