This past spring, I planted three herbs–basil, cilantro and mint–imagining the fresh flavours in my meals all season long. However, in the last few weeks, they've all grown flowers on top. My poor cilantro completely fell over from the weight and my basil just doesn't seem as bushy or yummy-looking. Sigh. My herb-infused culinary creations will have to wait until I figure out if they're still edible. Furthermore, can I cut back the flowers without damaging the plants?
Here's what Anne Marie had to say about the fate of the most fragrant end of my garden.
Some herbs are still quite useable even after they start to flower but others get too strong or woodier once this takes place. For most, frequent harvesting make the plants bushier and produce more harvestable stems.
Mint is usable before and after it flowers. In fact, mint can be collected and dried as the flowers begin to open. Young, tender stems before flowering are better than the older, woodier, bitter stems. Use the leaves dried or fresh.
Basil should be used when young before it goes to flower. You can stall the flowering by pinching out the flower buds whenever you see them. This will help create a bushier plant and promote more side growth. Basil stops producing nice leafy growth when it flowers. It is best to use fresh basil or cut it for drying up until just before the flowers open.
Cilantro should be harvested before the plant goes into flower. I don't know of any way to delay this from happening. It usually starts flowering once the weather gets hot. Or let it flower and harvest the seeds as coriander in late summer.
Ok, better luck next year with my basil and maybe I'll whip outside tomorrow and see about collecting my own coriander. That sounds promising.
But will my edible plants make it through the winter? Stay tuned!
For a great deal of the summer, I haven't had to worry about watering. In fact, my yard was becoming downright soggy. I think I spied moss behind the barbecue!
Relaxing on the train back to Edmonton, I think back over our journey (and am comfortable now with the train’s rhythm, which, due to the reality of being shunted aside by freight trains from time to time, seems less schedule-driven than destination-based). No matter. I’ve been sitting in the catbird’s seat, leisurely gazing at the beauty that is Canada–by turns rugged, gentle-looking, majestic and surprising, and always, always inspiring; it makes my heart swell with pride.
Another beautiful day in paradise. For breakfast, Carol, Shannon and I yum up some delicious spicy sausage rolls from the local bakery, washed down with lattes, then set off to visit four private gardens. They’re very different from one another–one is stuffed full of colourful annuals, another focuses on native plants, a third has charming vignettes and pretty corners galore and the final one is very shady–offering ample proof (as if I needed it) that you can create really lovely spaces even in a place with a really short growing season. Afterwards, we head for the famed Jasper Park Lodge to have a look around its stunning grounds. Talk about picture-postcard perfect.
I planted a few different peppers this past spring, but this little orange and black critter seemed only to have eyes (or fangs) for my tomatillo plant. I tried the soap and water method and I even picked some off and squished them myself, but the next day there was always one of their friends munching away at the leaves.
Three years ago I bought a cute little bungalow (I like to refer to it as a cottage) with a pretty decent front and backyard–my own little paradise in the city. Since we moved in winter, my first summer was a game of waiting to see what sprouted up–and then trying to figure out if it was plant or weed. What a learning experience it has been–and sometimes an overwhelming one–as I often look around my yard trying to figure out what area needs my TLC first! I've discovered that puttering around in my garden is so calming and a nice retreat from my busy life–when my busy life (and the weather) don't interrupt my plans to garden! Though I wistfully aspire to perfection, I am comfortable with the fact that my gardens are a work in progress–they inspire me to learn more about gardening techniques and plants–and how not to kill them.
The town of Jasper is adorable–a small, sweet, neighbourly sort of place, with just two short main shopping streets that run parallel to each other, set in an immense and unspoiled national park. We disembark at the well-preserved and tasteful old railway station, and look around at the pretty buildings–a number of them lovingly restored–in their soft, natural colour palettes. The town has kept the architecture on the down-low (no highrises, and the very few fast-food joints are discreetly clustered together at one end) in order to let the stunning natural beauty of the setting take centre stage, and does it ever. I half-expect to see a young Julie Andrews whirling down a mountainside, singing “High On the Hill Was a Lonely Goatherd.” So I hum a few bars of it and do a little limbering-up yodel to get into the mountain mood (my travelling mantra, which allows me to great leeway for making a fool of myself, has always been “they’ll never see me again…”).
Heading toward Jasper, the mountains sneak up on us. Flat, flattish, less flat then foothills. The train flashes past deep gorges and gleaming, silvery lakes, my view is intermittently obscured by groves of trees, by hillocks and berms and rusty red freight trains. And then we round another corner and pow! There they are: The Rockies.
I'd just scarfed down my blueberry breakfast pancakes as the train pulled into Edmonton station, an out-of-the-way outpost with nary a restaurant or shop nearby (apparently, some brain trust decided to move it from town to the boonies). Ordinarily, this would have meant a hefty cab ride in, but John Helder, Principal of Horticulture, Edmonton Community Services, kindly picked us up.
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