The Gardening Thread

[Fishwhenican]

Sorry to hear about your garden pests!

I actually broke down and tilled the garden and planted some corn beets and sunflowers a little over a week ago. Nothing coming up yet but it will be interesting to see if the deer leave it alone or just eat everything to the ground.

[thedorf]

[ QUOTE ]
Something is eating and killing my sunflowers.

[/ QUOTE ]

Same thing happened to mine when they were very small. Was talking to a friend about it and he said it's squirrels. That made me happy because I think I've got a solution for squirrels. It's called liquid fence. I've been using it on my main garden plot and haven't seen a bunny or squirrel since. Also, its active ingredient is putrescent eggs so i don't feel bad about spraying it around. I don't like nasty chemicals floating all over the place but this stuff seems pretty benign. you can get it at the hardware store. sorry, don't know a thing about potatoes

[fyodor]

I'll check it out
thanks

[Fishwhenican]

Garden update:

Well, looks like the sunflowers and some of the beets are coming up nicely. Still no sign of the sweet corn though and I fear that it was drowned out or something?? Shortly after planting things we had a LOT of rain which I thought would be OK but no sign of the darn corn!

Now I am unsure if I should try planting some more now or just still give it time and wait???

We did have our poppies bloom on one of the flower beds which is just a beautiful thing! Crazy thing, though, is that while we have them blooming and growing well in one bed the other bed where they are planted did nothing this year?????

[fyodor]

I couldn't find 'liquid fence' but I found something that was mostly made from capiscan that was supposed to be good for 30 days. It worked for the better part of a week. Sadly some squirrel with a less than perfect olfactory system simply walked right in and decimated all but one of the sunflowers. It was the largest plant of the bunch so hopefully it is just too big at this point for squirrel food.

Better news in the rest of the garden where both the potatoes and peas have begun to flower.

[Myrtle]

Not to hijack the thread, but......

For the last two weeks all my spare time has been in building a 20' by 50' water garden.

It's been something that I've wanted to do for over ten years, this year is the year that I'm doing it.

Spent a couple of months getting myself educated.....reading, internet, visiting experts.

Took three days to excavate the hole with a tractor. (Fortunately, I bought one 10 years ago when adding two additions to the old palace. BEST purchase I've ever made in my life!).

Ran into two giant boulders which I could not get out of the ground, so the shape and depth is very interesting.

I've been taking pictures as I go along. I'd be happy to post them if someone would be so kind to PM me with the proper way to get pictures posted without screwing up the thread.

In any case, after a marathon last weekend, I now have the liner, pump, filters and waterfall in, and as of tonight (Tuesday), it is now filled with water, after filling it from Sunday on.

It's been a burner here today, and I actually spent some time wading in it to cool off. At its' deepest, it's three feet.

Now the real fun starts.....Landscaping. I really do love it, as it allows the creative juices to flow.

Tomorrow I order two pallets of stone to edge the water pond with, and I'll start that within a couple of days. I manage to steal some time off early in the morning (before it gets too hot!) to get a little work done on it every day. I'll try working on it at night, but that is determined by how much energy this old bod's got left in it by the end of the day.

One of the best benefits is this level of manual labor gets me in really good shape, once I get past the first week or so of aches, pains, moans & groans.

I've lost about 15 lbs. already, and waist size is down about 4 inches.

The only negative effect is that I have generated a swollen disc in my neck, and have lost fine motor control and most of the strength of the fingers of my right hand (fortunately, I'm a southpaw), so even typing this is an act of frustration.

In any case, sorry for the ramble. If folks are interested in my progress, let me know, and once I learn how to post so pics, I will do so, along with the tale of how it's progressing.

Myrt........

[dcasper70]

pm sent

Anything from Myrtle is good reading...