Well the cuke beetles have arrived here in southern CT, both spotted and striped have made their unwelcome appearance. My cucumbers are flowering and fruiting already, though, so they are stronger than if the beetles had gotten here earlier, as they did the year before last and ruined my whole crop. Last year, not one single cuke beetle did I spy. This year they are on the cucumbers and also the tomatillos. I have made the sticky traps with clove oil and sprayed with Neem, hoping for the best deterrent from the combination approach, although I more or less expect to see the cuke plants bite the dust from the virus that has surely been transmitted to them. They look GREAT right now, but I can only imagine what 3 weeks time will demonstrate. A second late planting might help me, but really it is almost too late for that in my zone.

Yay ! It was not too bitter. I ate some plain, and made some into a yummy cucumber marinated salad ala happy_fl_gardener (http://forums.gardenweb.com/forums/load/flgard/msg0511341123949.html), and still have some cucumber leftover ... it was big ! I have some feta, so greek salad sounds like a good idea. I'll post back & let you know what the next one looks like. Good to hear other's experience with how the cukes look and how fast they grow. : ) Thanks for the info on the treated wood. As my house is on only 1/3 acre, that fence belongs to my neighbor. But it is the only sunny spot in the yard other than a small space in the front yard, and the fence is very old so hopefully everything leached out of it long ago. However, I did use 4x4's to line the bed to keep the zoysia grass from growing into it (although I am wearing a path in the grass because I go out to the garden so often, I may not have needed the 4x4's LOL). I don't know if they are treated or not. Everything else I am doing in the garden is organic (no pesticides or fertilizers) so hopefully we'll be ok. I had no intentions of being a gardener ... my mom came to visit to go to a Yanni concert and the next morning she wanted me to go to the farmer's market with her so she could get some fresh veggies. They had little 4-packs of plants for $1 with 2 free if you bought 10. I thought "Hey, for $10 I could plant these cute little bitty plants and if they die I haven't lost much. But even if I only get 3-4 red bell peppers out of them, I have broken even." On the way home, as I read the plant tags I realized how much SPACE these plants would take and promptly gave 2 entire 4-packs to my mom and gave 2 away out of every 4-pack to my sister-in-law, which left me with 20 plants. It took my hubby & I several hours over 2 days to dig up the zoysia sod, then many more hours the next weekend to start digging and chopping the heavy compacted clay soil in our yard. The end of that weekend was about when I discovered the square foot gardening method. Since we had already dug down, I decided to kinda improvise my "raised bed" into a "ground level bed" and fill it with 25% each my clay, compost, peat moss, and vermiculite (I had read that clay soil is very nutrient rich). That is also when we found out that a friend had a little hand-held tiller which he let us borrow to finish. Wow, it was ridiculous how much easier that was than a shovel and a hoe !!! We finally got our little plants in the ground May 19. I have been super lucky ... the plants have been growing like crazy, no disease, hardly any pests so far, and all of the plants now have fruit/veggies growing (except the beans which I just planted 2wks ago and of course I won't know about the sweet potatoes for a while). Although, my $10 investment turned into about $110+ after buying the wood, moss, vermiculite, trellis netting, more seeds, and flowers. The compost I got for free from a horse barn's compost pile and the landscape fabric we already had a big roll of. The trellis support came with the house when we bought it ... we think the previous owners used it to stack firewood. My little garden is a little bigger than 2 foot x 18 foot and I have since added to the plants that I originally bought and am already planning my fall garden and planning a better gardening space on our land when we build our new house in 2 years. Maybe I do have garden pests because it seems I have been bitten by the gardening bug !! Thank goodness I already knew about gardenweb from frequenting the building a home, kitchen, bath, etc forums. A funny story about the sweet potatoes ... I had room leftover in my garden after going the vertical/square foot method, so I was trying to think of what else I would like and what else could be planted here this time of year. After much thought I decided to add sweet potatoes, 1 zucchini, and beans. The zucchini and beans were an easy trip to Home Depot for seeds, but where to get potato slips ? It was too late to start my own & I called all over town but could not find any. Finally, I searched out sweet potato farms on our local agriculture extension website and called a farm about an hour away to see if they had any plants ... "Hi, I'm calling to see if you guys have sweet potato slips for sale?" "Sure we do, honey, how many do you need ?" "Ummmmm, I think about maybe 5 or 6 plants" (at which point the lady started laughing at me on the phone) "Honey, we sell the plants for $21 per thousand, if you only need 5 or 6, just come by the farm and I will give them to you !!" Here is what I have growing ... we are growing for immediate consumption (no canning or freezing or whatever) 2 Cherry Tomatoes 6 Tomatoes (2 ea. Better Boy, German Johnson, Homestead) 2 Bell Pepper 2 Yellow Squash 1 Zucchini Squash 2 Cucumber 3 Cantaloupe (2 were in one square of the pack - I didnt have the heart to thin one out) 2 Watermelon 2 Eggplant 5 Sweet Potatoes 12 Bush Beans (with room for 12 more planted this week and 12 more planted in 3 more weeks) ... plus 10 dwarf Marigolds, and 4 Petunias ... and Nasturtiums around the outside of the bed June 7 June 17 July 3

My worst gardening mistake was when I was just starting, and had inherited an old, mature garden. The mistake was to get a lot of books on roses, and read them, and believe what they said! It took me a while to learn that only LOCAL advice re the size, habit, health, & pruning needs of roses was of any use (most of the books I got were written in England or the US East Coast - both equally useless as to facts about how roses grow here, but gorgeous pictures, etc.). The books were so authoritative, and stated things as facts, period, without any qualifications (except for Graham Thomas, bless him, who always said that this is what this rose does where I garden, but I have heard that it behaves differently elsewhere...) that I was intimidated into believing them. Only after years of having some of my ancient roses identified by wonderful people on this forum did I realize that they were not freaks of nature, but behaved exactly as you would expect such a rose to behave in our climate... Knowing how ignorant I was, and wanting so much to take good care of the garden I had inherited, I also unfortunately took the advice of the ARS and others about the need for spraying constantly, but only for one or two years - it was just too silly, and too much work, and I gave up. Then all of the bees and butterflies, etc came back, and the roses were still happy. So, the main lesson turned out to be to trust your own eyes about what is going on in your garden, what grows & doesn't grow, and what you like & don't like, and don't take any advice unless it is LOCAL! Jackie

Elizabeth girl, you know if I could I'd be right there with you... You hang in there all will be fine. You are a strong willed person and you will make it through all of this. Glad it is looking up on baby's toe, I know how worried you were about that. I figured you were too busy to call and I was right, forgot you got the new house. Good luck with the move, sorry it is such a crazy time for you, but I know you well enough to know you will make it through all of this no matter how trying it feels. Don't lose hope, and don't let your self get down in the dumps over the move and David's appointments. Take one day at a time and if a box doesn't get cleaned out today then there is always tomorrow, or even next week. And ask for help! Don't let yourself get overwhelmed when you can get help. You have many thoughts and prays with you at this time. Take a deep breathe, get a Mt. Dew, sit down relax,or better yet go take a nap! You need to get some rest, it won't do anyone any good if you burnout trying to do it all all on your own. Happy belated Birthday, and remember you are only as old as you feel! Best wishes for you and yours! Call me when you get a new number! Fran