I was recently watering my squash when I came across this ugly bug. I had a bad feeling about it, so I did a Google image search on Squash Bug. Sure enough, I have squash bugs!
Adult Squash Bug – Acanthocephala terminalis
I don’t have too many plants, so I’ve just been killing the bugs I find rather than spraying. I thought I had it under control, but I recently found a hundred or so eggs and many nymphs on the underside of the leaves. My son and I scraped them all off into a jar and disposed of them.
Squash Bug eggs
We’ll see if this method keeps them under control. So far, the plants still seem very healthy. They have left the cantaloupe and pumpkin alone at this point. Does anyone have any suggestions for keeping these pests under control without harmful chemicals? Someone suggested spraying a little soapy water on the plants…
Squash Bug nymphs
Bell Pepper
I’m having really good luck with my peppers this year. They’re getting full sun from about 8:00 AM until sundown, are watered twice a day, grown in Full Circle Compost garden mix.
One of my favorite things to grow is squash. Probably because it’s so easy, squash plants usually produce abundant food much of the summer and fall, and it’s fun to say! Here’s the progression of my squash in the front yard garden so far this year.
Squash Mounds
I didn’t have enough garden soil to make complete rows, so I dug big holes and filled them in with the remaining soil that I had. Seed packets always tell you to plant your squash seeds in a “mound”, but never really tell you what a mound is exactly. I made mounds 2 – 2 1/2 feet across, with a modest rise to help keep the soil in place when watering. I planted 6 seeds per mound in a circle, imagining the final spacing of 3 plants per mound when the squash started growing.
Squash planted and mulched with straw
After planting the seeds according to the package instructions, I mulched the mounds with straw. The straw helps keep the mounds moist in the hot summer sun, but the straw also keeps the dirt in place when watering. After the Waterfall fire in 2004, they dumped thousands of pounds of straw all over the steep slopes of Ash Canyon to help prevent erosion. It worked pretty well up there, and works great in your garden too! Mulching softens the water impact from the hose, and also creates a complex path for the water running off your mound…water runoff is slowed and it soaks into the mound better.
Squash Flower
I planted a pale green Middle Eastern style squash (looks like zucchini), yellow squash, winter squash, and pumpkins. All did well except the winter squash, which did not germinate at all. More on this issue on the next post…
Big Healthy Plants
The squash are growing really fast in this summer heat, and the pumpkin vines are growing away from the mound. I even got my first flower this morning! I have 3 plants spaced pretty evenly on each mound, so there shouldn’t be too much root competition under ground. Now it’s time to wait for the fruit!
Growing potatoes is fun and easy, but there is definitely technique to learn. Last year Kristy grew a few, and we were so impressed that we decided to grow a lot more this year.
Chitted potatoes ready to plant
The first step is to chit your seed potatoes. We stuck ours in the kitchen window for a few weeks, a bright spot, but with no direct sun. We probably chitted ours a little too long, but we were still building the bed to plant them in.
Potatoes planted 4 inches deep
You can cut larger potatoes up and plant the pieces as long as each piece has a couple eyes. This turned out to be unneccessary for us though as we ran out of room to plant before we got to the cut pieces. We planted a 4′ x 8′ raised bed right down the middle, 8 – 10 inches apart, at a depth of about 4 inches with the sprouted eyes facing up.
Quickly Growing Potato Vines
Within a couple weeks, the vines emerged. They’re starting to grow really fast now, and it’s almost time to start hilling them up. Stay tuned for Part 2…
I was recently reading about the upcoming Farmers Markets in the Carson City area over on the Around Carson Blog. Here are the opening dates:
Carson City:
Pony Express Pavilion Farmers’ Market, Wednesday afternoons, 3-7 p.m., June 10 through Sept. 2. Mills Park, 1111 E. William St. Call 746-5024.
Saturday Morning Farmers’ Market, Third and Curry streets, Carson City. 9 a.m.-1 p.m. Starts June 27 through October.
Carson Valley:
Gardnerville – Lampe Park: Every Wednesday, 8am-1pm. Begins June 3
Minden – Downtown: Every Tuesday, 4-8pm. Begins June 2
Additionally, Muscle Powered will soon be discussing a summer long project to promote bicycling at the Carson City 3rd Street Farmers Market!
I was recently reading about progressive thinning in Steve Solomon’s book, Gardening When it Counts. I’ve made the mistake of not thinning my plants in the past. The overcrowding makes the plants compete for resources, and makes them more susceptible to pests. Once you get over the uneasy feeling of pulling up what you’ve just planted, you’ll notice happy healthy plants!
Swiss Chard
Instructions on the seed packages say to thin your seedlings to their final spacing once they emerge. With progressive thinning, you remove any immediate competition, but continue to let the thinly spaced plants grow. Most root production at this point is straight down, so you don’t really run the risk of the roots bumping into each other.
Swiss Chard and Spinach
As the leaves begin to touch, you thin again. Not only does this give you better power over selecting the best plants for survival, you can sometimes eat what you thin. We’ve been throwing the baby chard and spinach into the salad mix as we thin. At first I tried to transplant what I pulled out, but the plants didn’t survive. Only when I was able to grab a big chunk of earth around the root was I successful. It’s easier just to eat them or compost them.
Baby Greens – perfect to add to the salad mix
We spent the last weekend in May landscaping and getting the front side-yard ready for another vegetable garden. The pressure was on to get the front side-yard ready, since it’s now time to plant the warm weather veggies. If we delay much longer, some of them won’t be ready before the first frost.
Greenhouse Garden Center
Saturday was spent moving rock, and digging up trees and bushes. The previous owner of our house setup an ugly, low maintenance yard, so we’ve spent the last year hauling thousands of pounds of rock and bark, converting our yard to something we enjoy looking at, being in, and can garden on.
Adding Color to the Front Yard
We visited the Greenhouse Garden Center on Sunday morning. The Garden Center is a great place to spend an hour browsing, and begs to be explored. High quality plants, many varieties, and knowledgeable staff are all throughout the grounds. It’s a welcome alternative to the garden centers of the big box / warehouse stores. My son even had a good time exploring, and didn’t get bored! We bought as much as we could carry, and headed for home.
Front Side Yard – BEFORE
First we planted new shrubs and flowers in the front yard. We selected drought tolerant shrubs of different colors and gave them plenty of room to grow. We made the mistake of planting too close at our last place. Shrubs like Scotch broom grow up really quick!
Front Side Yard – BEFORE
The landscaping in the front side-yard is far from being finished, but there is now enough room to plant some veggies. Most of Saturday and part of Sunday were spent digging out bushes and moving rock. It was so rewarding to finally get something planted after doing all the prep! We planted a variety of peppers, tomatoes, and tomatillos, and will soon plant some pole beans, and a variety of squash. I’ll continue to work around the perimeter of the garden while everything is growing.
The beginnings of a new garden
We had about a half yard of Full Circle Compost garden soil left over, so there wasn’t enough to make complete raised beds. I loosened up the bed area, and mixed in garden soil and compost. Since the tomatoes and peppers are transplants, I dug out holes where I expect most of the root growth to take place and filled the holes with the good garden soil. There should be just enough soil left over to make some decent mounds for planting squash too. Next year I’ll order more soil and build the beds up complete.
The goal this year was to get the cool weather plants started early in the year. The seed packets said, “Plant as soon as the ground can be worked!”. We got the garden planted the end of March, and waited for emerging plants.
Baby Spinach
It turned out that March was a pretty harsh month for weather. We only got a few warm days in a row, and got cold for several days in between. Nothing germinated in the time the seed packets advertised, and I was just about ready to give up on the seeds. Especially the peas!
Peas
Luckily we’ve had a lot of consecutive warm days lately, and things are starting to pop up. The spinach emerged first with a high germination rate. Chard was second. About the only thing that hasn’t appeared is the Kale, so I plan to replant that this weekend.
Next year I may build a mini green house, or use the hoops on the beds for a more permanent type of cover. Obviously the seeds are pretty picky about what temperatures they’ll germinate in.
After some experimentation last year, I discovered that the existing dirt in my yard was horrible for growing vegetables. I mixed in quite a bit of good soil, but it still seemed like it contained too much clay. This year I decided to get a bunch of dirt from Full Circle Compost and build some raised beds. Our most successful garden in Gardnerville was grown in soil from Full Circle Compost.
A near complete bed with one hoop attached.
I did an internet search for raised beds, and found great plans to build the ultimate raised bed on the Sunset Magazine site.
I skipped on the hardware cloth bottom liner, and used 3 1/2″ deck screws instead of the #14 wood screws in the instructions. I found that I couldn’t afford redwood with the number of beds I plan to build, so I used douglas fir. Only 1/3 the price of the redwood! The construction went pretty smoothly, and the finished product looks great!
Two complete beds leveled and in place.
The big challenge has been to keep the dog out of the garden. A couple revisions on the pvc chicken coup fence seem to have done the trick.
The first gardening project of the year was to tidy up our compost heap. Not only was it a bit of an eyesore, the dog was rooting through it and bringing old veggies into the house. There are a lot of expensive composters available, but I was looking for something cheap and easy. After some internet searching, I found a the simple wire bin design.
Compost Heap Before
I found a 5′ x 3′ roll of “hardware cloth” at home depot for around $10. I just wired the ends together, and used a couple of stakes to help it keep its shape. I’m not certain this bin will be big enough as the garden grows, but it quickly and cheaply fixed my dog problem. I’ll either buy a bigger roll of hardware cloth, or just buy another 5 foot section to double the size of this one. I also purchased a little pitch fork to help turn the compost periodically.
Compost Heap After
