I'm a novice in Maple Ridge but I've had success with: carrots, corn, cucumbers, peas, beans, spinach. I use 4x4 raised beds. The main issue I have is knowing when to plant. Seed packages say really helpful things like Late Spring, or Early Summer. I need something like February 15th: plant peas. April 25th: plant corn. Does anyone have a tried and true list of planting times? I'll pretty much stick with the basic set of crops listed above, but I would like to add beets to the list. The peas planted Feb 15th do well for me, but that's all I've got.
best thing you can do is pick up a west coast seed catalogue. in the front few pages and throughot the booklet ther are hints for the west coast gardener. it should be available in your area it should be seen as a guideline as your garden will be different from those in the north shore
I'm in the same situation. Down in the States they have something called the Extension Service and they publish very detailed information for vegetable gardeners. Have a look at this PDF: http://muextension.missouri.edu/explorepdf/agguides/hort/g06201.pdf I don't know if we have the same thing for Vancouver and the Lower Mainland but if anyone knows, please post!
This is a good website for timing veggies in the Pacific Northwest-http://www.westsidegardener.com/quick/timetable.html.
Just in case there are some who could use a planting calendar, I've located an amazing one: http://bioarray.us/Skippy's planting calendar.html and you can get your frost date here:http://www.almanac.com/garden/frostcanada.php. Good luck with your garden!
These are great for ideas about gardening, but you can plant sooner with mini greenhouses, cold boxes, etc. Plant protection for nights or whenever plant tolerations are minimized. Remember, every climate has microclimates. No book or source will be exact. Learn and document. Understand the sun location, heat averages, and minimal heat and light needed for each to grow. Study your area and grow accordingly.
West Coast Seeds new Coastal BC planting guide. http://www.westcoastseeds.com/admin/files/2011PlantingChart.pdf
Remember that the world is warming. I now plant most things exactly three weeks earlier than I planted them, in the same yard, 30 years ago.
soccerdad; Do you find the mentioned planting guide to be useful? (West coast seeds - Coastal planting guide)
West Coast Seeds is the best place for suggested veggie planting times for me. I get the dates from the individual varietes I am going to plant, enter them on a spreadsheet in red, then change each entry to blue once done. I also track the actual date sown/planted out since in gardening as in war "No battle plan survives contact with the enemy". I will be starting to plan after new year. Last year was frusrating, with me planting things twice & seeds rotting in the cold & damp. Will 2012 be similar? My New years resolution? I am NOT going to grow Brussel Sprouts. I have tried for years & get thwarted by one darn thing after another. Last year it was cabbage root fly, previously un-noticed by me in my garden, that whacked all my brassicas....Oh, and my inclination to apply too much chicken manure.
Brussels sprouts are just insect homes in my garden too. As for planting veggies, West Coast's guide is a good start. But as others emphasize every small area is different. My backyard gets much much warmer than my front yard and so seeds in the former can be planted much earlier than seeds in the latter. And of course larger difference can be enormously important. I live fairly near the coast in Vancouver, and although the water moderates the temperatures so much that it gets nowhere near as hot in the summer as it does 100 km inland - think 75 F versus 90 F - that same moderation means that I can start seeds earlier here. The one thing to which I no longer pay even the slightest attention is the recommended start date for flower seeds found on seed packages. Take tomatos. If you start them as directed, by the time to transplant them outside they will be perhaps 1' high at the most. But tomato plants sold in stores at that time will be twice as tall and very thick and well-branched. Clearly the commercial growers started theirs much earlier than I did (they also may have better conditions, and they may have grown their plants further south, but I have a greenhouse that is pretty good so those are not important factors in explaining the difference in size). So why shouldn't I too start mine much earlier than directed, and get plants as good as the commercial growers produce? Thus I have already finished planting every type of flower that, according to my seed package, is supposed to be started in February.
soccerdad, do you plant things that are supposed to be planted in February in January? For example, West Coast Seeds says to start Leeks early Feb, would you start them in a week? I don't have a Greenhouse yet, but I just don't know how early to start things.
My greenhouse - temp ranging from about 54F at might to about 65F during the day and lighted (lit? illuminated?) from about 7:30 a.m. to about 7:30 p.m. - now contains: Delphiniums, growing well (maybe 4" high) Incarvillea, growing well (maybe 2" high) Pansies, growing well (although only 1/2" high) Hot pepper, growing OK (maybe 2" high) Tomatos, growing OK (maybe 2" high) Salpiglossis, just a few growing so far (maybe 1.5" high) Vinca, just now germinated Two types of Meconopsis, Grandis and Betonicifolia, both of which germinated in the afternoon of January 7 (marking the first time that I have succeeded in germinating this plant) Sweet pepper, none germinated yet Brugmansia, none germinated yet Primulas of various types, none of them germinated yet (I do well with Primulas except that I always fail with Primula Veris) And some Alstromeria are in the fridge and a few on the back porch, none germinated yet (another plant that has always failed to germinate for me). And Erythronium Revolutum is in a dark place in my office where the temperature does not vary. Today I expect to start Gloxinia and Tuberous Begonia seeds although they require more heat that I can generally provide. Leeks are one exception because I leave them out over the winter and harvest them in the spring - they grow during the year in which I plant them, do nothing over the winter and then, when it starts to warm up, grow like mad - and so I don't trouble to start them early.
