Old seeds and green manure

I finally got around to sorting through my seeds. I have collected lots over the years and I had way too many to fit in the seed box. So any seeds over 5 yrs old got turfed. I emptied the seeds from their package into a container, then to see what would happen, sprinkled them thickly over some unused garden beds.

The results were rather surprising. The seeds got watered in really well with a couple of days of rain and sprouted impressively well. So my now 'green manure' is full of beans, amaranth, peas, squash and many unidentified flowers and brassicas. I can probably harvest the tips of the veges I recognise as micro greens. The rest will keep on growing til frost or longer with out amounting to much and then die down to feed the beasties in the soil.
It was great to see the old seeds still so full of life. Also a great way to recycle them through the garden.

Off to B.C in a few days to start working on new garden beds there.

New beds to play with

In spite of my usual delayed planting this summer I am harvesting veg from the garden. Not a lot but enough. The lettuce, pak choi and arugala are great additions to the table and shortly there will be the peas and beans.

The big change this summer is I finally put in a permanent back fence on the vege garden. Every year it has been expanding by about the size of the compost bins as I moved them further back each year. Finally this year I said enough.
Three 4 x 4 posts and a bag of sacrete later I had the supports in. A few hours with some chicken wire and staples and it was done. The paths and the new beds were lined with cardboard. The raised beds were formed from some old lumber that I had around and filled with the compost from last winters bins. The paths were then covered with saw dust. A heavy rain a few days later settled it all in.
Now I am dividing some of the perennials and putting the transplants in these new 'nursery' beds ready to take out to my new garden on the west coast later in the fall.