The following article originally appeared as part of a series titled "Down Home" in the
Newfoundland Signal (published in Toronto) on November 8, 1976. In those days the author spent her summers
on Red Island with her husband Denis and their daughter Krista. Reprinted by permission.
RED ISLAND, Placentia Bay -- The garden was wonderful this year. We're lucky on Red
Island. Unlike many areas of Newfoundland, our little island has an abundance of deep fertile soil
for growing vegetables.
There have always been gardens on the island. The potatoes, cabbage, turnips, and
beets these plots provided were urgently needed by the early settler. And later, when a shop or
two appeared on the island, they stocked mainly "hard grub" and you still relied on
your piece of ground for fresh vegetables.
Even today, the outlines of the old potato trenches are clearly visible; the very
oldest beds worn nearly flat with the passage of time. If you dig into these ancient trenches,
you will find no stones at all - mute evidence of generations of thorough cultivation.
Gardening began every year in the spring with a little ceremony known as Cleaning
Out The Sheep House. Once the weather warmed enough to allow the sheep to be driven to their
summer pastures, the foot-deep mass of stinking sheep manure would be shovelled out of the shed
and spread on the ground by the older boys. Din well remembers staggering under load after load
of the smelly stuff, and heaving it onto his mother's cabbage garden along with enough oaths to
kill any sheep within sound of his voice.
Funny how life comes around full circle. We don't keep sheep now, but we do have hens.
And hen manure is worth its weight in gold. I save it up all winter and pack it, in the spring,
in plastic bags inside of cardboard boxes, and Din still ends up hauling manure each spring.
First, down to the boat in Placentia and across the bay to the island, and then up to the garden
when we land. (And some black looks I get from him, I tell you!)
But it's more than worth it in the end. Fortified with peat moss from the Lighthouse
Point, buckets of kelp and capelin, and ashes from the stove, the garden produces in abundance
cabbages as big as your head, sweet-tasting beets and turnips, potatoes, broccoli, peas, tomatoes,
Brussels sprouts, lettuce, radishes, onions, carrots, cucumbers, strawberries - and more than I
can call to mind at the moment.
There were squash last year, but we lost them this spring in late frosts. Actually
the tomatoes were withered too, but sprouted again from the stems just below the ground and grew
lovely tomatoes just the same.
On the far side of the garden we've planted a small orchard of dwarf fruit trees -
apples, plums, and pears. The peaches have resisted all our efforts to keep them alive, but
planting them in a more sheltered area might do the trick. We even have a grape vine that has so
far survived two winters, so I've come to the conclusion there's not too much you can't grow in
Newfoundland if you make up your mind.
I'm sure, by making careful use of what suitable land we have available, we could
easily quadruple the amount of food this province now produces.