From GG reader Robin:

Can you ask your readers if they are noticing fewer monarchs in their gardens?  I have a butterfly garden with lots of swamp milkweed, that normally would have two or three caterpillars per plant.  This year, I have only seen 2 caterpillars and that was 3 weeks ago on a pasture milkweed plant.
 
Thanks,
Robin

My milkweed has a suspicious lack of butterflies this year, too. Have you noticed a decline in butterflies in your garden?

The rabbits in my yard must be tasty. How do I know? They’ve mangled my heirloom peppers and nibbled my bean plants to nubs. Add some fried potatoes and a homegrown salad to the menu, the BF and I would have a very tasty supper.

Hasenpfeffer anyone?

To be honest, I only have myself to blame. I should have taken the proper precautions and covered my beds with chicken wire and plastic netting. But, after three years of scratching up my arms and tripping over twine, I was fed up.

This year, I chose garden convenience over garden defense. And now, I have no beans.

Lesson learned (again). Grrr.

What gardening lessons have you had to re-learn? Was it stubornness or laziness that got the best of you?

You’ve probably seen their telltale trails. Worse, you may even have seen signs of their handiwork — big holes in mature leaves, little plants chomped down to the stem.

Slugs. They’re here. Aiyeeee!

Slugs love the cool wet weather we’ve been having. And they’ve been multiplying like rabbits in some gardens. So far, I’ve just been picking them when I see them. But I may have to pull out the heavy artillery: homemade beer traps.

Beer traps are easy. You just bury the lid of a jar in the garden, making sure the rim is at soil level, then fill the lid with beer. Slugs, like most of the guys I know, are drawn to the beer. Unlike most of the guys I know, slugs drown in it.

I might also use cardboard traps. I just lay pieces of cardboard in the garden at night, then pick them up in the morning. Usually, the underside of the cardboard is covered with slugs. I either pick them off (OK, so that’s a little gross) or toss the cardboard, slugs and all.

Got slugs? What are you doing to deal with this invader? Escargo, anyone?

Today’s post comes from our rabbit-obsessed coworker, Colleen:

In my garden, this spring has been marked by two things: the unrelenting cool weather and an increasingly pitched battle with rabbits.

It all started when I found a large area of rabbit droppings between a fence and a neighbor’s hedge. Generally, I am unfazed by the random eaten plant, but, after an afternoon of removing buckets full of rabbit droppings and nasty urine-soaked mulch, I was decidedly anti-rabbit.

Phase One: I went to a nearby garden store for some rabbit repellent recommendations and returned home with dried blood flakes and a spicy, smelly powder called Shake Away. After drying out the landscaping fabric, removing the old mulch and laying new stuff down, I liberally applied both products and assumed that my problem was solved.

So naive!

(more…)

Hey! It’s really spring. I was just outside planting trees and when I came in, I felt the first tick of the season crawl up my neck. And the second! It’s amazing how creepy that feels after several tick-free months. I’d nearly forgotten how a tick truckin’ across my skin can suddenly make me itch everywhere and want a shower. And did I mention worry about Lyme Disease? Ah, makes me wish for snow (no, not really).

When I was a kid, I remember seeing my dad pull blood-engorged ticks off our German Shepard (named Duchess, of course) with a pair of pliers. I’d watch in horror as he tossed the tick in a tin can and set it on fire. Later, he took to smashing them with a hammer. I remember thinking that seemed unnecessarily violent.

But then, just what do you do with a tick you no longer care to share quarters with? You can’t just put ‘em back where they found you.

You should, of course, follow this advice from the Minnesota Department of Health, which monitors Lyme Disease (from the deer tick (on the right), not the wood tick (left). Both are magnified.

Which brings me to my preferred method of disposing of ticks. I sort of collect them in sealed plastic sandwich bags and watch ‘em slooooow down over a couple of days before I dispose of them. Makes my dad’s method seem kind, I know. Maybe in my old age, I’ll put them in the freezer and see if they thaw out and rebound. Who needs an iPod for entertainment?

Are ticks a problem in your yard? Do you take steps to keep them away from you? What do you do with them if you find them? (Tell the truth, you’re a screamer, aren’t you?) And, have you been unlucky enough to find them after they’ve, uh, settled into your more private parts?