First of all, plain footies or fruit sox as they are also called, aren't that effective, but in the last several years, people are using fruit sox soaked in kaolin clay. They are about 96% effective. Hardly anyone I know uses the plain ones anymore. You can buy the fruit sox already soaked in the clay, or do it yourself. I find them more expensive than ziplocs, but also more effective. Don, your climate is different than ours, so it might be a factor. The ziplocs close themselves shut at the bottom even if you cut out the bottom, so you have to keep opening them. Also, they sunburn the fruit. Many have a black quarter sized spot on them where the sun burned through. This is not such a problem with the fruit sox. The ziplocs are also more likely to be blown off the tree in a strong wind, because they create a small wing. I use both of them, and I find them equally worth the price difference. The ziplocs are cut to make sure that it can breathe and so the water during the summer can drain out. It doesn't rain here during the summer for a month in a row quite frequently. I wouldn't use a non zip sandwich bag. We get earwigs, but I don't think they eat the fruit. John S PDX OR

Hi Sheepie! Lots of rain has been falling north and northwest of us--has it been raining at your place the last couple of days? Hank, I've never used dental floss, but then I cage my tomatoes and don't generally have to tie anything. I just poke the ends of the branches back inside the cages when they try to "escape". I use various types of material in the garden to tie plants to fences, stakes or other supports, including jute twine, cotton twine, green velcro ties bought in a roll at the garden center, and old panty hose. I am a little concerned that something as thin as dental floss might cut little grooves into tender green plant tissue, though. Sheri, I think I will do another post on bugs in the garden in general, but let me say a couple of things quickly here. 1) Spiders are the absolute best thing to have in the garden because they are there for one reason and one reason alone and that is to eat insects. The spiders are your friend! Well, one year I had black widows in the garden, and I had to get rid of them, but other harmless spiders took their place and that was fine. 2) If you have a lot of pest bugs in the garden, you need more bugs and not less. Are you seeing any lady bugs or green lacewings? If so, that is great. Like spiders, the lady bugs and green lacewings are there to eat pest bugs. I bought those little bags or cartons of lady bugs at nurseries several years in a row and released them into my garden. I now have a healthy population of ladybugs and no longer have to buy any. The ladybugs and the green lacewings (I only had to release them one year to build a good population) leep most pests under control. 3) Most ants in general are good for the garden. They scavenge and remove dead bugs, bug eggs, etc. Some of our tiny native ants prey upon imported fire ants. I have two harvester ant beds right outside my garden and they are a huge help to me. I do treat with Safer organic fire ant bait for fire ants in the garden. Try to think of ants as an important part of the natural pest control system. 4) If your tomatoes have obvious insect bites on them, I would look for green tomato hornworms (I have had one monster-sized one strip an entire plant bare this week, including eating most of 4 tomatoes that were the size of tennis balls) or for stinkbugs. It is just about stinkbug time here. 5) Crickets and grasshoppers are a very complicated problem. I'll go into them on a separate post specifically about them, so it will be easy for someone to find later on if they are doing a 'search' of this forum. 6) Flies are a nuisance. I have never worried about them or tried to get rid of them, but then I am in horse and cattle ranch country where the flies outnumber the humans about a billion to one. 7) Caterpillars are complicated. The easy way to deal with them organically is to use Bt, a bacteria that kills any caterpillar, moth or butterfly that comes into contact with it. Bt is an organic product and is often found in products labeled 'Caterpillar Killer'. Because I love the butterflies and moths, I quit using Bt several years ago. Whether to use BT or not is an individual choice and I respect anyone's right to use it to rid their landscape of caterpillars. I prefer to not use it on our property, though, and just handpick caterpillars that have become a problem. It is easy to see bugs in the garden and get panicky and want to get rid of them all. I understand that. I have been there myself. When I was a young child, my dad sprayed DDT and other poisons to rid his garden of bugs. When I was a teenager, my dad sprayed religiously with Kelthane to get rid of the spider mites on his tomatoes. When I was a young woman in my 20s, with a family, home and garden of my own, my dad used Sevin dust as a multi-purpose bug killer. I tried his methods when I was in my mid- to late-20s and found they really didn't work. I started looking for a better way. It took me a few years, but I finally got it right. I'll describe it in the post I write in a few minutes about bugs. I'm not saying my way is the best way, but it is the best way for me and for all the critters who share this piece of land my family calls home. Dawn

Talk about your odd ball roses! That Kolkhoznitsa is wild and crazy! Love that spray on Nimbus and the deep color of Rembrandt Van Ryn!

I have made tomato cages out of cattle panels using bolt cutters to seperate sections of panel. each cage has four sides with I believe two square 6" sections. I take off the bottom row of wire and middle bottom upright wire to allow legs which can be inserted into ground for firm footing. I get enough sections for two cages out of each panel making each cage about 10-12 bucks each. I wire the panels together using a half inch pipe and wire around the pipe to allow the sides room to collapse and fold up. I let one corner free so that they can be unwrapped from around the plant come fall and moved to a new location the next spring so you can rotate sections of garden for tomato patch.