Lol Lea don't bothe rlooking at the link because it said the same thing about the blue plastic! ha ha You may want to go through it thugh because their were some other peoples methods that they said were successful. : )
Gardenquilts I'm sorry to hear about your troubles but I have to say you gave me a chuckle about your blonde moment : ) That happens to me all the time!
Seed Swap Chat #53 (sowing the seeds!)
I am sure other people have bigger problems than mine, perhaps they have more patience to deal with them.
I feel like I have been having one problem after another all winter, hopefully I will be able to turn things around soon.
I am just glad that my camera isn't broken. I took a picture, but didn't see anything on the screen in the back.
I still haven't gotten to the post office. Better run up there before it starts snowing again.
Mredith I really wanted to try the blue plastic but doesn' look like I'm going to find any we used to get mailers thrown out in the front yard with them but now they are white or yellow.
I'm trying to get water warmed up for my seedlings downstairs lol You should see it I have three gal. jugs with a towel on one side of them draped over hoping the little heater will heat them up it works just takes a while my water jugs are so cold don't want to stunt my plants and besides it makes them soak it up faster when the water is warm :)
Now I've lost my other coleus seeds I looked for them last night what in the heck happens to these seeds when I lose them lol They are hiding from me LOL I haven't sown one coleus and wanting to soak my daturas and can't find them anywhere! I know what it is I put them somewhere convenient to grab because I was wanting to do them the other day!
Ok Meredith you know this one I'm sure, I don't put my plants out until about the middle of May should I start the milkweeds in the house now or wait a couple of weeks I don't want them fighting the lights :) It's been so long since I've started them from seed I've forgotten how fast they grow :) Really I'm getting so old I can't remember anymore but the other excuse sounds better LOL
Hey Lea,
You still a spring chicken like Ella you to and a lot other's on here run circle's around me all the time. Funny you mentioned can't find your datura's after putting them right where you could get your hands on them lol . I am searching for where I put mine to grab, now I can say just getting to old to keep up. Hopefully we both will find .
Hope your having better day's.
Carolyn
On the blue plastic, would Ziploc freezer bags do? They're a light blue.
klstuart all of my baggies here are generic and clear :) Won't be in town for another week but will pick some up then put some on top of them thanks! You know that press and seal I've been using that for just stray trays that need it to be cooler instead of on the heat mat it works great lol
Carolyn I had some of my coleus and my datras in my annual bag to start just the other day I would like to know what I am doing with these still haven't found the other coleus and annuals I was going to start lol
Lea, I think it depends on which ones you are starting. The Bloodflower or a.k.a. tropical milkweed that we grow as annuals should be started now. It grows reasonably fast but it takes forever to germinate! You might get a few that sprout quickly but the majority wait about a month to come up. Those are one that I had much better luck with on a heat mat. The Orange ones grow tall pretty fast but I think you'll be okay because your last frost date is about a month earlier than mine. I can't remember the Swamp milkweed growing fast so I started mine already thinking they might take forever to germinate. I didn't give them cold treatment because the package doesn't say they need it, so I am worried they'll be slow and erratic. Right now 3 of them germinated out of probably 50 it's been 11 days so far.
Thanks Meredith I think I'll go ahead and start them after I get my coleus and daturas planted if I ever find them lol I'm searching now AGAIN :P
Even if you kept your seeds in the fridge for a while that should help some. I WS a bunch but I know I'll be impatient so I'm starting some in the house too so I won't be chomping at the bit to get them going LOL
If you can't find blue plastic, how about a green soda bottle?
Last year, I tossed some orange milkweed seeds in the "tiger garden" in late April -the hosta and tiger lily garden near the black walnut trees. I forgot about them until I tried to pullout a huge weed which showed white sap when in broke. Oops. The others stayed and bloomed. I'll see if they come back or reseed this year. This is shady, juglone rich spot, so your milkweed will probably do even better.
A soda bottle would be too hard to fit over a seed tray :)
Your orange milkweeds will come back they come back a little late so just be sure to watch for them I think the orange ones are late coming up too. Seems like it's almost the middle of summer before they come back you can't miss them they look like folding leaves coming up kind of neat :) it might be sooner my brain just doesn't want to remember things this year lol I would trust what Meredith says more lol
A tiger garden sounds interesting I may have an orange flower you might like I ordered some shorter maltese cross seeds for this year I'll save you some seeds, I'm hoping they bloom this year, if you don't have it those are a redish orange they look orange to me on the tall ones haven't seen the shorter ones but don't like the height on my other ones I'm not much on taller flowers unless it's dahlias or something like that and of course my EE's.
BTW my maltese cross are coming back now :) Oh and yes! I have four out of nine hellebores getting ready to bloom yeah!!! Looks like they may be white they are all white in bud I was hoping for some colors guess it doesn't really matter no one else will see them anyway lol Except for maybe Robin/dryad57 :) My first hellebore blooms!
Lea, you have 4 helebores blooming, or 4 helebore blooms? i.e. are they all on one plant, or do you have 4 plants blooming.? You must have gotten them all at the same time? A coop? Good for you!! I ordered some this year in the coop. I hope they don't all come at the same time as other things I have ordered. Can't even remember what all I have coming. Isn't that awful? I would love to move, but all my plants would have to go with me.
Darn you guys, I put all my milkweed seeds out to be WS. Wish I had kept them inside now since it sounds like they need some extra time. Oh well, live and learn.
Lea, congrats on the hellebore blooms!
I ordered a few from the co-op too. I usually don't see my plain greenish white ones flower, they are on the side of the house. But I've come to appreciate the look of the leaves.
Yes toofew I'm a foliage person anyway and these look like mini trees to me they would go nicely in a fairy garden in the shade. I've got four jugs of milkweed seeds outside :)
Jnette I have nine hellebores and four are getting ready to bloom :) Got some in a coop and a friend on here sent me a couple.
Lea, be sure to post pictures of the helebores. I love them. How old are they?
Lea, you have just gotta get that camera figured out. How else are we going to see all the flowers as they bloom? And, I want to see your light setup. I hope to get mine up and running by the end of the week. LOL, it's almost here isn't it.
GardenQuilts,
Tell me to mind my own business but... Do put in a call to
the Fire Dept and have them check out the wiring to that
thermostat ! Last thing you want is a house fire and thermostats
out of whack are a good indicator that something is wrong.
(IF it is not the thermostat itself). I'd call that lazy manager and
tell her that as well.
If it came down to me looking like an idiot over having a potential
fire hazard checked out or having a house fire. I know what I'd
choose!
Getting off my soapbox now,
Cris
fire, .
This is my third or fouth year for my helebores :) Lost track. I just hope they aren't all white they may be the lime green like toofew is talking about I'll check them today sometime and see if they are blooming :) The buds on them are big!
Time is running out need to get those plants started :)
I'm going to look for all the seeds that I can't find lol
What kind of animal digs trenched a couple of inches deep in gardens foraging for food. The bugger found my bulbs! I have seen voles about, Tiffany has killed 10 this winter so far, but not sure if this is their handiwork. We also have chipmunks and squirrels. I didn't see any little footprints with the ditch,m but I know it was dug last night. Something has been trying to get to my lilies under the snow, I reburied a few with fresh mothballs nearby. They have stayed buried so far, but the critter is still digging about. Tiffany is definitely going to get more late night walks.
Is it skunks or raccoons that forage for grubs? I haven’t had that problem here yet and surprised that I haven’t I have so many grubs everywhere I did to put plants in I just pitch them out in the road figure the birds will get them or the cars lol
Garden Quilts. That what I am trying to figure out too. I do know the chipmunks dig tunnels, but didn't think they would eat our bulbs. I know when the warm weather when and if it ever comes and I can get back outside gonna have a whole lot of damage. The worst is going to be to see which daylilies I still have growing that haven't been eaten and destroyed.
Yep definitely get your thermostat checked out. Every year before I turn furnace on, I get in there and make sure I clean all the dust off the fan blades with a sock on my hand a s much as I can. I have ha d to replace three thermostats over the years too. If you can get your cover off and look at the little mercury bobber inside lots of time you can tell if it gone bad. Hope things get better for ya.
If you have jap beetles you will have grubs in your soil. hate them cutworms. There is one cut worm that is good for your soil and ok around your plants one that is bad. One has like a smile on its face when you turn it on its belly , but can't remember off hand if it a good one or a bad one.
toofew I think you'll be good with wintersowing. Sometimes that cold period makes more seeds sprout than they would with just starting them indoors. : ) Except the curassavica, those ones aren'y hardy in zone 5 and they seem to take a long time to bloom so those ones are better started indoors up north. : )
I know there is a problem with the heater and/or thermostat, the problem is getting the managers to admit there is something wrong and fix it. They resist spending any money on repairs and end up losing their tenants. All I can do is keep vacuuming the indoor ducts and blowing the leaves and debris out of the outdoor ones. I have lettters and phone calls in to the local manager and the head office. I get so frustrated with people who don't do their jobs. I am looking for another place, but haven't found it yet. Since I don't drive, moving will be a challenge.
It may snow or rain or both again today, but I will try to get pics of the digging. I hope the critter is just after grubs not bulbs.The lily bulb I saw wasn't damaged, just exposed. I hate grubs. Never looked at one closely enough to see if it was smiling....
I haven't seen any sprouts, yet in my wintersowing containers. Some still have snow on them. None seemed to need watering. I have some hardy annuals to sow today. I am waiting a couple more weeks before starting any veggies inside.
I pulled out my pea and sweet pea seeds. I am debating when to plant them this year. My grandmother always planted them around her birthday in mid March.
Here you go:
Regarding the reader question about moles eating her bulbs: Here in Virginia we have a real problem with voles and moles. The voles, a relative of the mouse family, use the same tunnels the moles burrow. Where moles hunt for bugs and grubs, voles eat plants...flower bulbs, roots etc. Last year voles ate the roots off one of my roses. They also devoured almost all my tulip bulbs. They're not as fond of daffodils, I still have a few of them. I have tried everything and still have a problem. Jerry Baker has a temporary fix, but it has to be repeated occasionally. Mix Texas Peet, chili powder and dish soap with a quart of water. Pour into mole holes. I don't remember the amounts for the ingredients, so experiment. He also recommends putting sticks of Juicy Fruit gum in their holes, foil and all. It did seem to help. ~Media
One year I lost 3 Blackberry bushes to something, I suppose voles. They ate the root right op to where it started the bush. I haven't had any trouble with either since I planted Caster Beans. My sister had a lot of them too so I gave her some plants 2 years ago. Now she plants at least a half a dozen around her place. She has a couple acres in fruit trees, vegetables, and flowers.
Guess what works for one area may not for another. My big dog went after them but she made more of a mess than they did. Other than, of course, she didn't eat the plants. She was just a good rototiller. In the wrong places of course.
LOL I take my dog walking in the field and he wants to dig in every one of the mole hills not good esp. with as wet as it is but he does get them when he is tied out, ends up getting quite a few of them where he is tied out he will sit and watch them until they start to work then dive in after them such a funny site!
I've planted the castor bean plants and have tunnels a foot away from them they don't work here but I'll still grow them just in case besides they are cool looking plants! I've got those traps that have several spikes on them that stab them I guess but they don't work either and I have a couple of the scissors ones they don't work that good either I remember dad using those and hardly ever getting one. The neighbor out back stands for hours waiting for one to start moving then tries to get them with a pitch fork lol I've tried that but not standing for hours to watch them I don't have that much patients but I can't get them there is a girl here in town that grabs them out of the ground I've heard she is pretty good lol But sounds like the voles are more destructive than the moles for the plants there's no way to get rid of them except for hoping the cats or dogs get them. My beds are nothing but vole tunnels underneath! You go to plant a flower and run into a tunnel they are everywhere! Very frustrating!!!
Are mole holes small round holes slightly bigger than a quarter? I saw a couple of those. Tiffany is fussing to go out so I will mix up some soap and pepper and pour it in for good measure. What is "Texas peet."
I will point the holes out to Tiff again. she wasn't interested the first time, so I was afraid they may be snake holes. I don't like snakes, but they would eat the voles....
Those holes sound about right I would say they are sorry...Max doesn't pay any attention to vole holes either just the moles for some reason.
Texas Pete is hot sauce.
ants
Voles holes here are larger than a quarter. That size I'd say belong
to snakes - have quite a few of both snakes & voles.
Guinea hens will dig up & eat the bulbs. Have to chase them
away & they act pretty much like swans & will chase you back! lol
We have a baby vole that seems to have been abandoned by
the rest & it comes onto the porch along w/the feral cats to eat
the dry cat food.
Sometimes it feels like I'm living in a cross between Wild kingdom
& Snow White's world.
There are quite a few holes near my one neighbor's place. She has several bird feeders and birdseed all over the ground. Coincidence? I don't think so. I wonder if these critters are digging in her garden. There are too many problems with rodents here for people to be putting out rodent food, imho. She is also the source of the outdoor cats who think my garden is a litter box. Wish they would catch more of the rodents.
I will keep making up batches of soapy hot sauce and pouring them down the holes. I have some habenero (the spelling checker doesn't know how to spell this either) peppers in a jar in the fridge. I put a few near where the critters were digging and sprinkled some chilli powder and cayenne for good measure. I will also mention it to the managers here, but won't hold my breath about them doing anything. As the bf says, at least they are outside, for now....
I hope that they are just eating the grubs. Time will tell...
Cris are you sure your holes aren't chipmunk holes they are big enough to trip you when you step in them :) I have all kinds of vole holes in my middle bed and they are small never see hardly any snakes here anymore it's like someone took a stick and just poked holes all around my bed when I get my camera to working (right) I'll put a picture of what they look like lol Voles are very small like a mouse they just have a shorter tail.
Here is some more information about them it says their hole is the size of a silver dollar:
http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.unitedwildlife.com/images/s_voles%2B.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.unitedwildlife.com/testimonials.html&usg=__n_S7e5-dP7vyXiFW6DYV4bZ3mjA=&h=338&w=450&sz=72&hl=en&start=16&um=1&itbs=1&tbnid=JI9adcuWVDXgWM:&tbnh=95&tbnw=127&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dvoles%2Band%2Bmoles%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DX%26rls%3Dcom.microsoft:en-us:IE-SearchBox%26rlz%3D1I7ADBR_en%26tbs%3Disch:1
The tiger garden happened by accident. I tried lots of different plants, only the hostas and the orange plants survived. I have lots of big green foilage and a few orange flowers. More orange and black flowers are wintersowing, hopefully. In summer, I have shade loving plants like caladium and begonia in pots on the table. I really like the theme. Even when I finally move, I will have to continue having a tiger garden.
I didn't know about black walnut trees and juglone, so I killed a lot of plants, blaming it on the shade. I even managed to kill rhubarb. A neighbor gave me a huge hosta when she moved, I think it is sum and substance. I divided it and planted it there. (I had to divide it to fit it on my luggage cart to move it, it was so big) The black walnut trees are covered with orange/red trumpet vines. Nearby, there were lots of native orange daylilies growing (locals call those tiger lilies). Some came thru the fence, so I moved them closer to the hostas. They are multiplying well. I have tiger lilies (the spotted ones with the pips on the side, not the daylilies that people call tiger lilies) in the front garden, so I moved a few to the back yard. After reading about lily virus, I thought I should move my tiger lilies away from my oriental and asiatic lilies, although all my tiger lilies came from one sad rescued plant and I have seen no sign of virus anywhere.) I wintersowed some more milkweed to add to the ones already there. I am glad to hear that they will probably come back and will look for interesting leaves. (I always debate, is it a weed, is it a plant...)
I am starting some orange zinnias and black hollyhocks for the black garden. Both plants are said to be tolerant of juglone, I am less sure about the shade. I would love some orange maltese cross if you have any.
With my unfavorite neighbor, the boozehag, moving out I may be able to enjoy my back patio and tiger garden. The rest of us are planning to celebrate their departure!
Bad news girl thought I ordered some but didn't can't even find where I saw them at sorry!
I had a black walnut tree come up in the yard and tried a few times to get rid of it before it got too big and couldn't finally someone on here told me to take the bark off all the way around it and it took it two years to die but it finally did I was researching plants to see what to grow under it just in case lol Now there is a walnut tree coming up on the corner of the road out front at the stop sign and I have asked the owner of the property to try and get rid of it when it was just a few feet high and it's gotten to be about 10' high now guess I'll go over there and take it's bark away I can just see walnuts falling on cars stopping at the sign (when they do stop) and of course most of them will end up in my yard like all the leaves some people just have no respect for other people's property they just don't care! I hate walnut trees unless they are in a place where the mess isn't tracked in on my shoes lol The last house I lived in had a big old walnut tree right by my driveway and you just couldn't imagine the mess I had in the house all the time from two big dogs and people tracking it in! I had that crap in my car on the floor too. I wouldn't want one in my yard but that's just my opinion :) Sorry sore spot lol
I grew JP morning glories up the dead tree last year this winter the top of it fell out but still have enough left this year to plant more morning glories there :)
That is ok, not a problem. I have no shortage of seeds to play with. Just hope some of them germinate!
The black walnut trees were here when I moved in and will still be here after I leave! I read that they send out extra juglone if they are heavily pruned or cut down. A neighbor says that pounding copper into the base of a tree will kill it. I haven't tried that. They are really messy, but I do like the nuts for baking. I make the walnut bar recipe from Claiborne's NYT cookbook. The hulls can be used as a natural dye, yielding a cool brown. I like it for over dyeing or antiquing wool or fabric. I am learning to live with them, at least they are on the north side of the building. My cottage garden is on the south side, far enough away to not be affected by the juglone.
There is also a locust bean tree. It is very fragrant for about a week in the spring, messy and annoying the rest of the year. It drops these seed pods that look like snakes. Eeeekkkk. I always do a double take. Once I saw an actual snake and almost stepped on it thinking it was a seed pod.
I wish that I had a magnolia tree. They are my favorite. There was a beautiful tree outside the library at Cornell. I loved passing by it in spring.
I have two big catalpa (sp?) trees on the line of the property they make a mess too and those seed pods look like snakes too but I look for them lol
I found a big strange seed a few years back it was black, flat and two sides were almost straight on it, one side being bigger than the other so I stuck it in a pot to see what it was, some kind of tree and after it got a leaf on it thought it might be a magnolia I was going to keep it but my neighbor talked me out of it well she lost it I told her not to plant it yet to let it grow in it's pot so now I'll never know what it was for sure lol I have looked and looked for a seed like that again and can't find one of course lol
Lea -- i lived on Catalpa Street from 1973-1985 then 1988-2001
and i do not think i've even seen a Catalpa tree. but you spelled it right.
There is a Catalpa tree in our town next to the feed store. The lady that owns the place says they will not grow from seeds. But, I think that there are no other ones in the area and that is why it won't grow new trees from the seeds. They aren't fertilized. They must need a male and a female??
I really like the tree. But, I suppose if the pods did grow new trees everywhere that we would decide they weren't so wonderful. LOL
I just planted a seedpod from a Catalpa tree last week. Rarejem gave me some from her tree in Eastern Washington. We'll see if it germinates.
I never see seedlings from mine but I pull all tree seedlings around there I have a lot of trouble with Locus trees those are the bad boys I've been fighting since I've been out here and it's a losing battle! They spread by underground runners everywhere, there is a small woods next to our property so they are all over there! I have a line of cut grass and leaves on the property line that the neighbor leaves for me for composting about 25' long at least and they pop up in there all the time! I have another Caltapa further away at the top of the field no seedlings there either that I have noticed.