Tips for Week 26 in the Zone 9 Garden

Posted on June 24, 2015 by Jay White

Can you believe half of the year is already gone? I can’t. I saw an article yesterday that said we have reached the point in the year where our days will become 1 minute shorter each day from now until winter. That means that preparations for the fall garden are just around the corner. Until then, here are a few things you can do to start winding down your spring garden season.

Sunflowers are some of my favorite flowers. Mine are beginning to bloom. Photo by Sally White

Pest Control

Use flour and wood ash for insect control– OK, I am not sure this works because I have never tried it. However I recently visited with a man that has been growing organically for a lot longer than I have and he swears by it. He said he mixes a grocery bag with five pounds of flour and a shovel full of wood ash. He then throws it on everything to control caterpillars and squash bugs. I would love to hear from any of you who have tried this or other organic bug control remedies.
Smother weeds when possible – Plants need air, light and water to grow. Remove any of these from the equation and the plant will die. If you have fallow ground cover it with heavy cloth, mulch or building material to deprive weeds of the light they need to germinate
Solarize future planting areas – If you are going to till and plant a new area in the fall, mow it shortwater heavily and cover with 6 to 8 mil poly. Secure the edges with soil or lumber. The hot Texas sun will raise temperatures under the poly to over 140 degrees. This is hot enough to kill almost every plant and weed seed that is trapped under the cover

All of the rains of the past couple of months have delayed my tomatoes. I am pleased to say I am finally beginning to bring in a few each day.

Vegetables

Plant fall transplants now- If you want to save a few bucks you can grow your own fall transplants. Start broccoli, cauliflower, collard greens, chard, Brussel sprouts and cabbage now
Place spent plants in the compost bin – As you pull up your spent plants throw them on the compost pile. Keep it moist and turn it regularly for best results
Pick tomatoes when they begin to show color-Nothing brings big pests like birds, bunnies, raccoons and possums into the garden faster than red, ripe tomatoes.

Marigolds and daisies are beginning to be plagued by spider mites. Dispose of infected plants in the trash.

Ornamentals

Pull up plants that are invested with spider mites-Marigolds are notorious for spider mite infestations. If your plants are looking bad remove them and dispose of them in a sealed plastic bag
Fertilize blooming plants – I use a finished compost to fertilize my flower beds. Along with feeding them it acts like mulch which suppress weeds and conserves moisture. I also make compost tea on occasion and apply as a drench. Feed blooming plants monthly through August

I share these posts on Our SimpleHomestead Blog Hop. Be sure to stop by. The “hop” has tons of great information from gardeners and homesteaders all over the world!

Tip of the Week – Week 21 in the Zone 9 Garden

Posted on May 20, 2015 by Jay White

It finally finished raining long enough for Sally and I to harvest the rest of the potatoes. While we were out there we also pulled our first cucumbers and picked a small mess of green beans. We just finished an amazing dinner of cucumbers and onions, green beans and an okra/tomato/sausage/smoked poblano concoction. Everything but the sausage came straight from the garden or the freezer. And that my friends is why I garden!

On another note, I recently read an article that said internet readers want their information quick and easy. With that in mind I am going to structure my weekly tips in a different format for a while. If you like it, or even if you don’t, leave me a comment and let me know what you think.

Vegetables

Pick Green Beans
Harvest and cure onions
Control aphids, thrips and scale insects with a strong blast of water. If this is not working spray entire plant with neem oil or a water/dish soap mixture
Harvest Potatoes-It has rained so much lately that it has washed much of the soil away from my potato plants. I literally have potatoes on top of the ground. This will cause two problems. First, the harvest is going to be a muddy mess. No way around this. I will have to dig them and then go directly to the hose for a good wash. I do not normally recommend washing your potatoes. When potatoes come out of the ground their skins are soft and can be damaged by washing. Damaged skins let in fungus that will cause the potatoes to rot during storage. That is why we cure them before we store them. To cure potatoes we need to let them dry in the hot sun for a few hours. All of this rain is causing an unusual lack of sunshine. Because of this I will have to figure out a way to move the potatoes into the garage for curing. This is a big problem for me because my garage is already covered with the onions that I had to cure inside because of the rain.

Ornamentals

Pull weeds while the ground is soft. Throw them in the compost pile if they have not set seed
Dead head zinnias and marigolds
Plant zinnias (Benary’s Giant are my favorites) and marigolds from seed
Plant Sunflowers-There are about a million different varieties of sunflowers and I grow several of them (my favorite is a double called “Teddy Bear” that grows on three to four foot tall stalks and produces gorgeous flowers). For the next couple of months I will plant more seeds every other week. This “two week planting schedule” will ensure that Sally and I have an ample supply of fresh cuts for our home right up to the first frost.
Plant Gomphrena (Bachelor’s Buttons) – I have two places in my yard where I grow gomphrena (Bachelor’s Buttons). Gomphrena is a great plant for our area because it can really take the heat and it will keep flowers until the first frost. Even though it is an annual it is a great self-seeder and will come back on its own year after year. That is, it will come back year after year as long as you don’t have free ranging chickens that scratch up all of the seedlings in your beds. That is what has happened at my house. Thanks to my chickens I currently have no gomphrena. So this weekend I will be replanting. Many of our reseeders (like gomphrena, zinnia, poppies and marigolds) can be planted by running a rake over and area and then putting the seeds out in a broadcast manner. Once the seeds are down, run the rake across the soil to lightly cover the seeds. Finally, gently water the area. Keep the soil moist until the little plants develop their first set of real leaves.

Lawns

Do not fertilize until things dry out. Nitrogen, moisture and cool temps encourage brown spot

I share my posts on the HomeAcre Hop. Be sure to stop by the hop. It has tons of great information from gardeners and homesteaders all over the world!

Organic Aphid Control

Posted on May 21, 2014 by Jay White

If you have spent much time in the garden, you are familiar with aphids. These tiny little pests are quite common and quite annoying. In fact, they are so annoying; lots of people call them plant lice. Aphids do more damage to agricultural and horticultural plants than any other species of insect. In fact, one species of aphid almost entirely destroyed the French wine industry in the 1870’s. They also contributed to the spread of the “Late Blight” fungus that caused the Irish potato famine.

Aphids do more damage to agricultural and horticultural crops than any other insect. Photo by Bruce Leander

Aphids have modified mouth parts that allow them to drill directly into the phloem and extract all of the rich carbohydrates and sugars that it needs from your plants. Aphid damage on plants can lead to decreased growth rates, curled leaves, brown spots, low yields and even death. To make matters worse, aphids are known to spread many different plant viruses. For example, the green peach aphid is known to spread 110 different viruses.

This rose bud is covered with aphids in all stages of their development. The white things in the pictures are the skins they shed as they go from one phase to another. Photo by Sally White

Aphid also excrete a substance called “honeydew” that is also harmful to plants. Aphids feed on plants the same way a mosquito feeds on you. Once they “tap a vein” there is so much food available, and it us under so much pressure, that the unused sap passes through their bodies and onto the plant’s foliage. This forms a sticky, sweet covering on stems and leaves that is a perfect host for mold and fungus.

Close up of aphids in various stages of development. Photo by Bruce Leander.

While there are lots of insecticides that you can spray to control aphids, organic control is usually just as effective. Believe it or not, the most effective tool you can use against the aphid is water. Aphids are soft bodied pests. A good hard blast of water can actually cause the aphid to burst open. Even if it doesn’t burst the aphid, it will knock them to the ground. The ground is a very bad place for an aphid. There are lots of things down there that will eat it. Also, since most cannot fly or crawl very fast, they will often die from exposure before they make it back to your plant.

Effective control with water in not a “one and done” job. If you want to keep aphids in check you are going to need to spray every three or four days. Also, since aphids hide under leaves at night and during the hot part of the day, you need to spray upwards from the bottom of the plant. This is very difficult to accomplish with a water hose. Luckily there are tools out there that can make this job easier and more effective.

As you can see, my roses are infested with aphids again this year. Photo by Sally White.

The best tool I have found is made right here in Texas. It is called the MiteyFine sprayer. The MiteyFine sprayer is essentially a metal tube with a special nozzle that is designed to apply the right amount of pressure (and use the least amount of water) needed to kill aphids. MiteyFine comes in 46” and 58” lengths. The light weight shaft makes it easy to handle and the design ensures that the water finds the aphids that hide in those really hard to get to places.

The MiteyFine sprayer is the most effective tool I have found for organic control of aphids. Photo by Bruce Leander.

I have met several people that are skeptical that water alone can control aphids. In fact, just yesterday I was telling a friend that runs a landscape business about the MiteyFine sprayer. He asked “How do you mix the orange oil in with the water?” No matter how much I swore that water alone was enough, he just didn’t believe me. If you are like my friend, and you feel like you have to spray something on bugs, then you are in luck. Orange oil, neem oil and lantana oil are organic insecticides that can all be sprayed on active infestations with great result. These natural oils kill by clogging the pores that the insects use to breath. However, just like water, you need to spray every few days and you need to spray under the leaves. Be aware that there are some predatory bugs that eat aphids that will also be killed by any oil application.

Lady bugs and their babies are voracious aphid predators. Photo by Bruce Leander.

Lady bugs are another organic aphid control measure that I hear a lot about. While it is true that lady bugs eat a lot of aphids, you would need a whole lot more of them than you can afford to control a good infestation. I have lots of lady bugs in my gardens. However, I still have lots of aphids all over my plants. I am not saying you should not buy and release lady bugs in your garden. Just be aware that they are not the panacea they are made out to be.

Ladybug larvae are often called “aphid lions” because they eat so many of the pests. Photo by Bruce Leander.

Even though aphids are a nuisance, there is no reason to let them ruin all of those beautiful plants that you have worked so hard to grow. With a little observation and a little perseverance, you can control your aphid problems with some very effective organic tools.

Ladybugs lay their eggs close to an aphid infestation. The larvae begin to feed on the slow moving aphids immediately. Photo by Bruce Leander.