CP Rail has committed to cease all work on the Arbutus corridor until the City’s injunction application gets heard in court on December 9th, 2014.
Information from the City of Vancouver website: http://vancouver.ca/news-calendar/cp-rail-agrees-to-cease-work-on-arbutus-corridor.aspx
We have the go-ahead to plant garlic again after a years hiatus due to “Rust” problems. That plant disease is airborne and affects the Allium family (garlic, leeks & onions) as well as Hollyhocks and a few other perennials. We needed at least a year to try & eradicate this problem.
Planting Garlic….highlights from an article by Vancouver Sun’s Randy Shore who runs an excellent garden column on some Fridays.
#1 Buy good quality garlic at a garden centre (I like Red Russian variety but there are many interesting varieties), or at a farmers market, not at a grocery store!
#2 Garlic is a lime lover so your soil needs to be amended before planting with compost or mushroom manure, organic fertilizer (with a high nitrogen content) and a handful of dolomite lime. If leaves start to yellow in the spring, give the plants a dose of fish fertilizer.
#3 Break garlic cloves apart, being careful not to damage papery skins. Plant approx. 6″ apart and 4″ deep, with the pointed end up.
#4 Mulch the area with approx. 6″ of shredded leaves,ie run over dry leaves with a lawnmower or chop up in a large container with sharp hedge shears. This will keep winter rains from washing out nutrients and in summer will keep soil from drying out.
#5 Plant now, harvest next summer!
#1 Weed, deadhead and remove diseased plants from plots. Late tomato blight has hit the garden hard after the first rains. Please dispose of those plants in household garbage, not compost. This cleanup helps control the spread of disease and pests in the garden.
#2 Amend your soil with mushroom manure, compost or Sea Soil at this time and dig it in. Add a handful of lime as well or wait till spring.
#3 Plant spring bulbs if desired, with bonemeal in the hole before planting. Starting this fall we can plant garlic (now), leeks (spring) and onions, as our year has passed for not planting these crops due to Rust in the garden. Winter veggie plants can be put in now too: kale, winter flowering broccoli, some lettuces and radishes…Check West Coast Seeds Pamphlet re winter veggie planting (available free at garden centres)
#4 Some light pruning can be done to shrubs….currant bushes…cut long shoots back slightly and thin out crowded branches, cut down OLD canes of summer producing raspberries; fall-bearing raspberries… cut down ALL canes in January; and some removal of older wood from blueberries . Rhubarb can be divided as well now that it is dying back back and the weather is cooler. Perennial plants can be divided too, Hosta, Sedums and Iris as well as other large perennial clumps, most will tolerate dividing now, before winter.
#5 Finish clipping edges around the plots and inside and outside the fence and clear up debris in those areas too, then you are all set for spring! Don’t forget to check your garden regularly, esp if you have produce to pick, do some weeding and keep up maintenance which is much less over winter. By doing a thorough fall cleanup, your garden will be ready for planting in the spring and the work not so overwhelming!
The City of Vancouver filed a notice of civil claim in B.C. Supreme Court today in a direct constitutional challenge to Canadian Pacific’s actions to clear its property along Arbutus Corridor. See more at:
http://www.vancourier.com/news/city-of-vancouver-takes-cp-to-court-1.1413568#sthash.uinGNiIT.dpuf
The Arbutus Victory Garden website is an excellent resource for information regarding the CP situation. It provides latest news, links to media coverage and a copy of the August 17 letter to the city.
Maple Community Garden – Fall General Meeting
Date: Sunday, September 28, 2014
Time: 10:00am
Location: 2229 Maple Street (southwest corner of Maple St and W 6th Ave)
Agenda and previous general meeting minutes will be provided at the meeting.
Canadian Pacific Railway posted an update on its website on September 12th, announcing that they will resume work in the Corridor in the coming days following failed negotiations with the City of Vancouver:
http://www.cpr.ca/en/
hi,
below is a message sent by Arbutus Victory Gardens to all gardeners of the Arbutus Corridor about a general meeting organized on Thursday in Kitsilano.
Hope to see you there!
Good afternoon, gardeners along the Arbutus Corridor!
Most gardeners along the corridor have just received an email from the City of Vancouver about our meeting, this upcoming Thursday, August 28, at 6:30 pm at the Kitsilano Community Centre.The City of Vancouver may not have the most up-to-date contact list, particularly for some group-organized gardens, such as Maple, Pine, Cypress, Kerrisdale and World in a Garden. If you are from those gardens, could you please share the information about our meeting with your community, even if you are not able to attend personally?
When the Arbutus Victory Gardeners sent an open letter to the City of Vancouver, the City responded by meeting with some of our members and suggested that our most effective means of protest would be if all gardeners along the corridor meet, strategize and speak with one voice. The City helped us find the space to meet and kindly sent out our meeting invitation to Arbutus Corridor gardeners whose contact information they had.
Our plan for the meeting is to share the latest updates about CP and our gardens, and then to break up into small groups to strategize in specific areas in small groups. We need your help! Please attend if possible, but we are also looking for volunteers for the following:
- front door greeters and information desk
- have an interest in any of the following topics and are willing to help lead a small group session: herbicide use, legal injunctions, political action, plant inventories (we can provide you with a guide before the meeting to help with the discussion)
- media facilitation – greet any media that come and provide information
If you are able to assist in any of these areas, please email arbutusvictorygardens@gmail.com.
Thanks again, please spread the word, and we hope to see as many gardeners as possible on Thursday!
The August 2014 Notice To Residents from CPR indicates that in addition to returning the rail line to operating standards, CP will also be spraying herbicides to ‘prevent the re-growth of stubborn weeds on our right of way’ in accordance with their Integrated Vegetation Management Plan 2010. Maple Community Garden Executive does not have any further detail regarding the proposed use of herbicides by CPR.
Key links to other info on the CPR site:
Arbutus Corridor Overview Map [formal drawings, Maple Garden page 15-17]
CPR Site Survey [details of Maple Garden ‘encroachment’, page 6]
Arbutus Corridor upgrades [general info, with links to all CPR Notices To Residents]
A reminder that CPR has asked everyone to “…please direct any questions about CP’s activity in your community to our Community Connect line at community_connect@cpr.ca or 1 800/766-7912. Questions regarding the future use of this land as it pertains to the Arbutus Corridor Official Development Plan can be directed to the City of Vancouver.”
The Arbutus Victory Gardeners have just sent the following letter to Vancouver City Council, local MLAs, MPs, and CP Rail: http://arbutusvictorygardens.wordpress.com/letter-to-city-august-17
It contains four actions they are requesting the City and other government to support them on going forward with CP Rail:
In their letter to the other gardens, the gardeners from Arbutus Victory also stated:
We were absolutely devastated by the news of the destruction of the Marpole gardens and hope to halt the bulldozers before all other gardens are destroyed. We also hope Marpole gardeners will have new spaces to grow as soon as possible. Please contact us if you wish to work together and strengthen all of our voices going forward.