Some female insects might be getting lucky. As an alternative to toxic pesticides, scientists at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem have created “super-sexed” sterilized male leafhoppers to knock bug boots with females in the wild. Yes, that means that the female bugs will miss out on the joys of motherhood, but if the research proves successful, we may be able to eliminate a lot of the harmful and very ungreen chemicals that we currently use to keep food crops pest free.

via Scientists Use Sex-Crazed Bugs as Alternative to Toxic Pesticides | Inhabitat.

She’s decided to do square beds and has gotten a Square Foot Gardener book. I think it’s gimmicky, but it still has good info. We’ll see what happens.

Vegetable Planting and Seed Saving Instructions

Arugula – Planting: Sow seeds outdoors just beneath the surface of the soil as soon as the soil can be worked and the danger of a hard frost has past. For a continuous supply, seed a new row every three weeks throughout the summer.

Seed Saving: Arugulas will cross-pollinate. Separate varieties by ¼ mile. Allow plants to bolt and form seed stalks. Seedheads may need to be protected from bird damage and rain when drying on the plants. Seeds are produced over a 2-3 week period and will require repeated harvesting.

Beans – Planting: Sow seeds outdoors after the danger of frost has past and the soil and air temperatures are warm. Plant seeds 1″ deep and 2″ apart in rows 24″ to 36″ apart. Pole beans will need support. Snap varieties will produce abundantly if kept well picked throughout the summer.

Saving Seed: Bean flowers are self-pollinating and almost never cross-pollinate. As a precaution never plant two white seeded varieties side-by-side if you intend to save seed because crossing may occur but not be visible. It is always best to save seed from plants that ripen first and are free from disease. Harvest seed pods when completely dry, crush in a cloth or burlap sack and winnow the seeds from the chaff.

via Planting and Seed Saving Instructions.

hmmmm. snails...

Mmmmh. Homestyle escargot!

Oriole Parker-Rhodes, 59, a grandmother, has begun making meals out of the snails she has found in her garden and has set up an internet blog with her recipes and tips, and information on keeping and breeding them.

“Last summer it was really wet and warm, ideal for snails,” she said. “I was treading on them and they were also eating our home-grown potatoes.”

via Unwanted garden snails cooked by gardener – Telegraph.

from fireballsedai on Flickr

Planning time. Or I guess it would be more a refinement of plans. Basically I’ve been convincing myself into a circle about a few issues concerning the garden.

First off: Rain barrels. Or water on the most fundamental level. Ideally I’d like to have the entire garden be fed with soak hoses, with supplemental water coming from a hose in hand and possibly a sprinkler too. My problem is that my well pump doesn’t have enough umph to power a sprinkler (has to do with the 1/2″ pipes that my entire house is plumbed with. Sigh…).

My thoughts went right to rain barrels as a solution because the downspouts on the back of the house could use a little work anyway, and could easily be set up to drop their water into a barrel or three. They’d be perfectly situated as to provide the maximum amount of pressure possible (without building towers and involving pumps).

But now I’m reading that the soak hoses that I got on special may not work unless they are under pressure. I’m guessing the meager pressure from the house spigot will be enough to run them, but I’d still love to do the rain barrels. Hmmm…

Another of the plans that I’ve been refining of late is my chicken moat. I came across the idea in a Mother Earth News article a while back.

From Mother Earth News

Here’s what caught my eye:

My moat is simply a strip of dry land, enclosed by two parallel fences, which surrounds my family’s garden. Throughout the day, the hen patrol moves all around the garden (but never in it), munching on all those things hens love: weeds, seeds, worms, tiny pieces of stones and (best of all) bugs.

from The Chicken Moat – motherearthnews.com.

Love it. There’s just something very satisfying for me to see things that work together on many levels. Of course all the chicken poop goes into the compost pile. You get healthier eggs because the birds end up foraging over a relatively large space and get lots of insects and plant shoots. You can also get your poultry to help turn your garden under in the fall I’ve heard.

I’ve got most of the posts cut, and my 150′ roll of poultry mesh arrived a couple weeks back (it was actually cheaper to order it and ship it – Whiskey Tango Foxtrot?). Now I have to cut the rest of the poles, come up with an interesting and cheap way to make two garden entrances and borrow my da’s post hole digger.

Also, the design for the moat includes the need for making two underpasses for the chickens below the entrances to the garden. I have some cement square blocks that came with the house (think extra large stepping stones) for one side. For the other I only have some marble pavers (kind of aesthetic overkill if you ask me).

Do they get cuter than this?

Yes, they do get cuter

They are Silver Laced Wyandottes and Buff Orpingtons. They are both heavy breeds that are good layers, so they are called “dual purpose.” They are great for omelets and they are great for dinner too.

So much to do!

The greatest part of this read (you’ll have to wade through a lot of biology jargon) is the bit about the fungus that actually hunts (well, lures and preys upon) an insect-like creature for its nitrogen. The “hunting” can count for upwards of 25% of its nitrogen uptake.

Wow. Life is such an amazing thing.

A mycorrhiza (Greek for fungus roots coined by Frank, 1885[1]; typically seen in the plural forms mycorrhizae or mycorrhizas) is a symbiotic (occasionally weakly pathogenic) association between a fungus and the roots of a plant.[2] In a mycorrhizal association the fungus may colonize the roots of a host plant either intracellularly or extracellularly. It is an important part of soil life.

read more via Mycorrhiza – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

All said and done it cost about $300. Yikes! The most expensive stuff was for things that will give us years and years of fruit though. I kinda went overboard on the strawberries, but can you really have too many?

My plan is to do the family crop in the garden beds and along the garden fence (for most of the vining plants). Whatever is left over will be incorporated into the borders of the yard for a permaculture attempt. I’ve already scattered a bunch of chestnuts around. We’ll see if any come up.

I’m also going to have to tame the mad tangle of concord grapes that came with the house. If I can get them into line I think we’ll be able to get a ton of grapes from them in a few years. They are pretty productive as they are, but the vines have climbed some of the trees that came up in the area, so they are a bit out of reach. We’ll clear most of the wild raspberries and brambles out to make room for the new domestic raspberries and some of the strawberries. I might try to squeeze in the apple trees there too, depending on how much light I can bring in from cutting down a couple of the trees on the property border.

Lots of planning to do!