Seeds for the vegetable garden
West Coast Seeds are in! Their ‘Gardening Guide 2015’ gives a planting chart for our region and highlights varieties for container planting, attracting beneficial insects and for feeding pollinators. Now is the time to plant crops that require a cool start.
Seeds of UBC Botanical Garden’s more popular ornamentals have been collected and packaged for sale by our volunteer Friends of the Garden. These seeds are a wonderful take-away for visitors from afar.
Slow Conifers
The Garden Centre has a fresh shipment of dwarf and slow growing conifers suitable for smaller gardens. A favourite is Sciadopitys verticillata or Japanese Umbrella Pine. With unique textured needles in whorls and growth at 15cm per year, this tree will provide many years of interest in any planting scheme. After twenty years it might reach three metres and become a fine gift for a friend with a larger garden.
Keeping the Bees
The Shop now has an excellent selection of houses approved by Dr. Margriet Dogterom. Further information is also available at the Shop in her excellent guide “Pollination with Mason Bees : A Gardener and Naturalists’ Guide to Managing Mason Bees for Fruit Production.”
Honey bee and native bee populations are in serious decline due to habitat loss and destruction, pesticide use, monoculture and disease. These natural pollinators are essential to our existence and we can do our part by creating a haven for them in our gardens. We will be generously rewarded with delicious apples, raspberries, tomatoes, and many other fruits and vegetables. It is important to provide a variety of plants that will bloom successively throughout the season. Native plants attract native bees while exotic plants will attract honey bees.
In the Lower Mainland the tiny Blue Orchard Mason Bee is native to our area and is especially suited to our climate, being able to fly in cooler, less sunny conditions than other bees. Tiny as a fly, they are metallic blue and sport two sets of wings. They are so called due to their habit of packing mud in their nests like brick masons. They are super- efficient, collecting nectar and pollen simultaneously. Because they don’t sting and are not frightened by people, they are safe for children and pets and offer an excellent educational opportunity, as they can be observed at close range. They are especially partial to fruit tree blossoms, but they also like heathers, blueberries, skimmias, peiris, rhododendrons and currents. If you don’t have natural nesting sites on your property, you can attract them with man-made bee houses.
