Garden Products

GARDEN PESTS

If we could garden without any interference from the pests which attack plants, then indeed gardening would be a simple matter. But all the time we must watch out for these little foes little in size, but tremendous in the havoc they make.

As human illness may often be prevented by healthful conditions, so pests may be kept away by strict garden cleanliness. Heaps of waste are lodging places for the breeding of insects. I do not think a compost pile will do the harm, but unkempt, uncared-for spots seem to invite trouble.

There are certain helps to keeping pests down. The constant stirring up of the soil by earthworms is an aid in keeping the soil open to air and water. Many of our common birds feed upon insects. The sparrows, robins, chickadees, meadow larks and orioles are all examples of birds who help in this way. Some insects feed on other and harmful insects. Some kinds of ladybugs do this good deed. The ichneumon-fly helps too. And toads are wonders in the number of insects they can consume at one meal. The toad deserves very kind treatment from all of us.

Each gardener should try to make her or his garden into a place attractive to birds and toads. A good birdhouse, grain sprinkled about in early spring, a water-place, are invitations for birds to stay a while in your garden. If you wish toads, fix things up for them too. During a hot summer day a toad likes to rest in the shade. By night he is ready to go forth to eat but not to kill, since toads prefer live food. How can one “fix up” for toads? Well, one thing to do is to prepare a retreat, quiet, dark and damp. A few stones of some size underneath the shade of a shrub with perhaps a carpeting of damp leaves, would appear very fine to a toad.

There are two general classes of insects known by the way they do their work. One kind gnaws at the plant really taking pieces of it into its system. This kind of insect has a mouth fitted to do this work. Grasshoppers and caterpillars are of this sort. The other kind sucks the juices from a plant. This, in some ways, is the worst sort. Plant lice belong here, as do mosquitoes, which prey on us. All the scale insects fasten themselves on plants, and suck out the life of the plants.

Now can we fight these chaps? The gnawing fellows may be caught with poison sprayed upon plants, which they take into their bodies with the plant. The Bordeaux mixture which is a poison sprayed upon plants for this purpose.  

In the other case the only thing is to attack the insect direct. So certain insecticides, as they are called, are sprayed on the plant to fall upon the insect. They do a deadly work of attacking, in one way or another, the body of the insect.  

Sometimes we are much troubled with underground insects at work. You have seen a garden covered with ant hills. Here is a remedy, but one of which you must be careful.

This question is constantly being asked, ‘How can I tell what insect is doing the destructive work?’ Well, you can tell partly by the work done, and partly by seeing the insect itself. This latter thing is not always so easy to accomplish. I had cutworms one season and never saw one. I saw only the work done. If stalks of tender plants are cut clean off be pretty sure the cutworm is abroad. What does he look like? Well, that is a hard question because his family is a large one. Should you see sometime a grayish striped caterpillar, you may know it is a cutworm. But because of its habit of resting in the ground during the day and working by night, it is difficult to catch sight of one. The cutworm is around early in the season ready to cut the flower stalks of the hyacinths. When the peas come on a bit later, he is ready for them. A very good way to block him off is to put paper collars, or tin ones, about the plants. These collars should be about an inch away from the plant.

Of course, plant lice are more common. Those we see are often green in colour. But they may be red, yellow or brown. Lice are easy enough to find since they are always clinging to their host. As sucking insects they have to cling close to a plant for food, and one is pretty sure to find them. But the biting insects do their work, and then go hide. That makes them much more difficult to deal with.

Rose slugs do great damage to the rose bushes. They eat out the body of the leaves, so that just the veining is left. They are soft-bodied, green above and yellow below.  

A beetle, the striped beetle, attacks young melons and squash leaves. It eats the leaf by riddling out holes in it. This beetle, as its name implies, is striped. The back is black with yellow stripes running lengthwise.  

Then there are the slugs, which are garden pests. The slug will devour almost any garden plant, whether it be a flower or a vegetable. They lay lots of eggs in old rubbish heaps. Do you see the good of cleaning up rubbish? The slugs do more harm in the garden than almost any other single insect pest. You can discover them in the following way. There is a trick for bringing them to the surface of the ground in the day time. You see they rest during the day below ground. So just water the soil in which the slugs are supposed to be. How are you to know where they are? They are quite likely to hide near the plants they are feeding on. So water the ground with some nice clean lime water. This will disturb them, and up they’ll poke to see what the matter is.

Beside these most common of pests, pests which attack many kinds of plants, there are special pests for special plants. Discouraging, is it not? Beans have pests of their own; so have potatoes and cabbages. In fact, the vegetable garden has many inhabitants. In the flower garden lice are very bothersome, the cutworm and the slug have a good time there, too, and ants often get very numerous as the season advances. But for real discouraging insect troubles the vegetable garden takes the prize. If we were going into fruit to any extent, perhaps the vegetable garden would have to resign in favour of the fruit garden.

A common pest in the vegetable garden is the tomato worm. This is a large yellowish or greenish striped worm. Its work is to eat into the young fruit.

A great, light green caterpillar is found on celery. This caterpillar may be told by the black bands, one on each ring or segment of its body.

The squash bug may be told by its brown body, which is long and slender, and by the disagreeable odour from it when killed. The potato bug is another fellow to look out for. It is a beetle with yellow and black stripes down its crusty back. The little green cabbage worm is a perfect nuisance. It is a small caterpillar and smaller than the tomato worm. These are perhaps the most common of garden pests by name.  

About the author: Ron has been written articles for nearly 2 years. Come visit his latest website over comprarlanchas.com wich helps people find the best lanchas and information about comprar lanchas .

Barbecue or BBq What to choose?

The Barbecue, or BBQ has grown in popularity in recent years into quite a large industry.

The idea of having a few great friends over on a nice hot bright day is something that more and more people are doing these days, just having a few drinks and a barbecue.

It’s really nice to be able to entertain your family and friends outside in your patio, with plenty of food cooked inexpensively on your Barbeque; you can really show off your master cooking capabilities.

There are all types of barbecue on the market today from the small disposable ones you can buy cheaply from most places these days, from the supermarket to the local petrol station.

Then there is the most common barbecue that burns charcoal or gas, some of these are huge and quite capable of cooking large meals for a lot of people, a lot of these are really a bit of overkill for a lot of family gardens.

A good BBQ can last for years if you look after it, a lot of people just leave it outside during the winter months so when they want to use it again in the spring and summer, they have to spend hours cleaning it so it’s fit to use again.

You can spend a good amount of money on a good barbecue and that’s fine if you will be using it on a regular basis otherwise it would be better to just use the smaller lower priced ones.

If you’re not going to use your BBQ very often, you would be better off just using the disposable BBQs.

Disposable BBQs are ideal for cooking burgers or sausages, chicken or ribs, they are really very good and people often use these for picnics or taking to the seaside for the day.

Don’t forget that although these are disposable, you will have to make sure they are properly cooled down before you put them in the bin.

If you have a nice big landscaped garden, you can either choose to buy a large stainless steel BBQ or even have a go at building your own.

These are an excellent idea if you have the skills to do it yourself, with just a few bricks or nice stone you can soon build a very impressive BBQ.

Just make sure you find the desirable spot to build your brick or stone BBQ as once it’s finished, you can’t really move it. One advantage of building your own BBQ is that it’s going to be able to withstand all types of weather.

A brick or stone built BBQ has other advantages too because you can add to it each year by building on a small section to put your beer fridge in, or add a small roof over it to keep off the bright sunlight.

Some people with the space and money of course will have a purpose built area in their garden specifically for their barbecue, big enough to still cook and entertain in no matter what the weather is doing.

So give a lot of thought to what type of garden you have, how often you’re thinking of having some friends over for a BBQ and how much you can afford to spend.

Also think about all the good times you’re going to have too.

Garden Furniture

Finding the right garden furniture for your garden can be an exciting time.

Maybe you have just moved into your new home, or your new landscaping project has just been finished; now you’re ready to furnish your garden, but what to choose.

It’s really just the same as finding the right furniture for your home, will this work with that, do you go for teak or cane patio furniture.

There are other things to think of too, maybe you have a conservatory, and then patio and decking before you get to your lovely landscape garden.

Aluminium garden furniture is built to last and easy to look after, it doesn’t need any real routine maintenance, such as painting or varnishing, just a polish now and then.

Some people do prefer the old style rustic garden furniture, now this does look nice and looks its best in the older style of garden but you can use in the more modern garden but it depends on your style of landscaping. Old style seats and benches made from thin old logs do add some charm to any garden furniture choice.

The best way to get you going is the plastic variety; some of these do look very nice as the quality is getting better every year.

Plastic garden furniture is cheap to buy and can still look good, ideal if you have just spent all your money on landscaping or moving home.

There are things you can buy to make your garden special, such as patio heaters, stoves, hammocks, awnings, sun loungers and swing seats but you really do have to know where to stop.

There are a wide choice of BBQs that will make you look like a master chef in your garden too.

If you are lucky enough to have a conservatory you can make this an extra room in your house but also a comfortable place to sit and enjoy your garden with a sofa or nice comfy chairs.

The simplest way to start is to plan it out, so sit down with a pen and paper and write down everything you want for your garden. Once this is done you can then cross off the items you can do without for now as you can always add them later.

Take your list and visit your local garden centres and other places that sell garden furniture and shop around to find the best deals.

If you’re going to buy as much as possible from one place you can usually get a good price with some haggling, or, you can get bits from different shops.

The good thing about your garden furniture is that it is going to last you for years if you look after it, and let’s face it; some of it can be very expensive.

Garden furniture is not like the furniture in your home that has to be kept nice and clean and polished on a regular basis, as long as you can put it away in your garden shed during the harsh winter months it should last a long time, maybe just a bit of a clean and polish when you get it out again in the spring.