Myths about growing your own food in Ottawa
Debunked by Just Food’s Jordan Bouchard
KEEP IT OUT OF THE FRONT YARD
“We’ve heard that some people have been criticized for having a front yard garden — that it’s not allowed to be, it actually is allowed in the property standards provisions,” Bouchard said.
The caveats: it can’t interfere with pedestrian or car traffic and structures like sheds and raised beds can’t be built on the cityowned road allowance, which is on a home’s plan of survey or at the local Land Registry Office. And watch for underground utilities — call 1-800400-2255 before digging.
IT’S TOO HARD
“People think you have to be a specialist to grow food,” Bouchard said. “I grew up in a farming family so it’s just second nature to watch food being grown but for people have never seen it or never done, it seems so complicated.
“Seeds want to grow.”
He recommends starting small and beans, peas, lettuce, herbs like direct-sown cilantro, radishes, turnips and garlic as good starter crops. The Community Gardening Network even publishes a guide (it’s under “gardening resources” at justfood.ca) on how to prepare soil and lay out a garden and what vegetables to plant when.
Need inspiration? Ottawans can see what their neighbours are up to on Sept. 14 with a family-friendly urban bike tour of some of the city’s community gardens organized by Just Food.
VEGETABLE GARDENS ARE UGLY
“Another misconception is that gardening is not esthetically pleasing — I think there’s nothing better than looking at a nice patch of edible garden and a lot of our decoratives are edible, anyway,” said Bouchard, noting that hostas, for example, are edible and delicious stir-fried with soy sauce.
Herbs and edible flowers, like peppery nasturtiums and statuesque sunflowers, are at home in any ornamental garden while artful combinations of edibles — dubbed “edimentals” — are a hot trend.
GARDENING ONLY HAPPENS ON THE VICTORIA DAY WEEKEND
Ottawa’s summer is heartbreakingly fleeting but that’s not the beginning — or the end — of the season for the vegetable garden.
“Typically in Ottawa, a lot of people start planting at the May long weekend, but peas are a crop you can plant halfway through April,” Bouchard said. “They won’t do that well if you plant them at the end of May.”
Radishes and lettuce can also get an early start, or make an empty bed do double-duty. Seasoned gardeners like Melanson and Janveau plant them after earlier crops, such as garlic, have been harvested. Many winter vegetables actually taste sweeter after a frost.