A Most Curious Observation

I have just come to notice that I have gone nearly an entire cauliflower/broccoli/cabbage growing season without a sign of cabbage worms. Usually by now those little buggers are wreaking havoc on my cauliflower, broccoli and cabbage plants by eating big holes in the leaves. And, usually by now I am closely inspecting the topside and underside of each leaf looking for the little buggers, cursing because they are making me search for them and then laughing triumphantly when I find one. "Bwaahahaha! I shall name you 'Mushy' and you 'Squooshy' and you 'Clyde'."

I wonder where they are this year?

The Last of the Sowing

Sowed my last set of seed on Sunday, 5/24. I got my corn, green beans and sunflower seeds into the new raised bed. As soon as I see sprouting I will plant the 2 new cucumber plants I purchased over the weekend. My original purchase died because I missed watering it for 1 day. The newbies are staying in the garage where they will be protected from the intense sun.

The peas and snow peas are finally getting tall and producing flowers. I hope to have something to harvest off of them soon. I need to harvest my cauliflower. Both heads are huge! I bought more coconut milk today in anticipation of making some yummy curried cauliflower. The tomato plants are already larger than their cages. I need to get the 2nd tier added this week.

I tried to divide and transplant some hostas today but after all the rain yesterday it was just too mucky. I succeeded with one. Will have to wait on the rest. The plus side to all of the rain was that it was "easier" to get the dead/dying Andorra junipers out of the front landscape bed. These have been dying because they are not getting enough sunlight now that the maples in front are large and casting a lot of shade. It was still a lot of work. I got all 6 dug out in an hour or so but that was all the work I could handle for one day! Not sure what I will replace them with...if anything.

Dave and I trimmed up the weeping cherry tree in front. It looks so much better now! I had let it get a little too overgrown. Now I need to figure out how to prune back the viburnum that are as tall as the house! :)

Today's Harvest - Broccoli!

Had some yummy homegrown broccoli for dinner tonight. It and the french fries were good. Too bad the burgers were pretty icky. :(

Almost Done

Dave and I build the last 4'x4' raised bed this weekend. This evening I finished filling it with dirt and humus/manure. I'm going to let the manure air out a bit and work it into the soil tomorrow after work. Then it should be ready for corn, sunflowers, cucumbers and green beans. That will mean the end of all of my hard work planting. Now it's just waiting to reap the rewards!

I did lose 2 more lettuce plants - 1 red leaf and 1 romaine. I need to do some research and find out what's going on. It's like the plant rots from the base. It's all mushy and white. Yuck!!

The broccoli needs to be harvested and I have at least 1 head of cauliflower big enough to harvest. One cabbage plant is coming along nicely but the other seems stuck in "beginning to form a head" mode. I had this happen with a plant last year. Very strange. Eventually it produces but it will be a while. I noticed that one of the pea plants flowered today. Odd because both the pea and snow pea plants are only about 12" tall right now. From past experience they need to at least double in size to produce. All of the tomato plants love their new home - they have all at least tripled in size. I really need to harvest more lettuce! It will be too hot soon to keep it much longer. Dave's hops plants grow like 3" per day. It's crazy!

Today was the first of some hot, sunny, dry days to come. I watered everything well and that took 5 or 6 trips to the rain barrel. I suspect the next several days will see me making 7-10 trips to the rain barrel. I need to get something that will allow me to lug around more water. Hmmmm....

Who Needs Gardening When There's the Final Frontier?

New...Star...Trek...totally...awesome!!!!

Uh, garden? What garden? Oh yeah...that thing in the back yard. I'll tend to it tomorrow (do think I lost my cucumber plant because I failed to water it before I left for work this morning. Wah!).

More Surprises

Not much gardening activity going on this past week. I did replace the Juliet Roma tomato I inadvertently killed with a new one on Monday. She is now in the ground and appears very happy. We had a lot of rain Thursday & Friday so everything's doubled in size. I checked my cauliflower and broccoli and the heads have tripled! I'm going to have to tie off the cauliflower leaves to keep the heads from getting sun scorched.

Today was a day of unpleasant surprises in the garden. I discovered that one of my healthy, large red leaf lettuce plants just totally collapsed at some point this week. The thing was soggy and mushy when I pulled it out of the soil. I don't know if it got too much water or what. Too much water would be odd for lettuce as the plants like to be moist. When I got back from a day of adventure with my mom I discovered half of another plant had collapsed. Same mushy, soggy mess. I threw everything away too afraid to put it into the compost bin in case the plant collapse was caused by disease.

Other than the lettuce disappointments, everything else seems to be doing fine. I wish the peas and snow peas were growing faster. They seem to be stuck around the 5" mark. Not sure if it's because they haven't grabbed onto the trellis or what. Dave's hops are growing crazy. One is particularly happy growing about 4"/day.

Took a prowl around the Americorps website yesterday in between rounds of migraine headaches. I found the PERFECT opportunity for me! A farm manager at Gateway Greening's City Seeds project. City Seeds is a 2 acre farm in the heart of the city used to help rehabilitate the homeless and sell good produce in farmers markets in low income areas. Too bad they are not currently taking applications. I'm going to keep my eye on this...may even inquire. The experience would be truly amazing and would actually make me feel as if I'm DOING something with my life...leaving a small imprint on this big planet. Yes, I could always just volunteer my time but with a more than full time job and a household, finding a few hours is difficult. Listen to me whine...If I want it badly enough, I will find a way to make time.

I took some pix of the garden last week. I'll get them posted soon!

Surprises

Sometimes garden surprises are good. Like yesterday when I discovered that I had planted carrots in the middle of the upper bed. Given the fact that I have only 2 carrot sprouts in the lower bed because the lettuce is CRAZY happy and choking off all sunlight to the carrot sprouts, I was thrilled to discover the nearly dozen sprouts in the upper bed. Yay - I WILL have carrots this year!

On April 25th Dave and I built another 4' square x 2' tall raised bed. I've been filling it with dirt and compost since (40-ish bags to fill one of these puppies up!). Yesterday I planted a grape tomato and Early Girl tomato into the new raised bed. I would have planted a Juliet Roma had I not accidentally snapped its main stem during transplanting. :( The replacement Juliet Roma is sitting on my back patio awaiting its transfer to lots of soil. Maybe if I get up early enough tomorrow morning I can get it in the ground before work.

Oh, and to carry the surprises into another day, I discovered that the Cupid's Dart that I thought had died is resurrecting itself. It's a miracle! ;) Unfortunately it's right by the snow pea sprouts and someone's going to lose the battle if I don't intervene. Even if I do, the surgery is going to be quite tricky to extract said Cupid's Dart without killing off a few snow pea sprouts. Then there's the matter of finding a spot for the Cupid's Dart since all spots are taken. But, let's get through the tricky surgery first.

I still need to find a spot for the cucumber and basil I purchased yesterday. The idea is to plant the basil in with the tomato plants because they make good companion plants - or so I read. The cucumber...I'm not sure. I may try potting it again this year and hope for the best. Last year I had cukes growing until the plant collapsed after a long weekend in Indianapolis. Maybe this year I can get ONE cucumber!

Catching Up - April 23, 2009 - Bee Speaking

Tonight I went to the Missouri Botanical Garden to see Dr. May Berenbaum discuss Colony Collapse Disorder as part of The Global Garden Speaker Series. Colony Collapse Disorder is the mysterious disappearance of honeybees. It was first reported in 2006 by a beekeeper who checked on his bees that were wintering in Florida. Inexplicably several of his colonies were gone with no evidence of what occurred. The worker bees simply vanished leaving behind the nurses and the queens to starve. The interesting part is that there are no dead bees found outside of the colony which is usually the case in a pesticide kill or disease. Since I first heard about Colony Collapse Disorder on NPR a year or so ago I've been very interested in the latest and greatest research. See, honeybees pollinate over 100 of our agricultural crops that we rely on for food. Their work is estimated to be worth about $15B (yes, billion) a year. Without honeybees we will not have any fruits or nuts and many vegetables to eat. Honeybees also indirectly benefit the dairy and beef industries by pollinating the alfalfa those animals eat. So, without honeybees, we humans are in a world of hurt.

Of course I've noticed the lack of honeybees in my garden. Seems like honeybees were much more prevalent when I was a kid. Turns out that honeybee colonies have been on the decline since mid-to-late century. According to Dr. Berenbaum, much of the decline started occuring in the late 1980's to early 1990's. At this time the government allowed honeybees to be imported into the States. With those imports came a new set of diseases, mainly viral, that have led to colony deaths. Also making matters worse are the African Killer Bees. Dr. Berenbaum said that all of the Killer Bees found in this hemisphere originated from one farmer in South America who wanted a more tropical bee to pollinate his fields. Unfortunately he chose a very aggressive bee that has spread rapidly. Our Western Honeybees cannot compete.

Of particular interest were several things: 1) We have not diversified our portfolio when it comes to pollinators. We basically rely on the Western Honeybee. Natural pollinators do play some role but not the $15B role honeybees play in crop pollination. 2) We know remarkably very little about these little guys. Very little research has been conducted. The honeybee genome was sequenced in 2007. 3) Of the research conducted so far on CCD, the results do not conclusively point to one single factor. Pesticides seem to be playing a part, but do not provide the entire answer. We know the newest set of pesticides in the neonicotinoid family do cause memory loss in honeybees but we had been using these pesticides for a while before CCD was diagnosed. Also, France outlawed this class of pesticides to prevent further decline but they have still experienced colony loss. Interestingly enough, honeybees have a very small set of genes (~45) that contribute to toxin removal. Humans have over 400! So, it seems that pesticides accumulate and exacerbate each other but it's not the entire answer. 4) A new virus has been discovered that is impacting bee populations - Israel Acute Paralysis Virus. As you can guess from the description, it causes paralysis in bees who then die outside of the hive. While research has found evidence of IAPV in many tested CCD hives, it also does not entirely explain the cause of CCD. 5) Since the honeybee genome has been sequenced, Dr. Berenbaum stated there has been research into the immune system and toxin cleansing genes. They are trying to figure out the switches for these genes and also to see if there is some genetic marker for CCD. Unfortunately those studies are also inconclusive at this time because the results came back indicating that the most significant variance was found not in the immune or toxin-cleansing genes but in a whole slew of genes that "we don't know what they do." Sigh...The presentation was absolutely fascinating and well-attended.

I should note that several theories about CCD were also very briefly discussed. Bees disappearing because of cellphone use - disproven. Bees disappearing because of genetically modified corn - disproven (corn relies on wind to pollinate, not bees; also, if GM corn were the cause, then Illinois should have reported CCD because 80% of the corn planted in IL is GM but, to date, IL has reported no loss of bee colonies to CCD). Bee rapture, that is, the disappearance of bees because this is the start of the Rapture - well, I suppose it cannot be disproven but how would you scientifically prove it? Sorry - no science = no proof = not a conclusion.

So, what do I think? Well, I kinda like the idea that Diana Cox-Foster and Dennis vanEngelsdorp presented in the April 2009 edition of Scientific American ("Saving the Honeybee"). Their research supports the information Dr. Berenbaum presented in her speech - that is, that pesticides and new viral infections alone do not completely explain the phenomenon. However, they also mentioned that our agricultural practices may be contributing to the honeybee's demise. Our vast expanses of single crop fields may not be providing the variety of food sources for honeybees (Dr. Berenbaum did mention our farming practices in relation to native pollinators). So, perhaps we are starving the honeybees with our monocultural agricultural practices and our neatly manicured suburban lawns with uninteresting flowers for bees. That stress may be triggering decreased immune resistance, or maybe decreased ability to cleanse toxins from the body, which are then leading to CCD. The article also mentions that studies need to be performed on honeybees and their reaction to travelling around the country to pollinate crops (did you know that every portable honeybee colony in the USA needs to go to California every year to pollinate the almond crop??!!). More work needs to be done and we need to find an answer soon.

So, what can you do? Stop using pesticides on your lawn! Start planting native flowers attractive to honeybees and native pollinators! Read up on CCD and understand the current research! Be skeptical when others try to convince you it's bee rapture or cellphone use or whatever! Write to your congressperson about funding research for CCD! Especially if your congressperson is a Republican. The Republicans pointed to a $1M allocation for CCD research in the latest stimulus package as evidence of pork! Dear Mr. or Ms. Republican Congressperson - Without honeybees we may have no pork...or veggies...or fruits...or beef...to eat. Bet you won't think it's PORK then! Support the Xerces Society!

SAVE THE BEES - SAVE THE CHEERLEADER - SAVE US HUMANS!!

Catching Up - April 19, 2009

Lots of rain! Both rain barrels are full although the new one is leaking around the dispensing hose. I don't think it's a matter of tightening the clamp either. Not sure how I will repair without draining the water. :( Luckily it's not a significant leak so I'll just take a wait and see approach. All of the rain has kept me from dividing and transplanting daylilies and hostas. I need to get this done before the weather gets too hot for me! I also still need to build my 2 new raised beds. The lettuce is looking good. So are the cauliflower, broccoli and cabbage. Haven't seen any pea, snowpea or carrot sprouts. Why are carrots so hard to grow!!

Catching Up - April 5, 2009

Today I dug up the pea and snow pea seedlings because I couldn't remember what I had planted where and I had forgotten to mark them in the garden! I reseeded and this time remembered to make garden markers AND document here (they are in the upper bed--peas on the left and snow peas on the right!). Last night I divided and transplanted a few more daylilies in anticipation of rain all day today. We also got 2 of Dave's hops rhizomes planted in a new raised bed (funny how the raised beds for the hops were done quickly with no whining...haha!). At least without the rain I was able to get carrot seeds planted and my 2nd rain barrel set up. Now I have 140 gallon rainwater storage capacity. Woohoo! I've started watering my houseplants with rainwater again. They'll be happy! Now, if it would only rain so I can get the 2nd rain barrel filled up I'll be happy.

Tomorrow I'll be putting plastic over all of the beds because of predicted below freezing weather with a chance of snow. I hope the weather people are lying.

Oh-Something got into the lower bed today and burrowed under my lettuce. I suspect a rabbit although none of the plants showed signs of "nom-ing." I have no idea how a rabbit would get into the bed because of the height we built them (4' square x 2' tall). Need to keep an eye on things! Maybe I can catch that wascally wabbit!

Catching Up - March 29, 2009

Who would have guessed snow?! Not me! Yesterday morning I was quickly rigging up supports so I could put plastic cover over the gardens. Luckily I found the right supplies at Home Depot - some 2 foot rebar and some plastic tubing that was already looped in a way that created a nice looped support. I was quite cold as I hack-sawed the tubing outside. I can't believe this because we got at least an inch of rain earlier. Anyway, I woke up this morning to find heavy, wet snow weighing down the plastic. My plan had only worked 1/2 way. Hopefully everything will recover. The yard is a mess from all of the precipitation (remember the erosion problem?) and they are talking about more rain all week! I need to get daylilies divided and moved, and the compost bin moved, and 2 more raised beds to make, and...and...and...How will I get it all done with all this rain? Guess I shouldn't complain. It will be dry soon enough. At least the lettuce is happy!