Berries and Bugs

There is nothing better than fresh picked berries - and I have tons!
All of these raspberries came from one corner of the humungous bush. I didn't even move around. Just top to bottom. The container got full but there are still plenty more to pick.
Found some interesting bugs around the yard too. Look at the size of this dragonfly!

It was hanging out on my back porch for pretty much half the day. I thought it might be dead - but really, how could it hang there if it were dead? Eventually it took off. Well, not sure if it flew off, but it is gone and not on the porch floor.
I also found this little guy hanging around the huechera plant out back. Hopefully it found lots of bad bugs for dinner.

And speaking about bad bugs. My Picasso Petunias are COVERED in aphids. They can hang out there if they want as long as they stay away from my eggplant and any other vegetable I have growing. I am going to brew up a batch of 'saucy spray' just to be safe. Saucy spray is:
1/2 cup apple cider vinegar
1 teaspoon tabasco sauce
1/8 teaspoon liquid soap
It works on leaf hoppers, aphids and pretty much any other pest. It can also be used to deter raccoons. I haven't tried it on them yet, but the corn is looking really good so I guess an extra big batch will be made today.

First Harvest of the Season

Not the best picture and surely not the best looking radishes but this is my first time growing them and the first I dug up this year. Obviously some should have been left in longer but how much longer? These are Easter Egg radishes and the package says 28-30 days - well that would have been about a week and a half ago. I mean really - for cool weather crops they are being awfully finicky about the weather!
And the aphids all over the rose bushes? Well I think I killed some green lacewings too. How sad. All the pictures I have seen I thought those suckers were like 2 inches long and then some. Apparently they are only 5/8 of n inch. Damn - I hope they don't take it personally and come back to fight the aphids and other pests floating around here. I guess I should always do a Google search on insects before plucking them off my flowers and vegetables.

GOTCHA!!!!

I think I hear TAPs playing...do you? Thank to my now good friends at Arbico Organics (www.arbico-organics.com) I have much less Aphids nibbling at my flowers and I think they will stay away from the veggies too! This is the Sticky Aphid Whitefly Trap that I bought and this particular one is hanging near the "once was infected" rose bush. Although it was too late to save the bush I at least got rid of those pesky buggers.
I also have two in my garden - one in between the two zukes - which I cannot show you because those two things are monsters right now. The second is hanging from the tomato cage because under inspection there looked to be an infestation - this is that trap.

I still have the crop guard that I bought from Arbico but it needs to be sprayed when there will be 12 hours of no rain - Friday it downpoured and Saturday the gray clouds were rolling in but nothing came of them. And well today I was just too darn lazy. A girl needs one day to relax - I am a full time working schmuck too!
And rest assured the trap in non-poisonous - it is also extremely easy to use and lasts all season - even through the rain! I haven't seen any "good" bugs caught to it, well except one spider that, I think, was going after easy prey - I tried to take him off w/o tearing anything but am not sure how successful I was - I release it back into the ground and hoped for the best.
I have an experiment running out back with my sugar bush watermelons so stay tuned for that!