Gardening 2020

catapault

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Elphaba09 Elphaba09 If your garden makes you happy then it is wonderful garden. That's the great thing about gardening - there is something for everyone's taste. One friend only wanted to grow what he could eat. Another grows flowers for cutting. Someone else has a focus on native plants. Something for everyone. Plus it is the never-ending story, with always something new to learn.
 

NY cat man

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Elphaba09 Elphaba09 If your garden makes you happy then it is wonderful garden. That's the great thing about gardening - there is something for everyone's taste. One friend only wanted to grow what he could eat. Another grows flowers for cutting. Someone else has a focus on native plants. Something for everyone. Plus it is the never-ending story, with always something new to learn.
Not to mention how you can expand your vocabulary when you discover a new bug chowing down on those plants that you worked so hard to get to grow.
 

MoochNNoodles

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I spotted several large slugs outside recently. I think I’m going to have to make a trap. I believe they are what has been eating at my sunflowers.
 

NY cat man

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Here, it has been scarlet lily beetles, aphids, grasshoppers, and Japanese beetles assaulting our plants most recently.
 

MoochNNoodles

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It ended up a busy garden evening. The storm dropped about 5” of rain here according to weatherbug. That and/or the wind (it wasn’t supposed to get windy!) knocked down a bunch of my corn and did a number on my sunflowers. They were just getting buds too!

I ended up at Lowes to buy soil, stakes and twine to fix the corn. My DD is such a trooper. She crawled right down every row to pack soil around the base of each plant. We were both dirt balls by the time we came in. Both kids helped hold up the sunflowers while I used twine and leftover bamboo stakes out there. Two broke off but I’m hoping the rest will be ok. Everything else looks great. I was not expecting all that damage!

DD is in the middle there. You can hardly see her. I didn’t get a picture before. You can see the light twine from the last time I had to help it. I thought we were past that.
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This was yesterday. Crazy what one storm can do!!
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posiepurrs

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I have never seen so many chafer beetles! I need to put down some beneficial nematodes but they are to expensive right now. $125 to do my yard. Instead, I will just use what I have that will have les impact on the good bugs. Those beetles are decimating my poor pepper plants and have already taken out my basil.
 

WillowMarie

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MoochNNoodles MoochNNoodles that's a really popular spot in your yard ;)


Is it a type is assassin bug? They look similar to the ones I find in the house often.
 

les26

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Yesterday Deb and I had to concoct a chicken wire fence to put around our pepper plants, the rabbits and squirrels are chewing on the plants and also take a few bites out of the peppers themselves, I think it is mostly the rabbits as we have never had as many of them as we have this year. I had put up a plastic fence around the raised garden but the bigger rabbits jumped right over it and the little ones fit right through it! But today I checked several times and there were no critters inside the chicken wire fence. I just gave them a drink with some Peters plant food in it, I don't know if several of them will even make it and produce anything as they chewed them so badly but we'll see.

Ugh.........:mad: :argh:
 

NY cat man

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We had a torrential downpour yesterday, after nearly 2 weeks with no rain, and today I discovered that 5 flower spikes on my delphiniums were snapped off, even though I had them staked up. The weight of water was too much for them. Just as with last year, the heavy rain didn't come until they were fully in bloom.
 

MoochNNoodles

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MoochNNoodles MoochNNoodles Opps! Think they are stink bugs, not assassin bugs. :)
I have stink bugs. They are wider; more shield like. I hate those too. 😫 These are similar but a different shape. I picked up a zucchini the other day and there were SEVEN of those bugs on the bottom side!! 😖

I have to pull all those plants tomorrow. They are all basically dead. I was able to get some potted summer squash and zucchini at lowes. I’m going to plant it where I had the peas.
 

MoochNNoodles

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I did a lot if harvesting today! I went out to pick Roma beans and ended up picking those plus the wax bush beans and pole beans. And a big container of peppers and more Cherry tomatoes. I’m going to be busy getting those beans in the freezer!

I ended up chatting with my neighbor for quite a while. She gave me 3 zucchini since I had to pull all my plants. That was so nice of her! I’m going to enjoy those!

I also pulled the peas and replanted some squash I got at Lowes. We will see how that goes!
 

Winchester

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Not to mention how you can expand your vocabulary when you discover a new bug chowing down on those plants that you worked so hard to get to grow.
Indeed! A few years ago, we had some gorgeous corn in the garden. Rick could barely wait to be able to harvest that corn; he was so excited. It had been a good summer, rain-wise and sun-wise, and it was all beautiful. And then one morning, he went up to the garden and saw that something had rolled in our cornfield. Whatever it was scaled the fence, landed in the corn, and proceeded to have a good time. It chomped a good bite out of every single ear of corn. Rolled around and broke every single stalk. We think it was raccoons. The language that came out of that man's mouth would have made a sailor blush. He used every cuss word known to man and then he invented some interesting new ones. I swear he was ready to bed down in the ruined corn field with a gun for weeks afterward, just in case those coons came back.

MoochNNoodles MoochNNoodles I'm so sorry about your garden. Your daughter is a real worker, bless her heart. She's going to be a great gardener.

The Japanese beetles have landed here. We put bug bags out, but they've stripped some of the sweet potato leaves and some of the green beans leaves. Our crab apple has been decimated. We could see them coming out of the ground.

I mentioned elsewhere that we picked another mess of green and yellow beans yesterday. Three zucchini and three yellow squash; one of the zucchini is almost too big to use; where that thing came from, I've no idea. I swear it wasn't there the other day! Rick also brought in three really nice banana peppers that I cleaned, sliced, and threw in the freezer. I love banana peppers.

Some of our tomato plants were mis-identified at the nursery. They're grape tomatoes. As they start to turn, Rick's been bringing them in the house, so they mature in the kitchen. They're really tasty, but I don't like planting grape tomatoes. I guess I can dehydrate them to make tomato powder.

Around here, Dear Richard is the gardener. That's his alone time when he's up in the garden, weeding or staking. He loves it up there. While I like to garden, too, it's pretty much his domain and I've accepted that. His maternal grandfather had a huge truck patch when he was alive; that man dearly loved his garden. And I think Rick feels close to his grandfather when he's working. And to be a little honest, I think it's partly his church, too.
 

NY cat man

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Indeed! A few years ago, we had some gorgeous corn in the garden. Rick could barely wait to be able to harvest that corn; he was so excited. It had been a good summer, rain-wise and sun-wise, and it was all beautiful. And then one morning, he went up to the garden and saw that something had rolled in our cornfield. Whatever it was scaled the fence, landed in the corn, and proceeded to have a good time. It chomped a good bite out of every single ear of corn. Rolled around and broke every single stalk. We think it was raccoons. The language that came out of that man's mouth would have made a sailor blush. He used every cuss word known to man and then he invented some interesting new ones. I swear he was ready to bed down in the ruined corn field with a gun for weeks afterward, just in case those coons came back.

MoochNNoodles MoochNNoodles I'm so sorry about your garden. Your daughter is a real worker, bless her heart. She's going to be a great gardener.

The Japanese beetles have landed here. We put bug bags out, but they've stripped some of the sweet potato leaves and some of the green beans leaves. Our crab apple has been decimated. We could see them coming out of the ground.

I mentioned elsewhere that we picked another mess of green and yellow beans yesterday. Three zucchini and three yellow squash; one of the zucchini is almost too big to use; where that thing came from, I've no idea. I swear it wasn't there the other day! Rick also brought in three really nice banana peppers that I cleaned, sliced, and threw in the freezer. I love banana peppers.

Some of our tomato plants were mis-identified at the nursery. They're grape tomatoes. As they start to turn, Rick's been bringing them in the house, so they mature in the kitchen. They're really tasty, but I don't like planting grape tomatoes. I guess I can dehydrate them to make tomato powder.

Around here, Dear Richard is the gardener. That's his alone time when he's up in the garden, weeding or staking. He loves it up there. While I like to garden, too, it's pretty much his domain and I've accepted that. His maternal grandfather had a huge truck patch when he was alive; that man dearly loved his garden. And I think Rick feels close to his grandfather when he's working. And to be a little honest, I think it's partly his church, too.
Believe me, I was a sailor, and I knew guys who could go on and on and never repeat themselves. They could peel paint with their invective, and invent new variations on the fly. Never in my wildest dreams could I attain that lofty level of vituperation.
 
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