Peas, Pole Beans, Indeterminate Tomatoes and Cucumbers make great vegetables to grow along an arch or trellis. By growing vertically, you’ll get more sun, better air circulation (which also means less chance of disease), and you’ll produce more tomatoes and...
Continue ReadingUnlock The Secrets to Inviting Hummingbirds to Your Garden Let's meet our feathered friends, the Rufous Hummingbird (Selasphorus rufus) and Anna’s Hummingbird (Calypte anna). Typically, the Rufous marks the onset of spring, arriving around mid-March, and stays for a lovely...
Continue ReadingEverybody can grow a salad green garden. Small space gardeners, low-light gardeners, even indoor gardeners can plant seeds to grow a continuous supply of salad through the gardening season. Watch the video below to learn all about growing lettuces and...
Continue ReadingComposting: The Garden's Gift That Keeps on Giving Imagine a process that transforms your kitchen scraps and garden waste into a nutrient-rich, soil-enhancing marvel. Welcome to the world of composting! This eco-friendly practice, deeply rooted in organic and biodynamic gardening,...
Continue ReadingThe Monarch butterfly's fascinating journey and precarious situation has been capturing hearts and headlines recently. If you search "Monarch butterfly" on YouTube, you'll discover a multitude of videos dedicated to preserving this unique species. The Monarch's distinctive migration pattern, spanning...
Continue ReadingLet's face it, traditional lawns can be a real resource hog. They guzzle water, demand constant trimming and generally return very little for your efforts. Plus, they take up space that could be transformed into a verdant food garden, or...
Continue ReadingSeed varieties on the West Coast Seeds website are marked to indicate whether they are Hybrid Seeds (F1 or F2) or Open Pollinated Seeds (OP). Open Pollinated Seeds (OP) When two plants of the same variety produce offspring, the variety...
Continue ReadingComfrey is the perennial cousin of borage and their pink and blue blooms attract just as many pollinators. This fast-growing herb has multiple utilities. Learn how to grow comfrey below. LatinSymphytum OfficinaleFamily: Boraginaceae DifficultyEasy Season & ZoneSeason: All seasons (perennial)Exposure: Full...
Continue ReadingAbout Stinging Nettle Although maligned in modern times due to its hairy leaves that cause skin irrititations, Stinging Nettle actually has many favourable attributes. It is a nutrient-rich food (cooking neutralizes the stinging) and both the leaves and roots boasts a...
Continue ReadingCorn, beans, and squash have been grown together for centuries in the Americas, and for good reason: they naturally work in concert with each other. Corn provides a growing support for the beans, which in turn provide nitrogen for the...
Continue ReadingOne stalk of cooked broccoli gives you 75mg of vitamin C, 1300 IU of beta carotene, 3g of protein and 5g of dietary fibre with only 40 calories. The crown portion tastes great when cooked or steamed. You can eat...
Continue ReadingPractice mindful gardening with our new Gardening Journal. Complete with printable pages, this journal serves as a practical reference to guide you from garden planning through harvest. Pages include plant profiles, seed tracking charts, a checklist, even a budgeting page, and...
Continue ReadingEarly this year I was so excited to get a hold of African Violet seeds, I wanted to start growing them right away! However, African Violets need warm temperatures (20°C or higher) for germination, so I needed to wait patiently...
Continue ReadingWater close to the soil, and avoid overhead watering. Place your irrigation near or beneath the soil surface rather than spraying the top of the plant. The plant’s leaves will act as a sun umbrella, reducing evaporation so that more water has an opportunity to soak into the soil. Many plants, like tomatoes and squash, will be at increased risk to diseases like Late Blight and Powdery Mildew if their leaves are frequently soaked by overhead watering.
Continue ReadingGarlic is a perennial member of the onion family, Alliaceae, and is closely related to leeks, onions, shallots, and chives. All of these plants send up hollow, tubular (sometimes flattened) leaves from a bulb that grows below the ground. The leaves are followed by a flower stalk (scape), and then by the flower itself. Garlic may also produce “bulbils” – tiny bulbs that may begin to sprout, on the flower head. All parts of the garlic plant are edible, but the bulb is the most prized and useful in the kitchen.
Continue ReadingEven in large scale, chemically dependent farm systems, Integrated Pest Management can reduce human and environmental exposure to chemical pesticides, and save a great deal of money. For the organic grower IPM is the obvious logical way to manage pests.
Continue ReadingPlanting for fall & winter harvests has to start in the summer and fall. Just like we sow summer harvest crops in the late winter and spring – it’s the same concept. Did you know that many crops can be...
Continue ReadingThe Perennial Wildflower Seeds ingredients are listed below. This is the right blend to establish where flowers are needed to come back year after year. Perennial flowers are often drought resistant and very winter hardy, so they can be relied...
Continue ReadingHow do you know when to harvest garlic bulbs and if they have matured to the right point for harvest? Each leaf on the above-ground garlic plant represents one potential papery wrapper around the mature bulb. Having well developed, fully intact...
Continue ReadingAlthough they arrived from Europe, they’re well at home now in BC’s Lower Mainland and many other regions. This lively beetle (Amphimallon majalis) has an annual life cycle that is worth understanding in an attempt to control it. The beetle...
Continue ReadingCarrots are biennial plants, and store all of their first year’s energy in the long orange taproots we know so well. If left in the ground, they will flower in their second year, and produce quite pretty white umbels resembling yellow dill flowers.
Continue ReadingThe Chafer Beetle Resistant Lawn Blend is one lawn solution for home owners challenged by the animals that feed on the European chafer beetle, and dig up lawns in the process of hunting them. Continue reading below for some tips on how to grow Chafer Beetle Resistant Lawn Blend from seed.
Continue ReadingCilantro and dill are both good examples of umbelliferous plants. When these plants bloom, the flower structure is in a shape called an umbel — scores of tiny flowers arranged on a more or less flat or umbrella-shaped plane. Other...
Continue ReadingWest Coast Seeds has conducted significant research into the companion planting guidelines and has defined the best possible results and reasons for each of our recommendations in our companion planting chart, below are a few thoughtful suggestions for you while planning your garden this year.
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