THANKS to those who showed up for the work bee on Wednesday night. With their hard work, we were able to get the compost pile turned and ready to go and as well another one started. On the topic of the compost pile, although the pile is for all the gardeners to use, we ask that you are conscientious in your use as it is all we have for now and we want there to be enough for all. Most of the beds are in very good condition soil wise and most gardens had compost added to them last year. The exception to this would be some of the newer beds in the south garden and I plan to have that taken care of on Saturday, our next work bee...

WORK BEES On Saturday, May 15th from 8am-12pm, I will be holding another work bee. We have lots of toiling, tilling, digging and dirt moving to do so if you are able to help it will be greatly appreciated. Hours worked at work bees are applied directly toward your 16 hours of volunteer work in the garden (over the growing season) that we ask of our gardeners as part of their membership. I will be posting a sheet on the back door of the shed with everyone's name so that you will be able to keep track of any hours that you work in the garden. I will also be working on a list of individual duties for those of you that are not able to make the work bees.

WATER The work order for the water has been put in to the city and we hope that by next weekend we should have that part of the garden functioning. The north garden is relatively simple to deal with as far as hooking up hoses goes, but the south garden is a little more involved and I am likely going to have to show everyone from that area how to deal with that. However, until the water is hooked up, I can't show you. I did try to explain it last year in a blog post and you can click here to read that post. I think it's probably easier to learn "hands-on".

Typically most of you will water with a watering can. It will be someones task to keep the water barrels full and we suggest that you use the water from those barrels to water your plants. The cold water from the hose can be really shocking to the roots of plants. Your plants will appreciate it. I mean really, whens the last time you enjoyed a cold bath...:)

DUMP RUNS Is there anyone out there with a truck who would be interested in doing dump runs for the garden? This would count as volunteer hours. Mostly it would involve taking weeds to the city compost, as we cannot compost them in our small on site compost pile, and perhaps the occasional bag of garbage or prunings from early season clean-ups. If there is anyone out there interested it would be great if you could help out. Please email if you can.

In other news not related directly to the garden, I found a great link for building Bumblebee Houses. It would be a great and relatively simple project for kids and even better if you could convince a willing member of the springtime Bumblebee population to occupy it. :)

There are some great gardening oriented workshops listed here on the Foodscapers website. Heidi Marion, formerly of Wild Blue Yonder Farms, gardened with us last year and was a huge contributor to our Plant A Row program. It was more like 'Plant an Entire Garden Bed' in her case :). Anyway, she has a green thumb no matter where she operates and has an interesting website. Check it out.

If anyone has anything garden oriented or something you think other gardeners may find interesting that you would like to see posted here on the blog, please let me know and I'll see what I can do. Also, if there are ever any questions or concerns about the garden itself, feel free to contact me, Kathryn, at dugsyukon@hotmail.com.

I think that's it for now. I hope to see you all at the work bee tomorrow!