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Well, less than a month ago, my son-in-law and daughter and their family bought the place you see here
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It's an 88 acre farm on Manitoulin Island, 30 acres cleared. The barn could use some work, we're talking about that and you may see some more about that in the future
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but the house is pretty new and it's just a wonderful piece of land
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And it's described in this local history book. Now, I never had any reason to pay attention to this piece of property and its entry in this book
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but after they bought it, I paid close attention and I found something very interesting
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I won't read everything to you, but listen to this section. They first cleared the trees and sold firewood
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That's referring to Lornie and Alma Baker. They're the first people to actually clear land and farm here and that was in 1934 that they built the house
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So, pretty recently really. Then they burned off the land and the deep soil below the bluff would burn a long time
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But afterwards, it proved to be excellent gardening soil and you could almost see everything growing
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They grew and processed huge amounts of vegetables, selling some whenever possible
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So, that got me curious. Where is this legendary patch of gardening soil
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What does it look like? All we know for sure is that it's the bottom of a bluff
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Well, there's a couple of places on the property that meet that description
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but I have found something that I've never seen before in all my time
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It's at the bottom of a bluff. It's near the house and I think this is the legendary garden spot
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But something that my son-in-law discovered really clenches it for me. So, let's drive down
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I'll show you the spot and then I'll show you this interesting old finding too
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So, if this is the legendary garden spot, it hasn't been cultivated for at least 50 years
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There's a lot of overgrowth here. I can't go any further because there's a log
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So, let's head out on foot. I think it might be that way
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I've noticed other areas on this property grow really well. Better than I'm used to seeing around here
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And not necessarily because it's gotten any care or fertilizer. So, if you can see through the trees, that's a limestone bluff
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Not hugely tall. 20-something feet maybe. The house is up top. And then we come to this clearing which, by the way, you can't see on Google Earth too
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That's how I first spotted it. Now, no doubt this area has grown in
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There's some small stuff around here. If we're going to use it for a garden, we're going to have to bring it back to its former condition
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But, take a look at how tall these plants are. Look at that
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If nothing else, it certainly is a fertile little piece of ground here
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How tall is that? I'd call it 7 feet maybe. I've seen plants like this before, but never ever this big
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As you can see, if you look around, it's about the size of what you'd want for a big family garden
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As I said, it's grown in some, but this is, I think, where it's at
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And let's just take a look at the soil here. Scratch it a bit
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It's fairly light. It's fairly light, which is great for hoeing and things
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So, this sure looks like the spot to me. And we're going to try to grow something here
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We're going to cut this stuff down, prune back some trees, and just see how it will grow
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There's two challenges we're going to face though. One is deer, white-tailed deer
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There are a lot of them around here. A lot more than there were 70, 80, 90 years ago when this was cultivated
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People had to hunt deer a lot more. They hunted them out of season because it was either that or starvation up here in Manitoulin
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So, far more deer. We may have to set up an electric fence to deter them
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And as my cameraman Robert would tell you, if he could talk on this camera, there's a lot of mosquitoes down here too, which is to be expected
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I think maybe they're going to clear off a bit. When we get it trimmed off
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But, there's another thing I want to show you. And it's something that my son-in-law Paul discovered
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And this for me clinches it as this being the spot for that little garden where you could almost see everything grow
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So, let me go and we'll find this little thing right now
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So, this is that limestone bluff. It's not terribly tall, but it does fit the description
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The mystery garden is over there. And just down here is something you don't see very often
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There it is. It's a hand dug water well. Kind of dangerous
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It's not covered in any way. But, it's a good place to start
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And I'm going to go ahead and put this down. And I'm going to put this down
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And I'm going to put this down. And I'm going to put this down
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And I'm going to put this down. And I'm going to put this down
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And I'm going to put this down. And I'm going to put this down
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Water is about, oh, could be ten feet down. This is the pumping chamber and pipe for a hand pump that must have been in there
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Pulled out for some reason. We'll get a cover on this. But, if you wanted to have a garden, you'd need to have some water for dry years
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I think they built this well in order to service that garden
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Pumping water by hand in buckets and carrying it over. People were used to working a lot harder back then than we are now
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But, isn't this interesting? I did notice, too, that it's just barely big enough to dig in
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Because with these hand dug wells, you've got to dig your way down
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So, someone had to be down there digging out. And I don't think it could possibly be any smaller than it is now and still work
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An interesting little finding. Something the kids didn't know when they were choosing this property
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But, I'll show you more about this later as we develop this over the months and years
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And also, show you how that garden grows. One of the reasons I think it may be, this whole area actually, may be more fertile than the surrounding areas
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Is because, and I haven't seen it in the spring yet. Judging by the lay of the land, I think there's probably quite a little spring runoff here
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Bringing nutrients as it goes. It doesn't seem particularly wet, but we'll get a melt of snow with some rain
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We'll probably get some nutrients washing in here. Probably has been happening for zillions of years
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Maybe that's why it's so growthy out there. Also, it's quite sheltered
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None of the plants are going to get bothered by wind or streams like that
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An interesting little spot and an interesting little corner of the world
