What's eating your garden?
It's been a banner year for garden pests.
Started with having to pick the grape-leaf-folder worms off the Concord grapes.
There is something on the Frontenac grapes that are eating the vine ends and leaving them hanging by a strand. Haven't caught that bugger yet.
I grow fennel for the black swallowtail caterpillars to eat, so they're more pets than pests. But something ate the caterpillars this year. I don't think it was a bird. Some animal that broke over the plant tops to get at them.
Never had anything get through the chain link fence into the garden, but this year one baby bunny figured it out. He only ate the clover on the pathways. Had to chickenwire the whole inside of the chain link to keep that little guy from figuring out what kind of paradise he was missing beyond the clover (too close to the road for anything resembling an oh-my-gawd-a-gun.)
Broccoli worms were so bad this year had to chop it all down. Tried saltwater but they just died in the flower heads and didn't even fall out when boiled. At least not all the way. I don't mind a few as long as I don't see em but this was bad. Didn't have the money for bug fleece this year.
Flea beetles got the first round of cucumbers that were direct sown. Started a new set in pots in the cellar under lights. Planted them out when they were big enough to not mind the flea beetles.
Chipmunks got the cherry tree out front. They also got under the cover on the strawberries and took those away green! I found a stockpile of green strawberries neatly piled under the sump cover. I have tunnel traps for those critters. Silly state passed a law you are not allowed to drown any animal and I'm not taking a chance on my bleeding heart neighbors seeing the bucket traps. Tunnel traps work fine. Rat traps inside a 2' long wooden box made out of 1x6. The box keeps the neighborhood cats, skunks, raccoons, possums etc from getting their paws broken. There is no hunting season on chipmunks like there is with gray squirrels and rabbits.
A catbird moved in. I only got about a pint of cherries off the tree out back. Bird got the rest. I'm sure it's going to be a fight for the raspberries too. I do have netting to keep it out of the grapes. Gotta choose your battles, right? People tell me they've had birds get trapped in the netting and die. That would be just horrible.......wouldn't it?
Picked a whole can full of potato beetle larvae off the potato plants today. Killed em with soapy water. The plants are stressed so they are probably a bug magnet right now. Growing in boxes and it's been too hot and dry even with watering. I think next time I'm going to put a section of drain tile vertically in the box so I can deep water better.
Picked a whole can of pine worms off one of the ornamental Mugo I have in the front yard. Always just the one though. They don't seem to find the others tasty.
We won't talk about what the adelgids have done to the Hemlocks. Lots of standing deadwood in the 20 acres behind the house, owned by someone else. I consider it a fire hazard. I'm just happy the gypsy moths aren't out here yet. They're 2 towns over though. Only a matter of time.
On the upside though, the summer squash and lettuce have been tasty. There's a bumper crop of paste tomatoes and onions out there. I see a couple pumpkins on the vines even though the vines are short this year (too hot and dry.) The carrots and cabbage are doing ok. The cranberries have been flowering like crazy. It's late for them. We'll see if they can ripen fruit fast enough to beat the snow.
Sorry for the opus. I'm bored tonight.