In the area of the raised bed where we pulled out the last of the cauliflower, Marissa and I worked hard tilling the soil, breaking up the hard clumps and smoothing out the soil. Then Marissa planted two rows of broccoli, one rapini and the other regular broccoli. We watered first with Super Thrive, of course. While Marissa planted broccoli, I planted Flat of Italy red onions in the space between the basil in the raised bed. Still lots of empty spaces to fill. Must buy more Pak Choi seeds.

Then, Marissa worked up on the hillside tilling that soil. I brought her soil from the worm/compost pile and she mixed it in. I also added the same soil to the strawberries. We watered well.

Katherine arrived a little late, but I put her to work. She tilled the soil where the Scarlet Emperor beans were growing. Then she planted Royal Burgundy string beans. (They're purple, not green)
Afterwards, she tilled the soil all around so the water would sink in better. We both watered all the gardens well.

Harvested: cherry tomatoes, mache, rosemary, oregano, spinach, swiss chard and kale.

I'm starting to find tomato hookworms. Last year I called them caterpillars. Now I know better. I found 1 medium size and 1 tiny hookworm. Two days ago I found 4 or 5. I bought and put out the Trichogramma, but so far I haven't seen any results. In addition, I don't see any lady bugs. Maybe they flew away or maybe they're hiding, but I don't seem them. You hardly ever see the lacewings. However, I get two more shipments of them. Maybe future lacewings will help bring down the white fly population.

Sprayed Actinovate, especially over all the zucchini and squash. The powdery mildew is everywhere. I'm really surprised because I sprayed the Actinovate religiously and the mildew still appeared. Oh well.

Not a bad harvest today!

Wow, did we work hard today! It was time to pull out the cauliflower and beans. The Scarlet Emperor beans weren't producing flowers or beans any more. Going to replant regular string beans. The cauliflower gave a few lackluster heads of cauliflower. Some didn't produce any cauliflower. Others were starting to bolt. Juna and I pulled out all the plants. I will plant broccoli where the cauliflower use to be.

Meanwhile, while pulling out the potato bin, I discovered 4-5 large red potatoes. What a pleasant surprise.

Juna planted mache and spinach in the rows where they already existed, but the plants hadn't come up.

Saturday we will plant the beans and broccoli.

Harvested mache, spinach, swiss chard, red potatoes, radishes, cherry tomatoes and the last of the green beans and cauliflower.

Yes, I did it. I bought some small herb plants. I couldn't find seeds for Italian parsley and my last 2 attempts to start thyme and regular parsley failed. I don't know why. It's been a strange growing season this summer. Overcast in the morning, cold at night. I started everything else from seed, because that's how I like to do it. Then I know the plant is organic because I buy organic seeds. But sometimes you just have to buy the plant. So now I have Italian parsley, regular parsley and golden thyme growing in my herb garden. Yeah!

My flowering tree had spider mites so 2-3 weeks ago I cut off all the leaves and sprayed with Neem oil. The leaves are all back now and so are the spider mites. Not as many as before, but they're there. I sprayed the leaves, trunk and branches with Neem oil again.

Put out the rest of the lady bugs today. Hope they do their job!

Saturday gardening

Small group today. Just Katherine and myself. Katherine watered with compost tea. I put compost which had lots of mycorrhizal fungi in a barrel with water and left it for 2 days. Take out the compost and use the water in the garden. It's very beneficial for the plants. This is the third time I have done it. No more compost tea for now.

I tied up more of the large tomato plants. Saw lots of droppings of hookworm, but only found one worm. Took photos of all the lady bugs in the garden. Cool to see so many of them there.

Spread my worm pile among the various gardens. There are still quite a few worms and compost left. I want to get rid of that blue tarp in my backyard which is holding all the worms and compost.

I wasn't planning on doing that much in the garden today. I watered in the morning--a very overcast morning, as we have had for a week. However, the products I ordered from an organic catalogue company arrived today and I couldn't wait to apply them. The products were alive--lacewings, lady bugs, nematodes and trichogramma pretiosum. More later.........

Lacewings-Chrysoperla rufilabris is a voracious predator for aphids, whitefly. I spread the eggs, which arrived in a small box, all over the tomatoes, eggplant and green peppers. The lacewings come in 3 shipments. Yes, you have to reapply.

Lady bugs- come in a soft cotton bag. They instruct you to put them in the refrigerator for a while to cool them down. Amazing. I opened the bag and spread them all around the garden, after misting all the plants. I guess the lady bugs do better on a wet leaf. Instructions say they will be ready to eat. What? White fly and aphids.

Beneficial nematodes- I sprayed this on the ground in the spring, but I guess I needed another dose. Some of the carrots were coming out deformed. That could be due to hard ground or pests that are causing the deformation. The nematodes come in a sponge. You put the sponge in 2 quarts of water in your backpack sprayer and spray the ground.

Trichograma pretiosum-I have never used this before. It supposed to be good for tomato hookworm and corn earworms. I don't have any corn right now. It's all bee harvested, but I do have lots of big tomato plants and I am starting to see the droppings and the hookworms. This product came on a brown card (eggs) in a plastic bag. You put the brown card in the small cardboard box all the products arrived in and put it inside the leaves of one of the plants. They are attracted to light and will crawl out of the box after hatching.

I was supposed to spray Actinovate today, but I can't do everything. Maybe Sunday. Plus, who knows if this fungicide is bad for all the insects I just put in the garden. Meanwhile, I am concerned about the DE I sprayed last week. Don't kill my good bugs, please!

Yeah gardeners! We had 6 people today: Juna, Ginger & her mother inlaw, Becky, Katherine,Nancy & Marjan. Juna planted two rows of beets and 2 rows of celery. Nancy gardened for the first time. She cultivated and hoed. Katherine, Juna and Ginger moved earth to the hillside to cover the zucchini and cucumbers. Becky watered the tomatoes and strawberries. We harvested cherry tomatoes, kale, swiss chard, mint, mache, green beans, zucchini and cucumbers. Come on beefsteaks and brandywines--turn red already!

I don't know if the cucumbers and aluminum foil are working yet. I do know that Leelu is trying to eat the cucumbers!