what I'm growing: Sunflowers

I am by no means a 'master gardener' but I do have a passion for growing fruits, vegetables and flowers here on our farm. Every Spring, the excitement builds as I begin planting seeds on my potting bench and watch them turn into seedlings, then plants to pot out in the garden for a late summer harvest that will feed our family and beautify our home.

A favourite annual of many gardeners is of course non other than the simple yet beautiful sunflower. It is a classic annual in the garden..it's big, it's bold and it truly is so easy to grow!

Last year I grew a sunflower patch in my garden that yielded 9' tall plants. I loved walking through there in the morning light as it made me feel so humbled and small. It always amazes me what can grow from a tiny little seed! Did you know the tallest sunflower on record is currently at 27'?! I would have LOVED to have seen that! 

What is great about sunflowers is that they come in every size, perfect for every kind of garden whether that be a small plot, a container garden or a large field. There are dwarf sunflowers, doubles and they even come in a wide range of colours (Velvet Queen might be my favourite coloured sunflower - a dark, velvet-like shade of red)

During the summer months, sunflowers not only bring beauty to your garden, they also attract beneficial "friends" such as butterflies and bees. Of course attracting bees to your vegetable plot is a must to help pollination and as a gardener, you can't help but attract as many pollinators as possible! As a child I used to be afraid of buzzing bees in the garden but now I realize how beneficial they are and love hearing them work tirelessly collecting nectar. Wasps on the other hand...don't get me started!

Helianthus Annuus is native to North America and has been grown as a crop for some 5,000 years. At first, the plant only caught on in a modest way but so much has changed. Canada alone is a huge producer of sunflower oil and in many regions of our country you can see fields of golden sunflowers stretching as far as the eye can see from July thru to September. 

Did you know that sunflowers are called as such not because they're shaped much like a sunburst but because the flower buds actually follow the sun? Turning East in the morning, to the South by noon and to the West by late afternoon. Once the flower starts to open, however, this "daily spin", stops and at maturity, most sunflowers will face Southeast.

When it comes to sowing these beauties, there are many different approaches (go with whatever works best for you!). Most often I recommend sowing the seeds 1" apart and 1" deep in well drained soil. Once the seeds begin sprouting, thin them down to about 2' for small/medium plants or 3' for tall, single-stemmed varieties. Full sun is best (obviously) and adding a bit of compost at planting time and watering in droughts is generally the only care you need to give them while they grow. If however you are looking for a prize winning bloom, feed them constantly and never let their roots dry out completely. 

While I have grown sunflowers indoors for fun, I don't recommend doing this as sunflowers do not like any root disturbance while growing. The plants themselves grow rapidly but the flowers will not begin to bloom til mid-summer. If you are looking to have some for cut flowers, I recommend harvesting when the first few "petals" appear. Otherwise just leave them to do their thing in the garden.

I often will leave a few seed heads over the winter to help feed the birds that stay in our yard (we had quite a few this winter!!) but then chop them down in early Spring and resow them. However, oftentimes the seed heads will drop their seeds on their own and new flowers will start popping up in late May to early June!

Something I just learned last summer myself and I feel it's worth sharing is that sunflowers are allelopathic: their roots give off toxic properties that either prevent nearby plants from germinating or stunt their growth. This was proven to me when I planted a few varieties in my new zinnia bed. Every seed planted within 18" of the sunflowers never came up!! Lesson learned..

There are so many varieties of sunflowers out there for you to try and grow. Many hybrids offered are pollen free for cut flower use (florists) and their most attractive feature is that pollen won't fall (and stain your table setting, clothing etc) However the major disadvantage of this is that they produce far less seeds (some don't produce any!) therefore I like to plant a vast variety in my yard. 

This year I will be growing at least 10 different varieties of sunflowers. My favourites at the moment are:

- Teddy Bear: a dwarf sunflower that produces fully double golden yellow plants

- Ring of Fire: this is a nod to my husband and his admiration of the "man in black", Mr Johnny Cash. It is a very different sunflower, a 5" pollen-less flower with bi-coloured petals

- Lemon Eclair: I am so excited for this new flower to begin producing in my garden this year! It is a delicious lemon coloured sunflower with a chocolate brown centre. Long, cactus like outer petals are grounded by a fluffy centre..very excited!!

- finally, I am also planting Vanilla Ice this Summer in my front flower beds to add height and also to use in flower arrangements for our farmhouse

So there you have it. My first edition of "what I am growing" in 2015. I hope you learned something new about these garden classics and I hope I have inspired you to throw a few of these seeds in your own gardens in 2015!! Happy planting everyone!

the weekend lens

we arrived home on the farm Friday evening and I can't even explain to you how comforting it felt to pull into our yard. My dogs were happily barking and chasing our truck and I understood then how much this farm means to me. this weekend we were blessed with beautiful Spring-like weather, to which we played outside as much as we could. playing with our flock of chickens, cleaning up our yard from winter, swinging off the old tree, cooking meals on the bbq and getting my hands in the dirt to begin seeds again for this summers garden. the birds are happily chirping, the snow has almost disappeared (for now, at least) and our farm smells of musty earth and wet grass..I find myself looking for robins and meadowlarks..knowing that this could all too soon leave us for another wintry spell. but for now..I'm soaking up this sunny Spring weather. here's a look at our weekend thru my lens..

Garden Book Review: Groundbreaking Food Gardens

Yesterday, I opened every window at our farmhouse and let the warm breeze inspire me to start thinking about my 2015 garden. I wandered thru our farm in my Hunter wellies and caught myself thinking it was actually April! But since it isn't, I did the next best thing...I ordered seeds from my 2015 catalogues and I started rereading my favourite gardening book of 2014: 

Groundbreaking Food Gardens

this book is truly worth the cost and covers every type of food garden you could possibly imagine. Have a small patio but want to grow some food yourself? This book has you covered. Want to preserve your Summer harvest? This book has you covered. It gives you 73 plans for every type of garden you could ever want. Heirlooms, potagers, gardening with chickens, herb gardens..the list goes on!

I read about this book before it came out while reading a 2013 issue of Canadian Gardening. The author of the book, Niki Jabbour is Canadian (but don't let that stop you if you are American!) and she has garden plans for every type of garden. I personally love the illustrations to give you a better idea of the setup she had envisioned when creating all of the garden plans..

In this book, every garden plan is its own "chapter". I use that word lightly of course because it covers 73 plans and is 262 pages in total (basically 3-4 pages per plan) but you get a summary of what that "chapter" entails, tips and thoughts on each garden plan and illustration (as above) as well as a detailed planting list as well as a detailed illustrated garden plan broken down into sections.

My personal favourite chapters are: Culinary Herbs for Beginners, Eggs & Everything, Backyard Orchard, Canners Garden, Vintage Victory Garden, Vertical Vegetables and even a Cocktail Garden (!!)

So if you are in the mood for a new gardening book to inspire you this growing season..I highly recommend Groundbreaking Food Gardens!!

plans for preserving the harvest - 2015

I have been thinking a lot lately about the direction I would Iike to see this blog take in the future. I know I haven't been the best at keeping this space updated these last couple of years but oh how I love this place. Taking a quiet moment out from our busy life here on the farm to write and update has always felt so special to me and I cannot tell you how immensely passionate I am for this life I live out here in the country! Reading a new comment or hearing from readers always makes my day and I want to continue to inspire and share with you all as life continues here at Cosgrove Farms!

My hopes is to have the farmgirl diaries be a hub of farmlife inspiration for you. Whether it be posts about farm life in general, farming operations, the farmhouse, the farm garden, recipes and canning and of course the farms feathered and furry creatures! I would love to hear from you about what you would like to read about more often or even learn!!

This year I really want to preserve more of my own harvest here from the farm garden. I have been going through all of the new seed catalogues with excitement and planning up new plans for a new garden space (more on that soon!) and have been reading through all of the canning cookbooks I purchased in the last few years but have yet to actually preserve from. Then I thought well maybe I could blog about canning as well! But then I was feeling silly thinking, "well how can I write blog posts about canning when I barely put up much of my own?" Sure I make dill pickles every year and my homemade raspberry jam last Summer is still causing cravings..but what about preserving the rest of the harvest? So here's the deal. This year I am going to learn everything I can about putting up the garden..and I am going to share it all with you right here on the blog. Every failure and success..and hopefully there will be more success than not but hey, we've just got to start, right?

So last night I went through my books and marked out my favourite recipes using produce I know we will enjoy. I am not wasting my time on preserving things we won't eat..ain't nobody got time for that!! But what we do have time for are things like: dilly beans, pickled asparagus, vanilla-rhubarb jam with earl grey (!!), salsa, boozy canned peaches, pickled beets, tomato sauce, tomato juice..ack I am so excited!! Below are the cookbooks I will be preserving from (as seen above as well)

Personally, my favourite books are Canning for a new Generation and Food in Jars

My list above of things I will be attempting to make this Summer are recipes found in either of these.

I can't even tell you how excited I am for this year..so many exciting things planned for the horizon!!

Garden Cleanup

This past weekend I took to cleaning up my vegetable garden as well as cut down most annuals that I had lost in last weeks frost. The weekend weather was absolutely gorgeous..yet another reason why I love Fall the way I do. Its warm but not overly so and the light..oh the gorgeous Autumn light..I could hope for Fall all year long except I think I'd rather miss the anticipation of it more so ;)

Normally I feel sadness when pulling out all my vegetables but, as you know, this year was definitely not normal. Slow growing, poor soil and mosquitoes..oh the friggin mosquitoes!! How they haven't died yet with the frosts is beyond me but this week they are absolutely terrible! Bring on the frost again Mother Nature..those bugs have got to go! Anyways, I put my music on, wore my wellies and got to work! Pulling, cutting and tossing into the compost pile (I started composting this year, did I tell you that? I feel like an all star now..haha) and all I could feel was excitement. Excitement for my plans for this space. Excitement for the chicken coop that will be built in here this Winter to share the space with my vegetables (just typing that makes me excited. Nerdy, I know..but hey..I love it!) I could visualize while I pulled out the rows where my beds would be next year, what I would plant and how it would look in 5 years when I really get this place roaring ;)

Still, I do not regret planting my garden this year (why would I?) Of course, I did it for the wrong intentions (who says I can't do it all? Why can't I be a new mom with a baby and take on a brand new 1 acre yard along with a 3,000 sq ft garden that has never grown a thing before?) But, it kept me on my toes, I learned its soil, I learned about its light and how things will grow in there, I learned about the weeds and how to control them, I sometimes just stood in there to get away from everything else going on, even for just 5 minutes and, let me tell you, it was all worth it. Growing your own food is always a good idea. Sure, you don't need a huge garden like I have..just some dirt and a pot and you will never, ever regret planting a seed.

One thing that made me laugh this year were my pumpkins. Normally by September my vines are full of yellow/orange globes of goodness..the good 'ol jack o lanterns for our carving fun in October. But this year? I don't even know what happened..they just kind of..snailed along! 2 weeks ago my vines were still covered in blooms!! I knew I wouldn't get a single decent pumpkin out of my patch this year..as a matter of fact, this is the largest pumpkin I grew in 2014

Its so small and cute..makes me smile

All in all, I am glad the work is done now for another year. We still have lots to do in there this Fall with soil prep for next Spring (we want to level the ground, bring in new soil, possibly create raised beds and of course, prep the area where the chicken coop will be going in the West of the garden)

Not all was lost though, I grew plenty of beans, carrots, potatoes, onions and corn to supply us with numerous meals this coming Winter..

and I even grew a zucchini! You know you have poor soil when you grow just one of these guys

and I left most of my sunflowers for now because their cheery yellow faces just feel even more so in Autumn. Plus, I wanted to give these little guys as much pollen as they could get while the weather is still warm

Happy Wednesday everyone! Hope you are having a great week so far!!

Farewell Summer

The last couple of days have been quite a startling change from the heat of Summer we had been experiencing. The rains came, once again, and with them brought wind and even a light dusting of snow! Snow is September isn't exactly new to us Canadians but, it has been a while. I was so hoping for a long, warm Autumn for us..maybe things will turn around but right now, its hard to tell! We are only 1/2 way through our harvest (yikes!) and it keeps raining on us every week..silver lining of course is the moisture will be good for our 2015 crop. But first things first..lets get 2014's over with ;)

Yesterday morning I woke up to this:

It quickly melted but of course I had to run out and snap a shot of it to add to this week's Project Life spread ;)

Then this morning, we woke up to this:

Yup, all my beautiful flowers..all my vegetables that weren't salvaged before the frost...gone

As excited as I am for Autumn, it pains me to see all this beauty fade so quickly and die. I haven't loved my garden this year as much as I should have. finding garter snakes in your beds unexpectedly will do that to you. But, I did love going outside and being greeted by all the beautiful colours that nature provided me with. Every seed I planted, every bulb I dug..everything is gone again for another year.

And now all that is left to do is to pull everything up, compost what I can, store the bulbs, save some seeds and say goodbye to these beautiful sights til next year when they can all begin again. Even though it barely seemed like we had a Summer (late, wet Spring) I think the plants as well as ourselves are almost looking forward to a nice, relaxing Winter.

My 2014 Garden

You guys, this year my garden has been a true labor of love. Having a small baby, taking on a new/huge yard, creating a vegetable garden in a patch of dirt that has never grown a thing (= very poor soil) and a brutal hail storm meant the odds were against me in ever growing something I was proud of. Every day I would go out and wander my rows and be heartbroken over how slowly everything was growing and how quickly the weeds were taking over. My attempts to weed were often thwarted by a baby who needed me or chores that beckoned elsewhere and, before I knew it, my garden felt lost in a sea of portulaca and dandelions. I felt completely trumped by Mother Nature.

Then one morning, as I was taking out my compost, I caught a glimmer of my garden growing into the one I had envisioned last Winter when it was covered in a blanket of snow. The way the sunlight shone thru the trees, the way the birds sang all around me..it made me hopeful. And then a terrible hail storm came and pummelled my poor little veggies. Sunflowers were shredded in half, pumpkins were left with golf ball sizes holes, berries were demolished...and so was my hope for a producing year in our garden. But, I kept watering, weeding, staking and hoping. And now, I go out and am blown away with how its still growing, still blooming, still producing.

This morning I walked out there just as the sun was rising and I knew I had to capture my garden, weeds and all. Sure, most leaves have been shredded and most things aren't perfect..but its beautiful to me that, although it has had EVERYTHING against it, its still standing..still growing..still beautiful. (its amazing what a garden can teach you about life, no?)

Enjoy!!

My 7ft tall sunflower "forrest"

These photos just make me smile from ear to ear!

and, of course..my beautiful zinnias