by Greg Alder | Oct 6, 2023 | Pests, Vegetables |
Never do today what you can pay your kids to do tomorrow. It is sage advice that has been passed down for millenia. Last week, I employed it. I had been running around the yard in pursuit of white butterflies, the ones that lay eggs on the leaves of plants in the...
by Greg Alder | Jun 24, 2023 | Pests, Vegetables |
One downside to the wet winter and cool spring we’ve had is that earwigs, pill bugs, slugs, and snails have found this weather heavenly, and they continue to munch on my vegetables even during these first days of summer. But I’ve got a few tricks up...
by Greg Alder | May 26, 2023 | Fruit, Pests |
I am not afraid of so-called fruit tree pests and diseases. They’re just critters who also like to feed on our fruit trees. I say “also” because they’re just like us, they’re looking for a tasty snack too. They don’t munch on our...
by Greg Alder | Nov 11, 2022 | Pests, Vegetables |
It had been a few years since I grew wheat so I sowed the ‘Pima Club’ variety with optimism last week. Then a flock of white-crowned sparrows arrived. I walked up to the bed as they fluttered off, and I found a fuzzy mess. It looked like they had scratched...
by Greg Alder | Jun 17, 2022 | Pests, Vegetables |
Over the past few summers, some of my vegetables have performed worse and worse because of damage from root knot nematodes. What are root knot nematodes? They’re microscopic worm-like creatures that live in the dirt and bore into the roots of plants and...
by Greg Alder | Aug 20, 2021 | Citrus, Fruit, Pests |
Back in the winter of 2015, a neighbor noted how poor my lime tree looked. She said her lemon tree didn’t have those “curly leaves” because she sprays it. A couple days later she brought over a blue bottle of the stuff she uses: Bayer Advanced...
by Greg Alder | May 28, 2021 | Fruit, Pests |
Earlier this spring, a friend from Fallbrook was visiting and he mentioned that his peach tree had had a lot of leaf curl last year but this year there was no infection. “I finally got the spraying right!” he said. Slowly, I said, “Those results might not be just...
by Greg Alder | Feb 26, 2021 | Pests |
With hope, I planted 24 seedlings of broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, and brussels sprouts on an October day. By mid-November only two hadn’t been eaten down to the ground by rabbits. This was my first fall in a new house and gardening in a new location, and I hadn’t...
by Greg Alder | Feb 19, 2021 | Pests, Vegetables |
I’d long heard of people using dish soap mixed with water to spray on broccoli and cauliflower in order to control aphids. I was curious to test that out. In early January, I had a row of plants and I had three kids that might enjoy helping me experiment. Control...
by Greg Alder | Jul 24, 2020 | Pests, Vegetables |
I planted cucumbers on June 19 and expected them to take off in the warm weather and soil, but they kept wilting in the noonday sun. So I watered more. They continued to wilt every afternoon. When they weren’t wilting, they were barely growing. Finally, I yanked one...
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