Gardening is a constant flow of learning. Each lesson imprints important information that you should remember from that point on. Lessons on life, perseverance, and faith cause one to draw on patience and a positive attitude. Just when you think you have the whole thing figured out, something changes.
Last Week’s Lessons—–
- Lady Bugs have wings and will easily fly away when you release 500 of them from a tiny cup. Without tiny brands on their butts, your neighbor will enjoy your tiny little predators.
- Aphids feeding on roses treated with systemic insecticide will disappear quicker than your Lady Bugs.
- LB’s left to feast on aphids will leave when the aphid supply dries up.
- The hundreds of birds attracted to Winterpast with food, water, and wren-tals (bird houses — rental — wren-tal — get it?) find LB’s a tasty treat. Basic biology and the food chain.
And so it goes. I never understood those lucky souls who claim to purchase Lady Bugs each year and find them to be beneficial. If you already have Lady Bugs in your yard, it’s good and bad. The good is that they are there. The bad is that there’s enough for them to eat.
APHIDS!!! EWWWWW!!!
This years Lady Bug experienced ended up as a big fat loss of $17.00.
When thinking about benefiting from this cute little bugs, remember that the larval stage is the one that does the majority of the feasting. If you are lucky enough to have larval Lady Bugs, it means they like your yard and will stick around. Otherwise, don’t waste your money. It’s a romantic idea that doesn’t always work well.
On to the Praying Mantids. This little experiment turned out to be a dud, too. Another $17.00 down the drain. Their hardened-foam egg case is gorgeous. It’s comfy on its little bed of sawdust. It’s been laying there for one week now. Nothing. Not any sign of life. A complete dud.
Buying Insect Beneficial’s can be pretty tricky. There’s no guarantee that the store took care of the insects as instructed. Whether my egg case got too hot or too cold, something happened to prevent the hatching of the tiny little Praying Mantids. Very disappointing. I’ll give it another week, and then, the nursery owner and I will have a little chat.
I wish I could say that I KNOW the microscopic nematodes took off and are thriving. We followed the instructions to the letter, soaking them for exactly 50 minutes in three gallons of water and then watering them in under our apple trees. Not sure that we’ll ever know if they took off to do their work. I’m choosing to believe that they’re killing Coddling Moth Larvae as we speak.
On a happier note, when Miss Lady Bee, (teacher of all new BEEK’s), came to see our hive, we had some important questions. Would granular Bayer Systemic Rose Food and Insecticide hurt our hive? To our excitement, we learned bees don’t like roses and won’t be harmed in the least. Happily, we gave each rose a dose of food and aphid killer. Pretty sure that finished off the remaining Lady Bug we had left. The roses sure look great as they begin to bloom.
HHH has been enjoying the manly-man chores in the yard. After planting eleven new roses, he’s spread about 100 bags of bark here and there. He’s on top of watering, while looking for broken sprinkler lines and emitters. From dawn ’til dusk, he’s out there dreaming up ways to make Winterpast even more of a show piece than she already is. The gardens have never looked so beautiful.
With a family reunion for 75 guests coming up in August, we have our work cut out for us. The seedlings are maturing and some are even blooming now. I still have a hard time believing I grew four outrageous tomato plants from tiny little seeds. They are so healthy, they put the store plants to shame. Similar plants in the garden center are now priced at $20.00 each.
HHH and I will be embarking on a new adventure starting August 4th. With our deep love for gardening, we’ll be returning to college. We’re now enrolled in the Home Horticulture Certificate Program, which is a prerequisite to becoming Master Gardeners. Co-ed honeymooners. Absolutely delightful.
Whatever you do today, remember that when you stop having new interests, you begin to decline. There are so many wonderful hobbies to enjoy in this world. Find something that interests you and run with it.
More tomorrow.