Love Apple Farms

Battling Pests with Beer, Diatomaceous Earth and Sluggo

This winter in the garden we have been battling slugs, earwigs, and sow bugs (also known as pill bugs or the childhood name, rolly pollies). They have been eating their way through cabbages, chard, beets, and many other crops. To save our plants from these crawling critters, we've had to pull out all the organic weapons in our arsenal.

First, we bought beer. No, the slugs did not drive us to drink. By burying small dishes at soil level in our garden beds and filling them almost to the brim with beer, we were able to lure the slugs and pill bugs.  They seemed enticed by the yeast smell.  After their beer fest, they then fell into the vat and drowned. 
Don't laugh! The first week we set 10 traps and caught 84 slugs. To keep the rainwater from diluting the beer, we made a simple cover with plastic and a stick. We've been replenishing our beer levels and continuing to get results. Recycled containers can be used to fashion the dish and lean-to, and the cheapest beer you can find will do the trick.

 
We also spread diatomaceous earth on the soil surface around plants. Diatomaceous earth, or DE, is a naturally-occurring soft sedimentary rock consisting of fossilized remains of diatoms, a type of hard-shelled algae. It acts as a dessicant that dries out insects when they crawl across it. It can be purchased at Amazon.com or at most, good, garden centers.  It need to be replenished after a rain or frequent watering.

 
If that's not enough, we also on occasion sprinkle Monterey Sluggo, an insect and slug bait that has recently been OMRI certified for organic gardening. Heads up--a little goes a long way with this stuff. We use about a half cup on a 50 square foot bed. And this organic pesticide is now available at Costco!

Finally, no Integrated Pest Mangagement (IPM) at Love Apple would be complete without hand-picking. With the help of some dedicated volunteers, we scour the beds and plants for these pesky pests.

While we will never completely eradicate the pests, with constant efforts, we can control them to a level that we, and our plants, can live with.

Melon madness

As any farmer or home gardener can attest, there is a never-ending learning curve when it comes to growing things.  We have worked tirelessly on creating new methods and tricks to cultivate troublesome crops, and this season is no different.  Last season (and the season before that, and the season before that) we had some melon issues.  I suppose that's putting it lightly. If it wasn't the diseases it was shoddy growth. If it wasn't shoddy growth it was lack of fertility uptake. If it wasn't lack of fertility uptake it was the pests.

Last year it was the pests, and they came with friends.  Final consensus was the seed corn maggot, and boy, was it bad.  Plant growth was impeded from the vine damage, and each of the fruits was attacked where it lay on the soil.  We determined that the rind of the fruit softened where it contacted the soil, providing the perfect conditions for a maggot picnic.  We tried to combat this by putting each of the fruits on top of a piece of cardboard, but by the time we implemented this method it was too late.  I think Manresa got a total of 4 cantaloupe. 

With this in mind, our garden manager, Sara, did some research on our particular issues.  She found that many melon growers use black plastic over their soil when cultivating their crop.  This pulls double duty (always a huge plus in the garden), providing a moisture-free surface for the melons while also heating the soil.  Melons apparently don't like their feet to get cold.  Being the crafty farmers we are, we scoured the farm for something we already had on the property that would serve this purpose.  We had a bunch of clear plastic leftover from the temporary greenhouse we built for tomato seedling overflow, so we cut that to fit our melon beds and stapled it around the edges.  Growers prefer the black plastic since it warms the soil more effectively and also prevents weed germination, but we are thrifty and crafty, so clear plastic it is!

In her research, Sara also learned that melons really love high-potassium soil.  Buying potash as an amendment has become too expensive for us, so Sara implemented a banana-peel bucket for about a month with the intention to chop up the peels and add about 4-5 handfuls per 60 square foot bed.  Between saving our eggshells for tomato plants, banana peels for melon beds and food scraps for compost, our kitchen looked a little crazy, but hey, what's new.  Another scavenged source of potassium is wood ash, so we emptied out the fireplace and added about a quart of ash to each bed as well. *note: we maintained our usual bed amendment and added these elements to that recipe.

In preparation for the melon seedlings to go into their beds, Sara put the plastic on the beds for about 2 weeks before the plants actually went in, allowing the soil to heat up.  The covered beds were an average of 10 degrees warmer than their uncovered neighbors - looking good for our sugarbabies!  Before planting, our drip irrigation was turned on for about an hour to ensure that the seedlings would be received into nice, moist soil. She also drenched the holes three times before planting since we would be unable to get a consistent post-planting watering due to the plastic.  We made a 3 inch by 3 inch "X" in the plastic with a razor to accommodate the root balls of each plant. 

We pinch the growing tips (like you would with basil) while the plant is still young to encourage healthy root development.  Doing this early on encourages more of the plant's energy to go toward creating a happy, healthy root system which will benefit the plant greatly when it is more mature.  We top (pinch) the plants for about 3 weeks, then let it do it's thing.

Here are the plants today:

Since the plastic can get really hot on our 100 degree days, we plan to put straw down so that the roots don't burn.  We'll keep you updated on our progress - cross your fingers for our first good melon season!

Thanks to our excellent Helpxer, Natalie Mcanuff for these photos.

A Pest to Watch Out for This Spring: Leaf Miner

The damage done to this young chard is made by what can be quite a pernicious pest in the spring: Leaf Miner. There are many types of beetles and flies that have offspring which burrow inside leaves.  They make trails or tunnels that can meander around inside the leaf, looking like it has been "mined."  Another gross thing is that when you hold the leaf up to the light, you can sometimes see the maggot inside its tunnel.  Definitely NOT yummy.

The leaf miner in my garden loves the beets and chard the best.  No wonder, they are sister plants.  Leaf miners also bother (to a smaller extent) my spinach and lettuces, but boy, if there's a beet patch around for them to play in, that's where they're going.

I don't exactly know which species of critter I've got here at Love Apple Farm which is the exact "leaf miner," but I do know how to get a handle on them.

Our first line of defense is to trap them with a blue sticky trap, as you see in the pic below.  Position it at plant level in the garden, and your offending leaf miner is attracted to the trap instead of the plant, gets stuck on it, and that's the end of it.
We also can hand pick each leaf off that has the miner inside.  Be careful what you do with these  Don't simply throw them away, the maggots will hatch in the trash (or compost pile) and continue their life cycle.  Either put them in a sealed plastic bag or squish each one, killing the maggot.  Better yet, give them to your chickens.  They'll love eating the leaves AND the maggots.  The ultimate lean protein and leafy green diet.

Don't have chickens and wish you did?  Consider taking my class in April on Keeping Backyard Chickens.  In the meantime, watch out for those leaf miners, they can do some serious damage!

Cabbage and Broccoli in January

January's frosty mornings and short day length are no match for the cold loving veggies like broccoli and cabbage.

Savoy Cabbage

Broccoli

This broccoli (below) has whiteflies. Time for some organic pest treatment, pyrethrin spray at dusk (so we don't hurt our honeybees that are out only during the day).

Adding Fertility: Sow a Winter Cover Crop

Although our winter garden is in full swing, we nevertheless do not have every single bed planted out with cool-season vegetables. That's because it's important, if you can, to put some of your garden beds into a rotational cover-cropping program. A cover crop, or green manure, is a plant sown not for eating but to enrich the soil. Instead of taking nutrients OUT of your garden, they actually add them back. They also act to improve the soil's structure and it's ability to sustain growth and hold water and nutrients.

There are many types of cover crops, from legumes which grab the nitrogen out of the air and infuse it into the soil, to buckwheat, which serves to choke out invasive weeds before they take over your garden. The choice of a proper and productive cover crop for your garden firstly depends on the time of year you are sowing it. Some green manures won't germinate if it's too cold, while others can handle frost, even snow, with no problem. Secondly, you should consider whether you've got a special agenda over and above a basic desire for adding soil fertility.

For my California garden that gets plenty of frosts, but no snow, I had a larger choice of crops that would survive the winter here. Knowing that, I then sought to figure out what other benefits besides improving my soil health I could gain out of a specific cover crop.  After a bit of research, I settled on Pacific Gold Mustard.  I've got a few dodgy pests in my soil, and this type of mustard supposedly deters both wire worms and harmful nematodes.  The fact that David Kinch can also use the delicious spicy young leaves in his signature "Into the Vegetable Garden" dish, also played into my decision.

For a 50 square foot bed, we use about half a cup of seed.  The bed is not prepared at all, just cleared of previous vegetation.  We sprinkle the seed uniformly on top of the soil, trying to achieve about two or three seeds per square inch.  We then scratch it into the top inch of soil with a hard metal rake.  It's better to use an up and down motion rather than an actual raking movement.  If you rake back and forth, you're more likely to get bare patches where you've raked the seed out of place.  We then make sure the bed is kept constantly moist until germination occurs.  This usually means we've got to water every day if it doesn't rain.  The seeds can begin to emerge 48 hours after sowing, if the weather is mild.  If not, expect to wait a week before you see any green.

Once up, back off on the water, only giving it a spritz during extremely dry conditions.  You can begin to eat the tender greens within a few weeks by either pulling up the whole plant or by snipping off individual leaves.  It's best to mow down the whole lot before it flowers and sets seed, though.   We will cut all of the mustard off at the soil level in about late February, turn it all under the soil with our spade forks, and let it naturally compost for a month or two before we plant our warm-loving veggies.

So a triple threat: soil health, pest control, and yummy eats!

Attack of the Aphids

Where did those guys come from?!

One of my tomato plants was covered with aphids the other morning and required emergency intervention. I quickly got an organic pesticide: "Monterey Take Down Garden Spray."  Pyrethrin is the main ingredient, which is derived from chrysanthemum leaves and is an OMRI-certified pesticide (organic).

I mixed up a batch of spray in my 2 gallon garden sprayer. Also into the mix went one and a half aspirin tablets to help the plant's immune system at the same time.  I worked quickly as I needed to spray ASAP before the bees came into the hoophouse for the day. The fact that it happened to be cold and overcast weather meant the bees would stay safely in their hive for a while.  Although I noticed the neighboring tomato plants had a few aphids, only the heavily infested plant was sprayed.

Later that night, after the bees went to bed, I sprayed the infested others. The emergency treatment was applied to the one plant only.  It'll need follow-up treatment, no doubt, in about a week. (I kind of like that name for a horror movie: "The Infested Others!")

 

I hate Tomato Fruitworms

Check out the chutzpa of this guy who hatched inside my kitchen last week and got some good chompin' in before I noticed him. 

These tomatoes were brought into the house to ripen up.  Since the nights were getting colder, there was no hope that the tomatoes would finish ripening on the vines.  So as we were taking them down, we stripped off most of the green fruits.  We then brought the trays inside to ripen.

The trays were just hangin' out on my kitchen counter, and I must have passed them by a hundred times a day.  I don't know why I didn't notice this guy sooner, but all of a sudden, I caught sight of him, and Gack!  Where the heck did you come from?

If this were earlier in the season, and the tomato fruitworms were starting to attack my tomatoes, I'd have to move pretty quickly to protect them.  One year, I lost about a third of my crop because I didn't do anything to stop them.  It was the first time they had ever been a problem in my garden, and so I kept thinking that they'd just go away.  Not a good idea!  Now, when I see the first signs of an infestation, I immediately go on-line and purchase eggs of the predatory insect, the Trichogramma wasp.

The Trichogramma wasp's favorite food source are caterpillars like this voracious fruitworm.  But don't freak out, the wasps are so tiny, you cannot even see them.  I prefer using predatory insects rather than spraying or dusting, because it's much safer and quicker.  I don't have to take up valuable time mixing and applying an organic pesticide.

Fortunately, I don't have to do anything right now, though.  It's the end of the tomato season, and this little guy is the last of the tomato fruitworms.  For this year, at least.