July 20. 2015

A recent question is "why my spinach seedling only get so tall then disappear".

 

I have experienced this with several seedlings also. The strange thing I discovered this bug on my Boc Choy roots that I had brought into the house to clean for dinner. An odd response from Deb when she was going to wipe some soil off of the stove when she realized it was crawling, got my curiosity. Luckily Deb is not timid. I sprayed neem oil that I used as a soil drench. It didn't touch them. Although I did not see them adversely affecting the boc choy, I was concerned. 

 

It wasn't until I noticed these same critters wreaking havoc on my carrot, radish, spinach, and beet seedlings that they really got my attention. There were hundreds if not thousands of them. I could not ID them but they looked like they belonged to the Lepidoptera family. My best shot, so I brought out the Bt (Bacillus thuringiensis) [a bacterium that is highly effective against moths and butterflies] and soil drenched them. Not all butterflies are adorable Monarchs. This  took care of them.

 

So if you are having this problem look very close in the soil around your seedlings and this may be your problem. They are very dirt colored and you need to watch for motion. It may take some patience.

 

On a lighter note I am having a bumper crop harvest of Sun Cokes or sometimes called Jerusalem artichokes. They are neither an artichoke or from Jerusalem.  They are the root of a North American sun flower. Very productive (35 pound from 6 feet). I should be harvesting them for a while.

 

One may ask “sun choke?”.  These are tasty little roots that can be boiled and mashed like smashed potatoes, chopped and cooked for a hash, roasted with other veggies, eaten raw or use them as a substitute for water chestnuts.

 

To the untrained eye they can be confused with ginger which also is a root. Oh how I wish I were that good to have this kind of harvest with ginger, ohhh maybe someday!

 

Yes the feel of spring is in the air. I have heard the Curved bill thrasher’s in spring chorus along with the cactus wrens doing their so familiar rattle. So spring planting is on the way. Of course all the fabric is out and ready for those chilly nights to come. I had some setbacks with my early tomato seedlings but I should be good to go by the first of March. 

 

Transplanted my bulb onion seedlings and I must say they are some very nice transplants.

 

The recent sunny weather has the peas blooming, beets and cabbages are sizing up, new seedlings of carrots, green onions, beets and radishes are up.

 

What a lovely time of year before our usual spring weather kicks into gear.  Happy gardening.

 

 

 

 

It sometimes is considered that if you grow organic that you are at the mercy of the elements. Veggies are scrawny, undernourished, bug ridden and generally unsellable. I can say from over several decades (since the 70’s) of organic gardening that none of these descriptions of organic gardening are true.

 

I will terminate a crop before I resort to ANY nonorganic practice.  There are a number of steps to proceed through in order to protect your garden from pests. Last Earth Day I printed out a cheat sheet that went through these steps. I am going to break this list into segments and reprint in this column. There will be four articles.

Organic pest control requires many fronts to achieve success. The very most important is soil fertility. Unhealthy plants from malnutrition will not be able to fend off any pest attach. Fend off means that it can outgrow any predation. “Feeding the soil and the soil feeds the plants”, THIS is the focus of organic culture, unlike traditional agriculture where everything is supplied with a complete fertilizer “pill”. The long term problem with traditional agriculture is soil fertility depletion which leaves the plants to fend for themselves as they might!

Building soil fertility is the long term requirement for organic culture. It is done by adding compost, green manures, cover crops, turning under the residuals of a crop or even just as simple as crop rotations. The idea is to build organic matter within the plant bed. Compost is an amazing substance that has been broken down by bacteria, fungus, and microbes. Compost can inoculate the garden with these pathogen fighting bacteria, microbes and fungus when it is added to the garden soil. The stuff is literally alive and always gives the garden a positive boost.

When you plant a “veritable dinner plate” for the world, even if you do not want them, guests will come. Once you notice “dinner guests” it pays to identify them and learn what you can about your “guests”. The idea is to find their weakest link.

This is why pest ID is so important. Most folks have hover flies in their garden and see them hovering about. The adults are pollinators but their young are a different story. The traditional name for fly larvae is maggots. This has a tendency to drive the YUCK factor. Hover fly maggots are incredible devourers of aphids and crawl around on the under sides of leaves (first thought they are bad guys) where the aphids are. Oblivious killing will help the aphids into a position of domination. They are not as attractive as a “lady bug” kind of friend but worth their weight in gold, that biodiversity thingy.

Determining whether the damage is cosmetic or detrimental (personal decision) is important. Cosmetic (no action needed) may be some chewing on leaves, whereas detrimental (immediate action) may be girdling of young seedlings by cut worms.