Karl's Garden Blog

This morning, I woke up and started putting the potted plants that I’d pulled inside for the cold back out onto the patio. Right away, one of the pots holding my first attempts at cucumbers cracked at the rim I was holding it by in my right hand, and fell to the ground, shattering. Eowyn was on it in seconds, with her curious schnozz savaging the poor cuke.

Shattered Dreams -- and root balls

I should’ve gotten the hint then and gone back to bed, but like the brave trooper I am, I … soldiered on.

While I was removing the blanketing from my flower beds (we got down close to freezing last night — no, I didn’t wake up early enough to see if it had frosted), I noticed that a bunch of broccoli plants had holes chewed in them, and one Kohlrabi plant had been entirely consumed. Grrr. Glad those bugs enjoyed the nice warm, safe weekend under the tent. Off to Lowe’s to grab some Neem Oil Concentrate. I’ll blog about that later, but … let’s just say that for now, those bugs are toast. I just hope that my sweetpeas don’t catch any of the overspray and die from the neem oil.

While I was at Lowe’s, I grabbed some fish emulsion fertilizer, because I was this close to putting (gaak) Miracle Gro on my bed for lack of a better choice. Lowe’s was the first place I saw that had a reasonable organic fertilizer choice. At 5-1-1, it’s not ideal for my needs, but my soil should already have plenty of potassium and phosphorous in it… While watering the garden with it, Eo was definitely interested. Lord, that stuff stinks. I drained the last onto the flowers and lettuce I’d just potted today (Romaine seems to like flowerpots better than it likes my raised bed, and I’m happy to oblige it…) and went around front to throw some on the flowerbeds. While I was around front, Miss Schnozz again attacked the flower pots to get at whatever smelled so interesting. Three lettuce plants and my last surviving Verbena later…

I rushed off to Kroger to do get dinner before dusk so that I can spray the garden with the neem oil, which says not to spray in direct sunlight. While I’m there, in my dirty garden clothes, reeking of fish emulsion and dirt, of course I run into half a dozen friends that I haven’t seen in ages, including some people that I know professionally. I realize it’s the weekend, but this is the bible belt, and while I’m gardening, the rest of them are in their churchgoing clothes.

Yeah.

Shoulda stayed in bed.

Edit: And then Henry just ate an entire pound of raw chicken fresh from the grocery store when I stepped outside to check the grill. He’s now so stuffed he can hardly walk. >.<

On the bright side, I did find out that Neem Oil also repels dogs.