I have a friend that makes all natural beauty products. She does everything from soaps to repellants to lotions. Here's the web addy www.forclaudiassayke.com. I love her stuff. It smells good and safe for the kids. You can even use it on infants! And it won't sting on cuts of in eyes (when they wiggle while spraying:)I know it's not plants but until you find something check it out.

oops, was having one of my spells last night, & "keeping out undesireables" just made me snicker... I never have seen snakes in the compost, either; maybe the activity in the pile is too much for them. I usually find them in undisturbed places, like under the wooden pallets in the shed or in the bottom of soil-filled flower pots that haven't have plants in them for about a year. I wouldn't worry about these almost-always harmless creatures, especially if nobody's seen one in the area, & if I saw one, I'd leave it alone. Hardware cloth will keep out all but the tiniest snakes (hatchlings, which you aren't likely to have & which aren't likely to migrate to a compost pile anyway). Since your bees aren't aggressive types, like Africanized bees, they'll fly away when you start stirring things up. Just make a gentle start to turning the pile, so that they go away rather than get agitated. but I would be careful not to drown the bees; they are a gardener's friends (pollinators). I think as you gain more experience in the yard, garden, & compost pile, you'll become more comfortable with the critters we find "out there". The micro-critters in the compost have their place in the garden, the medium-critters like earthworms & bees have their place, & the macro-critters like snakes, & us, have their place, too. Best luck, & enjoy your garden & compost!

I use Bt in my rain barrels, which is what I use for hydro. It's also used in agriculture as a spray and is a pesticide of choice for many low impact gardeners. Now, much seed is now genetically modified with Bt (Monsanto). A dab will do ya. I use an 1/8th of a "donut" in my barrels. It's all about surface area rather than amount of water. Mosquitoes will breed in my ebb and flow system if I don't use Bt treated water. So I don't see why they wouldn't breed in the aerogarden. Of course, the larvae are easy to ID, so just check. They will be little things about a quarter inch or less long that swim by whipping their tails around. Bt only kills larvae since the adults won't ingest it.

It is in the grass. No, I haven't done a soil test. I could dig some up and bring it to Lowes or HD (think they test there). Much of the soil there has come from the bags you get at HD or Lowes ..I don't buy the cheapest but also don't buy the most expensive. Also, my son suggested maybe the horsetail came from a plant I purchased (could even have come from the soil I purchased) because nobody else in the neighborhood either side of me has it. They will if I don't get rid of it though. This is the 2nd year I think I've noticed it. I'm going to go outside (hopefully today) and dig up some of those weeds. I can't redo the beds right now but my grandson (15) is going to come by on the weekend and start digging up the ones alongside the grass ...I have some bushes growing there also. Q. Is it possible to leave the big bushes in the ground (the rose bush which is doing so well ...last year it flourished! and the hydrangea ) I can dig up the shasta daisy and the sedums bc I know they will come back, but I'm worried about the rose bush and hydrangea bush and the clematis. So Can I put cardboard around those plants????? This post was edited by nanaclaire on Mon, May 19, 14 at 10:33