Brassica musings
AmyinOwasso/zone 6b
7 years ago
last modified: 7 years ago
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Okiedawn OK Zone 7
7 years agoAmyinOwasso/zone 6b
7 years agoRelated Discussions
New Year Resolutions
Comments (15)OK Melissa, we can do our daylight countdown together. Naturally, it doesn't help my light-afflicted cause by staying in bed till 11am but, in these days of unemployment, I am loving my pillow. I also need to work harder (ahem) although the next skip arrives soon for the final death-throes of my home garden.Buy the lilacs, Melissa, and the paeonies. What else is money good for? Sherry, while you are 'fixing' your back garden gravel and paving, I will be doing the very same. I save 2pound coins in an old teapot (!) and am now up to almost 300 (6oo pounds! riches) - the new garden funds. Loving the blog too (although, once the gardening days get longer, I am betting the blog entries get shorter) Elemire, medlars: gorgeous flowers - weird fruit, weirder 'bletting'. Schisandra though - me too. Think we need two if we want the long strings of berries. Have been fancying this for my north wall for some time. Sandersonia....ah yes, I have also had it twice - each time for only one year. I tried to dig it up the second time but forgot exactly where it had been....and you remember those tiddly little rooty things to plant - totally invisible! Now consigned to the growing list of plants which I have failed with - along with gardenias, red echinaceas,cercis canadensis, zephyranthes, azaleas,phlox, hebes... Annececilia: pruning apples - although there are many, many books out there, you really cannot beat hands-on teaching. Until you find a good course or get a knowledgeable friend in, wait. The trees will not die if they never see a lopping saw or secateurs again. Sadly, in the UK, we have grubbed up many ancient orchards (philistine farmers, landowners) yet there are still century old apples and pears, blooming and fruiting, all over England. Pruning, training, shaping, mmmm, as an inveterate meddler, I LOVE these jobs. They should be approached joyfully, without fear and anxiety so dispense with worry, clear your head, sharpen your tools and jump in with confidence. Look upon it as a great experiment and take photos, if you can, of the bare branches. Step back from your work often and look again. When you have looked for a good while, make a cut, any cut. Then step back and look again. You can practice renovation pruning on some of the old gnarly trees and shape some of the younger ones into pyramids or standards. If you still feel anxious or uncertain, then wait and read and look some more - you have lots of time and apples (unlike cherries or peaches or plums) are obliging. Oh yeah, cross the weeding off the list - this is another futile, tedious job which we never really get on top of and it just makes us feel guilty. Those weeds are some creatures livelihood. Holley - yes, yes, yes - a greenhouse. Your life will be changed forever. I am in my third year of owning a greenhouse and, even though it takes up a QUARTER of my entire garden, it is a most wonderful investment (mine was free on freecycle so check those sort of things first - who cares what it looks like as long as it works. As for raised beds - my whole garden has been laid out on rubble with NO soil at all. Raised beds are the way to go - not so much bending, you can choose your soil, you can sit on the edges (for hours)and the soil remains friable because it does not get trodden on and compacted. You will never look back. Kim - aaaah. You have given us a few laughs and plenty good advice. Glad to raise a smile for you....See MoreCan I use rockdust on pH 7 soil
Comments (16)I have never used rockdust but I was curious about your question so I Googled it. It is milled volcanic rock quarried in Scotland. It is advertised as 'helping with poor acidic soils' which are pretty rare in UK gardens anywhere, and very unlikely in SE England. But you say you don't want to be told you don't need it, so I will refrain. Just going by what the manufacturers say, you shouldn't add lime as well as rockdust. Not because rockdust will raise the pH but because lime will 'lock up' the minerals in the rockdust. The application rate recommended by the manufacturers (and they presumably will be trying to get you to use as much as possible) is 1/2 kg per sq metre, so your 2 - 3 kg psm looks like way too much. I am just curious as to whether you have had your allotment for very long. Have you had disappointing yields in the past or are you trying to preempt hypothetical problems? If the latter maybe a year of growing in the conditions as they are will help form a picture of what your soil might or might not need. Regarding your other post about lime and clubroot. Does your plot definitely have clubroot or are you just anticipating that it might be a problem? The allotment site where I have my plot does not have clubroot. It is not inevitable. If your land does not have it already and you grow your own brassicas from seed you may never experience it. pnbrown - yes there is greensand in the UK....See MoreMusings on the SFG so far,,,,
Comments (27)Here are the primary methods of controlling earwigs & sowbugs so that they remain helpful scavangers & leaf-mold manufacturers rather than plant eaters: 1) Both earwigs & wood louses need moist tight areas to persist. Sweeping up wood mulches, getting rid of wood piles, & general clean-up, gives them fewer places to hide & breed. Also keep compost piles away from the main gardens. 2) Avoid pesticides & encourage a natural balance of insects with increasing numbers of predator insects. If you must use pesticides, do not permit the pesticides to come in contact with the garden, where beneficial insects will be the first killed, & harmful insects will be the first to bounce back. Take small milk cartons (or similar waterproof carton) & poke holes in the sides with pencil. Bait the box with bran & oatmeal or cream of wheat -- mixed with a powdered insecticide which states explicitely that it can kill earwigs. This is not the most recommended because ants & other insects may disperse the poisoned bait into the garden, but I know that toxin-reliant gardeners need to wean themselves & it's hard for them to go cold turkey, so the bait-box method is a bridging technique to going fully organic. 3) Encourage birds, which eat earwigs as though they were candy. Also encourage frogs & toads if you're in an area where that is possible. 4) Place a half-inch or an inch of cooking oil in a pop-can or a jar, & sink the jar halfway in the ground or lay the can on its side with the key-hole spout upward so the oil won't run out. Oily tunafish cans or catfood cans are short enough they wouldn't have to be sunk in the ground at all. Earwigs can climb glass & metal very easily, & will be interested in the odor of the oil. They will drown themselves by the hundreds in the half-inch of oil, which you will have to clean out every three or four days. You will know the first morning how well it's working. 5) Earwigs seek cover by daylight. Place two-foot-long scraps of soaker hoses around the bases of plants that have shown signs of earwig attack. Every morning, empty the earwigs out of the lengths of hose into vinegar or soapy water (the common recommendation to just drown them is folly; they can live underwater for half a day, & can climb out any time they want. Gilled sowbugs can survive underwater for several days, & leave at will). 6) Or, lightly dampen loose rolls of newspapers & place those near plants that are at risk. At dawn the earwigs will take cover in the newspaper rolls, which can daily be tightly wrapped in plastic grocery bags & discarded. 7) Plant Purple Pitcher Plants (Sarracenia purpurea ) in a boggy sun-garden. This is a prostrate pitcherplant & it catches primarily sowbugs but also beetles & earwigs. Each pitcher will be contain a huge amount of ground-crawling insects, but primarily sowbugs. Cobra Lily (Darlingtonia californica) is also good at catching earwigs, & will usually live in harmony with the purple pitcher plants though the cobra is more aggressive in its spread. Most other pitcherplants lift their pitchers high & catch flying insects rather than sowbugs or earwigs....See Morecool season Dawn bumps
Comments (1)Thanks again, Rick. What a lot of valuable information!...See Morehazelinok
7 years agoOkiedawn OK Zone 7
7 years agoRebecca (7a)
7 years agoOkiedawn OK Zone 7
7 years agoTurbo Cat (7a)
7 years agolast modified: 7 years agoOkiedawn OK Zone 7
7 years agoTurbo Cat (7a)
7 years agoOkiedawn OK Zone 7
7 years agoAmyinOwasso/zone 6b
7 years agoOkiedawn OK Zone 7
7 years agoLoneJack Zn 6a, KC
7 years agoOkiedawn OK Zone 7
7 years ago
LoneJack Zn 6a, KC