Stink bugs

Sunflowers Protect Garden

~ McArtor ~ 2 Comments
sunflowers from 2010 garden

Last week in our community garden we turned the soil, picked spinach, pulled weeds, planted sugar snap peas, leeks and shallots and discussed last years’ stink bug invasion with a new garden neighbor.   She feared the stink bugs might cause damage to her new garden this summer.  She heard other community gardeners’ stories of tomatoes, squash and other crops ruined by the pesky bugs.  I reassured her that the stink bugs did not damage our crops.  We had an abundance of tomatoes, peppers, eggplants and squash, but by the end of summer our sunflowers were infested with the bugs.  We had a stink bug hotel towering above our garden (see Fall Clean Up and Demolition blog post).   We did not plan to grow sunflowers in our garden this year, but after talking to our new garden neighbor,  I realize the sunflowers probably saved our crops last year!   We will plant sunflowers again to divert the stink bugs.

How will you protect your garden from the stink bugs this year?

Fall Clean Up and Demolition

~ McArtor ~ 2 Comments

Welcome to the first entry on my garden blog!  Just in time for fall clean up of the garden.    Summer harvests are slowing down after a fabulous season.  All those tiny seeds planted in March produced hundreds of cherry, olivade roma, big boy and grape tomatoes and numerous zucchini and  cubanelle, bell, habanero, jalapeno and banana peppers.  The wonder of this marvelous bargain, one seed planted buys a crop of nourishment.  It is hard to say goodbye to my generous plants.  How is your garden clean up going?

This week in our garden plot,  I uprooted five brown shriveling  tomato plants and sixteen huge sagging sunflower plants.  The tomato plants folded and twisted nicely into my crowded compost bin.  But the  10 foot sunflower plants stood rigid.  Immovable posts stuck in the dry dirt.  I used a shovel to chop the 4 to 5 inch thick stalks and dig around the wide root balls.  When the first giant toppled to the ground, hundreds of bugs scattered.  I destroyed  the Sunflower Hotel for bugs!  Ugh!  stink bugs, wasps, bees, flies, caterpillars, butterflies, beetles and even a wolf spider evacuated in a flurry.   After my skin stopped crawling, I felt appreciation towards those stubborn sunflowers.   They brought  VIP bugs to our garden…..wasps, bees, flies and a wolf spider!  Unfortunately,  the Sunflower Hotel had to be condemned because the pesky stink bugs outnumbered all the VIPs.