April 6, 2008 at 12:57 am (compost, gardening, worm bin, worms)
I have such cabin fever! I had hoped to clean out my front berm, give away lots and lots of bulbs that keep multiplying like rabbits. Prune my roses. Give away the bulbs I cleaned out, and my iris that have gotten into my roses as well. Well, I was going to get started anyway. Mother Nature had other plans. She’s become quite the trickster, hasn’t she? Weren’t we supposed to get rain this weekend? Snow at the much higher elevations? Yeah, right, and my hair is purple, (I keep threatening my son I’m going to dye my hair purple, or bright green).
The weather forecasters have been having a hard time getting it right a lot this year. I’m beginning to think they should be in the same group as politicians! Except they don’t get any favors from lying.
What I can do is get my worm bin started. I shred lots of paper, get it wet, not soggy. Then I put it on the bottom of my worm bin which is just an old shipping crate. I had drilled several holes in the sides and bottom. Then I go to my compost, remove the top layer of un-composted waste which gets tossed into the empty compost bin. Under that top layer will be my worms. Lots of lovely worms that will eat my garbage and give me in return their poop. This time of year it’s still pretty cold so they’ll be in balls of worms which is easy to grab. I put them on top of the wet newspaper, then put some food waste on top of them, then I add some more shredded newspaper on top of them. I will then top it all off with an old shower curtain liner. The liner will help keep them from freezing while keeping them damp. Then I close the top. As the year goes on, I add more waste, onion ends and skins, carrot and potato peels, lettuce cores, etc. to the bin. It is amazing how fast those little guys will eat it all up. They also eat paper so shredding paper will go on all year as well. I will put my egg cartons in water for a few minutes, letting it soak up water, then I shred it and put it in the worm bin. I do that with the compost too.
Oh, I love my worms. You’ll see. I can’t stop talking about them. My friends tease me that I name them all. Yeah, well, not really. I only name my favorites. Just don’t tell anyone!
Soon, very soon though, this white stuff will be gone and I’ll be working in the dirt. The trick is, I have to remain sane until that time and with the snow of today, that is becoming much harder!
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March 30, 2008 at 10:57 pm (apple trees, compost, fruit trees, gardening, indoor plants, organic, scale, worms)
I enjoy gardening. I hate it too, sometimes. I could use some advice, ideas, etc. and I can give it. Where to go for more ideas, or to purchase something? Maybe I can help, or maybe you can.
I have, in the past used a fair amount of chemicals in my garden and as the years roll on I am learning that chemicals are costly and not necessarily worth the price. I’m finding it more fun and much cheaper to go “green” or “organic” than not. Although, I don’t consider myself either of those. I’m just too cheap, too ignorant and way too lazy to use the chemicals. I still use some fertilizers though. Inside my house I have a Schefflera that has a bad case of scale. So I gave it a healthy dose of a systemic pesticide. The kind you put into the soil. Didn’t work. I called my friend who has battled with scale off and on for years said two things: 1) wash every single leaf thoroughly and the stems, repeat in a week or 2) throw it out. I washed it, twice and so far it hasn’t come back. It might, but it’s so much better to just wash off the plant. It looks so much better to, you know? Not so dusty!
Outside I have an apple tree that gets bugs every year. Every year my husband sprays the tree all summer long and we still end up with buggy apples. Still makes good juice though. An orchardist told me to use a fly bait. The kind you hang on the tree limbs. The baited cards have glue on them so the flies stick to them. He said I should only need about 3 cards. He told me I would still get some wormy apples but not nearly as many as in the past. Really, the sprays used by orchardist and those used by home owners are not the same.
So, I’m heading in a different direction in gardening. I guess I have been heading this way for some time and now I’ve finally realized it. I have been using worm castings for years and composting too. So I’ll talk about that as well. Now if I can just get my lawn to look good and get rid of the nasty weeds! Yeah, I still rely on RoundUp occasionally.
I live in Eastern Washington, zone 5 for those you are interested.
So, I’m hoping to learn a lot about gardening using more of what I have and less of what can be harmful to other people, animals and plants. It’s a learning experience!
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March 30, 2008 at 10:15 pm (Uncategorized)
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