July 27, 2014

garden bugs!

All of these are beneficial bugs. Great pollinators. Ooops, wait a minute. I just looked up that pretty grasshopper. I read that grasshoppers are terribly destructive pests in vegetable gardens. He’s on my basil. Maybe THAT’S who’s been eating my basil. I’ve added slug pellets and they are not slowing the damage. I am reading there’s not much you can do about grasshoppers as they are so mobile. BIRDS! come here, birds… PS. BugGuide says the pretty grasshopper is a Scudderia. They are herbivores, but don’t usually eat too much.…

July 11, 2014

the good, the bad and the ugly…… I am fighting garden pests

I have many crops doing great this year. At my community plot, where I have been gardening for about 7 years now, I have super potatoes, tomatoes, onions, garlic, and winter squash. Only minor problems there, including a few Colorado potato bugs that I have been controlling by hand picking and some minor squash borer damage that I’m sure the plants can outgrow. Late blight can be a problem at the large community garden with lots of tomatoes. Its been confirmed nearby (on Long Island) already,so I will start spraying…

July 15, 2013

organic spray box for a community garden

Today I set up a box at our community garden containing organic sprays for gardeners to use. The box includes: – Precut 6 x 10 foot sections of row cover, – Baggies of Sluggo – A large, 1 gal sprayer with premixed Copper fungicide – Small spray bottle of premixed Oxidate – A bag of Dipel, wetting agent bottle and small sprayer Recommendations: – To protect against late blight on tomatoes: we recommend spraying tomatoes alternately with Oxidate and Copper, before every rain and at least every 7 days. –…

July 12, 2013

late blight – arrgh!

I got a notice today that late blight appears to be in our area. Its within 200 miles away – in Franklin County, western MA. **#@&!!! *^&&%%*!! Map: http://www.usablight.org/?q=map At our community garden, we had such a bad experience with late blight last year that we contracted to have late blight resistant tomato seedlings grown for us by a local grower this spring. (I wish I could find the newspaper article link – another **%^$@!) Our garden is supplying a few organic pest controls to all gardeners. Now that late…

June 6, 2013

fighting garden pests

Its that time of year….. – Slugs ate 80% of my red runner beans but none of my Chinese beans (thank goodness). Time for Sluggo. – Slugs are also eating my basil, and I’m finding baby slugs inside the lettuce heads when I wash them. I transplanted the basil to fill in the holes and sprinkled on some Sluggo. – Leaf miners are all over my beets greens. I should have covered them earlier, but did not. I’ll just ignore them and hope some new leaves can out grow the…

April 15, 2013

fruit trees sprayed with dormant oil

Today I sprayed my apple (dwarf Fugi) and two pear trees (a Keiffer and a Bartlett) with a dormant oil spray. I also gave one of my grapes (a Cabernet Sauvignon) a spray too. The buds are nicely swollen and I am pleased to see that there are a few flowers buds ready to pop on the pears this year – finally. (I have been pruning them wrong and removing the buds for 2 years.) It was a warm sunny day – up to about 50*F, and bugs just starting…

January 30, 2013

planning early for late blight

We had such a bad time with late blight at our community garden last year. This year we will be distributing late blight resistant tomatoes to any of our gardeners who want to give them a try. We have contracted to have 500 seedlings grown for us. They will be grown locally by Sandra at Underwood Greenhouses, a old greenhouse (circa 1905) in Belmont. Sandra has purchased all of the seeds and is planning to begin planting in March (I think). I am looking forward to photographing the process. I…

August 9, 2012

late blight hit my tomatoes

Today I found definite late blight lesions on my tomatoes. Several of them. Even on fruit. Sad. I removed all of the lesions and bagged them in plastic. I will leave the bag out in the sun for a few days to heat kill the pathogen, then I’ll dispose of it in my home trash. I also removed all of the larger tomatoes that seemed close to ripening. I’ll rinse them and let them ripen at home. I’ve been spraying with copper fungicide, so today after removing infected leaves, I…

August 2, 2012

trying to prevent late blight

On Saturday, I found what looked like late blight in tomatoes in our community garden. I have been watching for it since it was confirmed a week ago in a field a mile away. I sent a sample for analysis (to UMass plant lab) and late blight was confirmed on Monday. Since then, its amazing how fast the infection has spread. Five plots now have nearly dead tomatoes and gardeners are in the process of removing the plants and debris. Adjacent plots have early infections. My plot is on the…

July 25, 2012

late blight

I just got back from spraying my tomato plants. We had a little rain yesterday and I’ve been spraying with a copper fungicide after every rain to protect against late blight. My plants look really good this year, so I’m hoping for a good harvest before the blight comes in. The latest info on tomato blight is at this site: http://extension.umass.edu/vegetable/alerts/late-blight-alert-update Late blight was spotted early this year, July 3, in some commercial tomato fields near my garden and in other parts of the New England. But it seems that…

weeks and counting until my last spring frost