23,948 Garden Web Discussions | Vegetable Gardening
The active ingredient in AzaGard is azadirachtin which comes from Neem Oil. There have been mixed reports about its effectiveness against stink bugs. It appears to be most effective against them in the nymph stage, but it needs to come into direct contact with them to kill. How many stink bug nymphs did you see in your garden? I didn't even see the bugs themselves, but I did see extensive damage on my tomatoes and peppers at harvest. If you can't find them, you can't kill them.
An organic insecticide that is supposed to be a little more effective against them is pyrethrin. There are also traps that work like Japanese beetle traps, but if you look at the reviews they get on Amazon.com, you can see that most people didn't think they were effective.
The problem is that contact insecticides are not effective because of the bugs have hard coats, and they feed by piercing the skin of the fruit or vegetable, so they avoid most of the insecticide on the surface. They feed on so many different kinds of plants that you would need to treat everything in your garden to begin to make a dent. It sounds like the most effective control for home gardeners is growing trap crops (like okra or amaranth), using row covers and, from what Dave says, using a kaolin clay product like Surround.
Thanks for all the input.
Dave, thanks for the Kaolin advice. I have a ton of the stuff and I've used it on cukes to stop the cucumber beetles. Will try it elsewhere and see what happens. Any idea of whether it inhibits corn pollination?
Last year I spent every evening killing 1000's of the two types of beetles.
Scott
I agree with digdirt. It doesn't look like it but it still MIGHT be pressure treated, but it's doubtful that any poisonous chemicals are in high enough concentration to be of danger. Keep in mind, even an apple has arsenic in them! :) Here's my suggestion: take one of the boards and put a bottomless pot on it (like say an empty milk carton with the bottom cut out, or even a styrofoam cup.) Plant a few seeds in the pot of cucumber and beans. They will be your canary-in-the-coal-mine testers. Cukes and beans are very sensitive to chemicals, so if they croak shortly after sprouting they are probably being poisoned. If they live ...the wood is okay to use.
The old PT wood/lumber had a greenish hue. But what they have now has redish color.
Your neighbor's old fence has been weathered for years and supposing that originally it had bad chemicals, it has leached out already. BUT, i would not use that stuff anyway. You spend time and energy to make a raised bed/planter and it falls apart the next year or so.
Both HD and Lowes in my area are selling cedar lumber (5/8" - 5 1/6" x 6') for about 2 bucks. They are perfect for planters and small raised beds. I have used a lot of them.
Viroflay is an excellent spinach, especially for cooking.
It's sweeter than a lot of heirlooms, even when stressed. Warm climate winter growers love it because it has less of a chance of going bitter/strong during occasional high-heat events.
I've had friends grow it. The only knock from some of them is that while it's sweet and rather tender it can be a bit a thick (though still tender) if picked in the "baby" stage...but that's a positive to some and doesn't matter to those that grow it for cooking.
I've used hoop house to extend the end of the growing season, but this coming Spring will be my first attempt at extending the growing season from the early end using floating row covers for some crops and hoop houses for others, sometimes in combination with row covers on a particularly freezing cold night. So I'll have to get back to you on my results lol. But I don't see why it won't work, I've certainly read enough posts by others who have done so successfully.
Depending on what temp zone you're in you'll likely get some variance across the country in how much time you gain by using them. Soil temps, not necessarily air temps are really the deciding factor for a number of crops to get going in the Spring. I'll be happy with a month jump but if we don't have a particularly harsh finish to winter it could be possible to gain more than that, especially the ones used over raised beds. The use of the hoop house combined with the use of black plastic on the ground surface of the bed and possibly even wrapped around the outside of the bed structure itself will help warm the soil well in advance of any regular soil left to mother nature alone. That and the fact that my seeds are started with the use of a home made light rack and are grown in my greenhouse until it's time for them to be planted should help get them decent size before going in ground.
Lots of discussions about this over on the Growing Tomatoes forum here that you can read through. And how often you feed a plant depends on if it is in the ground or in a container.
But coffee grounds is hardly a well-balanced or even a good fertilizer. Whatever nutrients they might supply to the plant are minimal.
Dave
If you want to go an easy-peasy route, home depot sells fence panels that are all assembled and you have to do is come up with a way to put them up. Lots of different styles, but you will definitely pay a premium for them, cost of convenience and all.
My dogs dig voles that like the soil among the mature apple and pear trees, which makes a mess but is of certain benefit.
In the veg garden I use temporary chicken wire fences to keep dogs, cats and chickens off of sensitive beds.
One suggestion: Don't try to alter the current dog trails through your yard too much. Instead try to design around them, within reason.
I'd quit spraying the leaves with anything as coating the leaves only makes the problem worse.
It is one thing to spray plant leaves when the plant is outside exposed to the elements but indoors the spray coating only builds up and plugs the leaf pores.
And dish soap sprays unless carefully mixed and very weak can kill plants all on its own.
Instead just make up a diluted Neem and water mix in a bowl and gently wipe the underside of the leaves with a soft cloth dipped in it. That wipes off the mites at the same time.
But please understand that mites are very difficult to control/eliminate unless you use the chemical pesticides that are effective on them. So the plant may be a lost cause.
And yes, if you have other plants that are not yet infected, then I would toss this plant before the problem spreads.
Dave
Both varieties are currently only available wholesale to commercial growers (minimum order 1000 seeds). You can contact the distributors at the phone numbers on the link below.
Dave
Here is a link that might be useful: Outstanding Seed distributors list
I had contacted and bought some other seeds from one of the growers dealers to whom they sell, they didn't have either pumpkins and that is where I saw the listed two types and just had to get some seeds for them......sadly the price I would have to pay for a thousand seeds from the growers would break my piggy bank and I couldn't buy seeds for the rest of my gardens......I was hoping there was another dealer who might sell the seeds in a smaller amount.....though I think your right, I should call the distributor and ask if there is one of their dealers to whom they sell which might have them available to a "small" grower, in a "smaller" amount....thanks again "digdirt"....
You can't separate plants grown in rock wool since they quickly incorporate the wool cube right into the roots and base of the plant. One reason why onions and other root crops aren't commonly considered a rock wool crop since you have to sacrifice part of the edible root to get rid of the wool cube..
Are clusters bad? If you plan to harvest and use them as scallions, yes. If you don't care if they look like bulbs of garlic or shallots and are willing to sacrifice the immature ones attached around the core, fine.
Dave
I saved rosemary seeds and basil and holy basil seeds last year. I'd love to trade with you. I am just learning how to save seeds. I want to grow mostly heirloom plants. I didn't have much luck on the seed exchange here. I got alot of seeds that didn't germinate.
Zackey, my wife grew holy basil for the first time this past year. I really liked the flavor. I wouldn't have thought any kind of basil would make a nice tea, but I thought the holy basil made an outstanding tea. I just saw in Southern Exposure's catalog that holy basil is supposed to be a different species from other basils (O. sanctum instead of O. basilicum.) I wonder if that means it won't cross with other basils. I also wonder what kind of isolation distance is necessary to prevent cross-pollination in basils that can cross-pollinate. Zackey, if you (or anyone else) wants to e-mail me directly, I'd be glad to hear about your interests, idea, recommendations, to explore potential for trades, etc.
Anne, thanks for the suggestion. I am familiar with CFSA. As one of the farms that gave a pre-conference farm tour my wife and I got free passes to the annual conference one year, and we certainly hear about other things that CFSA does. I haven't, however, seen/recognized much in the way of opportunities with CFSA to connect with other seed savers, especially not the kind of small-scale seed savers that would presumably be more open to non-commercial kinds of information sharing and cooperation, etc. I think they host an annual seed swap, and I used to think seed swaps would bring a bunch of seed savers together, but my impression now is that seed swaps (speaking generally here about seed swaps everywhere) mostly just involve leftover and surplus commercial seed.
It will draw critters if you just dump it on top. If your compost pile is large enough, you could dig a hole in it and bury the chowder. Or, you could dig a hole/trench in your garden bed and bury it there. I sure wouldn't waste it. None of my leftovers go in the garbage can or down the disposal.
It will not harm your compost; it will decompose and become a part of the pile. As it decomposes, there will be a little more stench caused by the gasses released by the milk and fish. I would bury it in the middle of the pile to help control the smell. If critters get to it, they may mess your pile up, but other than that, I see no reason not to compost it.
That's interesting that you don't get them on your iPad sunnibel. If you look at the bottom of this screen you will see 'Learn more about in-text links on this page here'.
What you see is certain words within posts in a different colour and if you are unfortunate enough to hover your cursor near them an ad fills the middle of the screen making it impossible to continue reading the post until you click the x to close it. Even then often clicking the x makes it continue and you have to click again elsewhere to really get rid of it. For example a post about garden 'clean' up will cause an ad about a floor polish to fill your screen. They have annoyed plenty of other people.
Here is a link that might be useful: In text ads.
One thing annoys me about this 'sticky':
1. That it is on every page of each forum, not just page one.
Actually two things annoy me about this 'sticky':
2. That it is essentially an advertisement, not relevant to the topic of each forum and certainly not an attempt to preserve some of the valuable information or sage wisdom that drops off beyond 'page 67' every day, or even to be helpful to newcomers.
Actually three things annoy me about this 'sticky':
3. That it is just a repeat of a link from the 'What's new' section an inch above it!
I grew shallots from bulb last year with good sucess however the bulbs are pricy. I am in Minnesota so fall planting I doubt will work. I want to try these from seed this year. I typically start onions from seed in late February and work them under grow lights till they are ready to go outside. I am wondering if shallots from seed work the same way. If I do start them from seed will they have multiple shallots per plant or only one the first season?
The other day I started some corn salad in my cold frames. I will start some lettuce when a get a nice day. With things like lettuce (Most cold crop) the difficult part is to get the seeds germinate. Once you do that (indoor or in cold frame) they cane be transplanted into garden. Better yet, under a plastic hoop.
I stuck some mummified, sprouting, red potatoes in a pot, near a sunny window. They most likely won't survive. But I've got something growing! They are kinda leggie! :)