What's the buzz
It's a rainy day here, yay!
Actually the weather has been brilliant for the past few weeks! They are calling for lovely warm (20-33c) sunny days & cooler (15c)rainy nights. All really ideal for the farmers & gardeners. For me personally, I prefer part sun, breezy & cooler days(20-25c) as those are ideal conditions for working in the forest. :)
I was talking to folks from tens of thousands of kilometres away, informing me of a heatwave elsewhere in Canada.
Hilarious that I should get the news from them but as I'm not on social media or care for the news...
Apparently all of British Columbia is suffering right now. Year after year of drought and forest fires and now this heatwave of high 40c (47c??) yikes!
British Columbia is perhaps the most expensive/overpriced place to live in all of Canada. Historically, the retirees from other parts of Canada would move there for it's weather, for the past four+ decades, which drove the real estate prices up. However a new entry in the past 3+ decades there have been the Asian buyers which drove the prices to an even higher heights.
Obviously they are not the only ones living there as the wealthy and super-wealthy still need others to do the everyday jobs. The question is, how are those folks managing on wages far far below what it costs to rent there, never mind buying real estate.
Perhaps British Columbia has better marketing/commercials?
I know that New Brunswick rarely, if ever advertises the provinces' features. For the longest time I didn't get that but lately, the more I think about it, the more it makes sense to me.
When in town or when talking to any of the neighbours, I hear that 95% of the properties under $200K here are selling just as quick as they get listed while 95% properties listed over that number. are not.
Some are first-time buyers who gave up on ever being able to purchase properties in their own home provinces. Others seem to be simply investors. I'm interested in hearing from you and how are things where you live.
An update.
A while back, I wrote about a Romanian family who bought a bulldoze property sight unseen here and were devastate upon arrival to learn that it would have to be demolished. Yesterday, at the end of our yoga session, neighbours informed me that having failed to find anyone to bulldoze & rebuild for them, plus having spent thousands in temporary accommodations, they had decided to buy a property in Moncton(three hours away) and abandon their property here. By the way, Moncton real estate prices are much higher than here!
I wonder just how many such stories are being told right now. In these folks case, having me inspect this property for under $100, would have saved them so much money, time, stress & grief.
It seems that we penny pinch most of our lives and/as we end-up parting with tens of thousands of dollars by attempting to save, in this case $100.
Changing the topic.
There was a question of what we've planted in our 33 raised beds. I don't know if I've answered this already but I really don't mind repeating it..all very exciting :)
So this year we have 4 beds dedicated to our 350-400 garlic cloves. Typically/historically each clove produces 3-5 cloves, so that's roughly 1,400 cloves. Next year, we might spread that 400 number into 5 or even 6 beds. Although garlic plants don't have a tone of foliage, like tomatoes for instance, they do have some leaves. So by spreading them farther apart, they should have more air circulation & sunlight penetration. We usually mulch the beds so moisture evaporation should not be an issue.
We have 3 or 4 dedicated strawberry beds of different varieties. Although we have so many different berry bushes(blackberry, raspberry, chock cherry, blackcurrant etc.), strawberries are my favourite.
There are oh 3? beds of tomatoes of different varieties. Tending(suckers) to them starting this stage of the lives, is a chore that I honestly don't mind doing :)
The rest of the beds occupy onions, carrots, celery, lovage, beets, asparagus, peas, cucumbers, kale, pumpkin, squash, etc. as far as the plants go.
We also have dill, parsley, sage, mint etc. for herbs.
As always, although we have a ton of wild flowers, daisies, black-eyed sue, goldenrods, clovers, dandelions, evening prime rose, st. john's wort, etc., growing just around the garden and the main-building alone, we plant annuals such as sunflowers, poppies, marigolds and
calendula in each bed both to attract more pollinators and for their medicinal qualities, as with the wild flowers.
This year and right now in particular, we are collecting evening primrose & St. John's wort to make salves with.
Most everything blooms at different times, making it a habitat or a never-ending buffet of nectar for the beneficial insects, pollinators, butterflies and even the few hummingbirds that reside on our property.
I'm happy to report that our neighbourhood is growing again :)
Three families of 4 and one family of 2. Two of these families are not right in the neighbourhood as they couldn't find anything that suited their needs but as they are somewhat close-by and plan to also grow organically and be involved with community events & activities, we like to think of them as neighbours :)
So this brings the rough count to 39 adults and 17 kids. Now, I call us a neighbourhood because otherwise typically there is no such place as a neighbourhood in the rural/country in Canada, due to the vast space between properties. The numbers that I provided is on somewhere between 500-1000 acres of land, in our neighbourhood.
However, at the core of the community where we reside, some properties are are only 1-2.5 acres away from others. This is why I call us a neighbourhood. A nice combination of privacy and yet close enough to bike or walk to.
Be well :)
