tips and bits

Think you have slugs? If you see this damaage on your hostas,

although they will eat many other plants if they are hungry or plentiful,

you have/had slugs! Because of all the rain in 2009 and 2010,

any garden remotely prone, as here, to slugs is going to have more

than ever so be prepared to take that ammonia/water mixture

(30A/70W) out and spray the ground, spray the new shoots when they

arrive and spray any time you see a slug. Remember, they multiply like mosquitoes but are easier to kill, and are able to level a young plant

over night if you aren't diligent. If, after garden clean up in the fall,

you spray thoroughly again, it's likely you will get most of the eggs

that might otherwise survive the winter and be ahead of the game come

the following spring, and so on. One slug has the potential to produce about 40,000 offspring so never get "too sure of yourself"; been

there, done that so drought or no drought, there were plenty of slugs

here this year and I expect no less next! I simply presume.

Have you found ants crawling in your garden or creating mini-

mountains on our beautiful lawn? There are chemicals but wouldn't

you rather they just move away without adding another pollutant

to the ground? Buy a cheap no-name brand ground coffee and

spread it around the area where the ants are most abundant. The

next day they're gone without leaving behind residual poison; just

an ANT-FREE yard! This has NOT worked for everyone and ants

are becoming a larger issue, but at least give it a try; it worked for

me in days and has done so repeatedly for years.for other

chemical free solutions, email

Reena Nerbas <household solutions@mts.net>

Ants were quite problematic this year and dependant on the size

of ant hills, even Poulins was having trouble getting rid of them;

the weather was very unusual and perhaps the reason the ants

were so plentiful. In my own experience, when humidity is high,

which is was - at times 100% and NO rain, it is quite common to

find aphids (as well as powdery mildew) on the foliage of trees

and shrubs; dogwoods are particularly susceptible. It dawned

on me one morning that the spot where I consistantly found

ants crawling on my legs and arms was where were two

dogwoods I was battling aphids by pinching off the infected

leaves. Everytime I pinched a leaf set, the ants were on me,

coming FROM the leaf so I began using the hose to spray, and

a soap & water solution to kill the aphids, avoiding contact

with the ants; when the aphids were gone, so were the ants.

Symptoms of Hosta Virus X

Hosta Virus X affects different hosta cultivars in different ways, so it is impossible to

give a definitive description of symptoms. The most common visual symptom is blue

or green markings on a light colored leaf. These markings usually follow leaf veins and

bleed out into surrounding tissue giving the plant a mottled appearance. The tissue

often appears lumpy, puckered and of different thickness or texture that normally

colored tissue. Less common symptoms include dried, brown spots and twisted, deformed leaves. It may be difficult to detect off colored mottling on dark, solid colored leaves. Some green tissue will show lighter colored mottling along the veins,

but it is often not as pronounced as the markings on gold tissue; some dark colored

Hostas appear as if bleach was spilled on them. To make matters worse, some

cultivars don’t show any visible symptoms of being infected with HVX and it may take

years for symptoms to show after a plant has been infected. In the interim, be informed.

I bought hosta this year as well as dug up sick ones. It's a pretty hard plant to replace

so just beware. Read what info there is on the two websites listed below and "hope" for the best. For example, see far upper left, a healthy 'Striptease' Hosta, immediate left, the sick one from my garden. Click below or copy and

http://www.americanhostasociety.org/Viruses.html

http://www.hostalibrary.org/firstlook/HVXMyths.html

Read and check thoroughly; some hosta have these markings and should/you need

to dig deeper and what does one replace hosta with? A new venture into hardy (Z2-4) ferns has made the removal of a ton of big, old hostas here less painful. Buy locally

or check out http://www.thimblefarms.com. A friend and I ordered ferns (potted)

from them this year and I'll let you know how they fared this spring. However, having

lost so many hosta to HVX, I've been experimenting with locally purchased ferns for about 6 years with great success so I'm just broadening the scope. Surprisingly

drought tolerant, adding them to an ever growing collection of newer hybrids of

Heuchera and Coral Bells, it's a pretty impressive show.

"Good luck!"

It all sounds so complicated but in truth, the

basics of gardening and reinventing your yard is

based on simple logic so never feel as if what

YOUR problem is, is unsurmountable. Shauna

Walsh attended a landscape design course

in spring of 2011 and was bewildered by her back

yard and understandably; there were some

awkwardly shaped spaces and her wish list was

lengthy. It included 100% hardscaping to maximize her garden and seating area while giving her two

dogs an area of their own and still feel part of it all.

Her wish list included removing a poorly poured concrete sidewalk which was going to cause water problems down the road. However, the 2nd week

of the class, Shauna sent some 'AFTER' photos

which meant she had really been a) paying

attention and b) not feeling overwhelmed by

obvious obstacles. The following is what Shauna started with and where she was a week later;

not done in a week-end but definitely done by a warrior!

Birds seem to prefer baths that are set

at ground level, where they typically find

water in nature. While birds are bathing,

they are sometimes less wary than is safe,

and if their feathers get soaked, they can’t

take off or fly as quickly as normal, so cats pose a very serious danger. If you have

a cat, please keep it indoors. If cats are at

all likely to be lurking in your neighbour-

hood, make sure there is a fairly wide

open area between your birdbath and the nearest thick shrubbery, so birds have a

better chance to detect and get away from

a pouncing cat in time. Place your birdbath

in the shade if possible, to keep the water cooler and fresher. Nearby trees also

provide branches on which they can preen. Clean sand or gravel on the bottom will

provide more secure footing. Arrange a few branches or stones in the water so birds

can stand on them to drink without getting

wet and a few copper pennies (pre-1982)

to keep algae from forming. The water

should be no deeper than 1/2 to an inch at

the edges, sloping to a maximum of 2

inches deep in the middle of the bath.

One of the best ways to make your bird

bath even more attractive is provide

dripping water. Many birds find the sight

and sound of moving water irresistible. You

can use a commercial dripper or sprayer, or make your own by recycling an old bucket

or plastic container. Punch a tiny hole in

the bottom, fill it with water, and hang it

above the birdbath so the water drips

into it, and keep the water as fresh as

possible!

Broken concrete is officially known as Urbanite. Clients have

encouraged me to start a blog to document the sustainable

landscape installation in their yards long before it was considered earth friendly or 'chic'! There is no shortage of info on the internet

and Canadian Gardening Magazine put an article on it in their

March of '08 issue. This berm has been held up by 'Urbanite' for

more than 9 years and isn't going anywhere.

Use Urbanite as an option for these reasons:

1) It’s a free material.

2) It’s recycled

3) We capture all the embodied energy in the original concrete.

4) There’s no mining involved.

5) It’s versatile.

6) It lasts.

7) It's utterly original and completely green.

8) If it's what you can justify/afford at the moment, you can always

change it later IF you really want to.

Chemicals vs Eco-friendly Home-made Recipes

For insects, inside and out, a couple of drops of phosphate free liquid detergent, equal parts vegetable oil and a large spray container of water will kill the bugs. Don't wash it off.

If transplanting from outside in, shake soil loose, soak entire plant in container of water & a few drops of liquid detergent. Again, don't wash it off. For weeds between cracks, etc.

either paint on industrial chemicals with a tiny brush (don't spray) or mix 1 qt. vinegar with 2 tbsp. of dish soap in a spray bottle. Spray the mixture on the foliage. Be careful not to

spray on desireable plants. Within hours the weeds or grass will start turning brown. Repeat if necessary. Note: full strength vinegar works faster but don't spray your perennials; it will

burn them.

Slugs

After spring or fall clean up, remove all debris from garden. Mix 3-parts water to 7-parts household ammonia and spray the surface of the ground and the underside of any nearby

plant material still in leaf. Spray thoroughly - it's natural and can't do any damage to anything BUT slugs. Repeat process in early spring after ground thaw and again when plants begin

to appear above ground. Repeat in late spring and use as necessary during season to control. If done regularly, you can keep the number of slugs in your garden to almost none!

Remember a single slug can lay up to 400 eggs which can survive for two years. After fall clean-up spray again to kill some of those eggs that can last up to THREE years and don't

presume a single season of spraying will do it. I speak from experience. Use thick layers of newspaper instead of groundcloth to smother grass or weeds. It works just as effectively,

you are recycling and it composts while it's killing what you don't want. If reshaping your garden, recycle removed sod to create berms - just cover with newspaper and stomp on it

until it appears nature made.

Nature's guarantee: Chaos, but don't let it stop you.

The anti-slug solution is nothing short of miraculous. We should do all we can to keep our gardens healthy, as nature makes ammonia and she makes slugs, we're just introducing

them and composting simultaneously. and why would you want to look at those slime trails and the tell tale holes if you don't have to. Summer of '10, even the pots, far off the ground,

were invaded! This year, 2011, despite the drought there are slugs. They aren't huge which means they are newly hatched and there aren't thousands of them but they will have lived

long enough (because we were complacent/drought meant NO slugs - wrong!!) to lay an insane number of eggs so if you are reading this now, you can spray even after the ground is

frozen, as long as there is no snow on it. If not, then get on it next year. Princess Auto had the best prices on battery operated sprayers; around $35-39.