Of Importance...Praying Mantis Egg Case

  The weather has been plenty warm enough to plant the spring/summer gardens.  Mark has been building several raised gardens to go along with our in-ground plots.  These are being filled with mulch from the downed leaves (winter storm) and compost from our bins started last year.  There will be no need to buy the chemical-laden stuff this year which makes me elated.  So far, squash, potatoes, bell peppers and tomatoes have been planted with hopes of digging rows for green beans coming this weekend.   It is a lot of work but the rewards are great...fresh veggies without the high cost, getting a workout without a gym membership and lots of sunshine just to lift the spirits.  I guess all of the elation comes from memories of growing up on a small farm and the happy times as a kid.

 In one of the veggie plots there is a pear tree right smack in the middle.  When it was planted, I had no idea that my gardens were going to expand to this area.  The tree does not present a problem and actually provides a bit of cooling shade to some of the plants.  As I was looking at the pear blossoms, I noticed a bump on one of the small limbs.  Yep, there was a praying mantis egg case!  Yay!  I am excited!  I am in hopes that every last one of the eggs in this case would hatch to be a healthy critter.  That would mean that up to 200 praying mantids would roam the garden devouring all of the pests that intended to devour my plants!  After admiring the case for a few moments, I started to work again.

  On the west side of this same garden, there is a small persimmon tree that has seen better days.  In fact, I do believe it has met its demise so I started to remove it.  While examining the small tree for any life, I found yet another praying mantis egg case!  Whoa! That could mean up to 400 mantids!  My gardens would definitely benefit from this.  Needless to say, the persimmon tree (even though quite dead) will stay put for the time being.  That egg case is valuable if only to a gardener.

Last Year's Hot Peppers!

   Last spring, Darling Daughter brought me a couple dozen "hot pepper" plants.  She said there was a combination of tabasco peppers and scotch bonnet peppers.  Alrighty, then.  I suppose I never thought much about hot peppers as being anything but hot.  So....I planted hot peppers in the garden.  Spring turned to summer and that waned into fall.  Those plants made exactly five peppers and, believe it or not, the snails ate those.  Hmmm.  Something was surely amiss with the pepper plants but, since winter has a way of killing fragile plants, I dug up each of the surviving plants, potted them and stuck them in the greenhouse.  There, they sat besides some tomato plants that, on a whim, I dug and potted. What was I thinking?  These were just more things for me to tend over the winter months.  Sort of dumb.

  Anyway, come this spring, I planted all of those things back into the garden.  Surprisingly, the year old tomato plants bloomed and set tomatoes almost immediately!  Woohoo!  The peppers sat dormant.  Last month, however, as the tomatoes withered...the peppers started thriving!  Yes!  Now I had hot peppers....lots of hot peppers....too many hot peppers!  What can you do with an overload of the things?  I quickly found out that you do NOT want to put them in the dehydrator in the middle of the kitchen with no vent fan.  Nope..NEVER DO THAT!  EVER!  NEVER EVER!  Just take my word on it...don't do it.

  Thankfully, Darling Daughter made the offhanded comment that her pepper plants did not survive and she would love "some" peppers.  YES!  Tomorrow, a box of peppers is heading to her house.  I hope she is ready.  I have some sixty plus on the table and will pick that many more before sending the box to her.

  While the tabasco peppers are not extremely hot on the scale of "pepper hotness", those scotch bonnets rate pretty high up there in heat.  In comparison...using the Scoville scale, tabascos range around 30,000 to 40,000 while the scotch bonnets go at a whopping 100,000 to 350,000 (heat units).  Yep, that is quite a difference!  

  Being as this pepper is so hot, what in the world possessed me to even agree to have it in the garden?  Every time I am out there picking the peppers, I have to marvel at that fact.  What was I thinking?  No, I do not wear gloves to pick the peppers even though I strongly advise the use.  I am sure that some day I shall make the mistake of wiping the sweat from my brow and will regret the lack of good judgement.                            

We are friends!

   Since my days are back to being boring due to a torn muscle, it is pertinent that I find ways to entertain myself.  There is nothing worse than trying to confine a normally active person.  For the life of me, I cannot sit on the sofa and do absolutely nothing.  Sitting and I are not good at working together.  That said, I head to the gardens.  In the Small Gardens, there are any number of things that can hold the attention for a while.  While I cannot do much as far as tilling the soil or pulling the spent plants, I can, at least, pick the tomatoes. 

  It was when I was in the tomato patch that one of my friendly garden helpers caught my eye.  Most folks would claim that this little one is more of a pest but I do not see it that way.  Even though carpenter bees can drill holes in anything made of wood...the fence, the gates...even the Little Bayou House...their ability of pollinating tomato plants makes up for the negatives.  It is a fact that carpenter bees pollinate as well as bumblebees which puts them right behind honeybees in line of importance to a gardener.  

  The bee this morning was just lounging about on one of the boards that line the pathway through the vegetable plot.  It was soaking up a bit of sunshine before starting its day.  Well, if the bee needed a few moments to get its act together, I may as well join it.  Plop!  I sat down next to the little cutie and started conversing (one sided, of course) with it.  The bee leisurely crawled about on the board then up on my hand.  Sweet!  The two of us sat there...alone in the world (or at least the garden).  

  It is nice to be able to share a bit of "quality time" with the critters I find in the gardens.  Not many folks make it down to the Little Bayou House to visit so I tend to pour out my troubles, share my ideas or make small talk with whatever critter happens to linger long enough.  We are friends...those critters and I...we are friends.

Inside Wishing to be Outside

  The past four weeks have seen me "trapped" inside the Little Bayou House.  It is not that I could not leave but rather that I knew that I had better not venture out too far.  Why?  Because, if I did, I would not want to come back to the task at hand.  The upstairs rooms were in dire need of repainting and reorganizing...neither of which were something I wished to attend.  I would have much rather been outside working than confined to the house.  

  In that month, things outside have changed.  Of course, it has gotten a LOT hotter, there are a LOT more mosquitoes and there are a LOT more weeds!  The garden plots need help!  I took a few moments this morning to check for more ripe tomatoes and realized that the vegetable garden was greatly resembling a flower garden.  Four-o-clocks had sprouted up everywhere and were nigh on three feet high!  Hot pink blooms were still open this early and were flooding the place with a delightful scent.  Petunias had also made their appearance and were mingling with the tomatoes.  Oh, goodness!

  I still have a few more days of "finishing" touches to add to the room upstairs then I shall be out and about again.   My brain is counting the hours as I cannot take much more of this inside work.  Give me the "great outdoors".   I am tired...tired of being inside looking out.  

"Red Bird Pest Control"

  To my way of thinking, the best pest control is free pest control.  In the past, I used all sorts of sprays.  I admit it.  It was terrible but I did it because that was what I was told to do.  How do you get rid of caterpillars in the garden?  "You spray them."  It was ridiculous, expensive and probably killing a lot more than caterpillars...me included.  So...I quit.  Then I went the whole routine of companion planting, herbal sprays and soap.  None really accomplished what I wanted.  I wanted the caterpillars to stop eating my plants not be clean, smell like garlic and live in a flowery world.  I wanted them gone!

  

  Today as I was planting squash seeds, I heard a fluttering of wings.  Just a few feet from where I was working, a male cardinal flew to a tomato plant.  I knew there were some caterpillars already munching the leaves so was elated to see the bird there.  Yep, that fellow snatched a caterpillar and flew off to the east.  I figure there is a nest of little ones somewhere near the greenhouse.  Within a few minutes, the bird was back!  Oh, this was great!

  All in all, the bird made about a dozen trips to the tomato plants.  Each time, he flew back eastward so I think he was successful in finding food for his offspring.  This...THIS...is the type of pest control that I have been wanting!  Effective, free and pretty!  My goodness, it cannot get any better!

Smelly Helper!

   While it still seems early for insects to be devouring the garden, they are.  You would think that not many could stand the chilly weather but my cabbages, broccoli and cauliflower will beg to differ with that idea.  I can handle the caterpillars or cabbage worms as they are easy to spot and, also, the wrens love them.  They are not the problem.  The worst is the cabbage aphids (often called plant lice).  Those little critters can suck the life out of a broccoli plant in a few days.  Plus, they just keep on multiplying.  It is an endless task trying to beat those little suckers.

  Then...today, a helper came to lend a hand and I am in hopes that many more will find their way to the garden.  I was sitting on the front steps as I sipped a glass of water.  I had been planting blueberry bushes and, well, digging that many holes is a tad difficult.  As I was resting, I noticed a slight movement to my left.  There, a pretty little green bug was trying to dry its wings.  Oh, my goodness!  The warmth of the bright sunshine had brought out a lovely Stink Lacewing.  (A not so lovely name for the pretty little thing but they do smell bad if you poke at them.)  The Lacewings are garden helpers in the best way!  They eat a ton of pests.

  I watched as the little thing sunned and tested the area with its cute antennae!  Once its wings were stable, the lacewing took flight over the garden fence and to the broccoli!  I can only hope it has a ton of siblings as there are enough aphids to feed an entire army of them!  Carry on, Stink Lacewing!  Carry on.

Wee Finds In The Garden

  Before finding the wasp nest yesterday, I had made a lovely discovery in the far corner of the garden.  While down on my knees weeding where the squash used to be, some tiny fungi caught my eye.  The wee things always are a source of interest so I made a mental note to bring the camera back into the garden once I completed my task.  Well, needless to say, the encounter with the wasps wiped the brain clear of any finds.  This morning, however, getting pictures of the fungi was first on the list of things to do.  Photographing the tiny things was no easy task as the mosquitoes were trying to eat me alive but patience was the key.  

  Bird's Nest Fungi are odd looking things.  At first, they are tiny, brown nodules that eventually develop creamy white sheets across the top.  As the days go by, the membranes split to reveal the "eggs" or spores in a nest shaped bowls which gives the fungi their funny name.  Contrary to what was once thought, the cups do not "shoot" the spores out but raindrops bounce them out of the cups.  The spores drop to the ground and then new fungi sprout.  This creates clusters of the tiny cups in shaded garden areas that are heavy with mulch.

  I have heard that a lot of folks try to get rid of the bird's nest fungi from their mulched areas.  This, is something that confuses me as the fungi is actually creating fertile soil from the mulch which is a win/win situation for true gardeners.  I have no problem with the (literally) pea-sized fungi.  They do not smell bad like some other mushrooms and are creating nice soil for the garden.  They can stay in my gardens!

Wasp Attack!

   After yet another sleepless night, my morning was spent cutting out most of the summer garden.  The rains have done it no favors as the plants are huge but not bearing fruit.  Tomato plants are not supposed to be ten feet tall!  All was going well with wheelbarrow after wheelbarrow full of debris being hauled to the compost.  Finally, all that was left was to do a bit of weeding.  Mind you, I had been twisting and turning every plant in the garden up until this time.  The weeding should have been a breeze.  Right.

  Five minutes into weeding, I grabbed a handful of errant chives and felt the telltale zap of a wasp sting.  Thinking I had inadvertently grabbed a ground wasp, I actually apologized "I am sorry little lady!  I did not mean to grab you."  But it was not a solitary ground wasp.  Time and time again, I was zapped!  Oh, my.  Stepping back, I tried to find the nest.  There had to be either a yellow jacket nest (in ground) or a paper wasp nest somewhere nearby.

  Five stings later and I found the home of my attackers!  In a non-used birdfeeder, a red wasp nest was highly concealed.  Around it were dozens of wasps just waiting to protect their nest.  Ok, so now that I knew where it was, it was time to go dunk that welt covered hand in some vinegar.  About a half hour later, the wasps were all dead thanks to some well aimed bug spray.  The garden is a safe place once again and I am happy to say that the vinegar worked quite well at soothing the stings and relieving the swelling.  

Slow Growers

   Ahh, yes!  Even though the weather is getting a tad too warm, the green peas are finally blooming!  The seeds were planted months ago and promptly sprouted.  Then, a spate of inclement weather set in and the plants sat at three inches tall for over a month!  They did not grow at all.  I fertilized, weeded, mulched and provided a lovely fence for them but they sat idle.  I was a tad disappointed, to say the least.  To me, there is nothing more pathetic that those who do not even try...plants included. Then, suddenly, a growth spurt came and the fence is starting to be covered and, better yet, there are blooms!  I can already taste those fresh green peas!  

   It is sort of funny how plants let you know when they want to grow and when they would rather not be bothered.   It was the same with the cabbages, mustard greens, broccoli, cauliflower and spinach.  It took forever for them to mature but, oh, when they did, we ate fine!  The carrots, on the other hand, are still tiny.  Hopefully, they will be inspired by the peas.  Here it is time for the spring garden to be put in and I am still waiting for the winter garden to do its thing!  Hurry it up a bit, plants!

Of Cabbages and Hurricanes!

   Mentally, it was important for me to take a few moments break from hurricane cleanup.  This is going to take several months with only Son and me doing the work.  Both mentally and physically, it is exhausting work.  Mark will be back working and won't be able to help.  Son and I will work as a team and do it but breaks now and again help us regain the gusto that will help us win.  Yesterday's break came in the form of clearing the small vegetable plot. Yes, it was still clearing hurricane debris but, at least, this had a different motive.  I wanted to check on my little plants.  Just days before Zeta hit our area, I planted broccoli, cauliflower, cabbages and mustard greens.  I was not even sure if the plants were still there or if the seeds had sprouted.  Limbs and debris totally filled the small garden.

  After removing the large limbs and some roofing from the greenhouse, I was ready to start searching for my little plants. Carefully raking between (what I thought were) the rows, I started finding plants!  Green, green plants had survived the onslaught!  It was almost overwhelming to find something living since we have been dealing with a lot of death lately in the form of dead plants and animals.  Now!  Green! 

  After my afternoon's work, I finally have the garden space somewhat cleared and I am overjoyed that only one cabbage plant was gone.  Life is good.