Leaf Miners and Slugs

I worked most of the morning on an application to renew my line of credit at Zions bank.  There were three pages to complete.  The application called for income and expense figures that to awhile to find.  I took it to Fillmore early this afternoon.  I for got to take my income tax papers.  I brought the application home and Robert Reidhead, the loan office will get it Tuesday afternoon.

I have a terrible infestation of Leaf Miners.  They are destroying beets and chard plants. They are in the older plants and even some of the young seedlings.  The above photo shows them in a large beet plant.

There is an adult fly about the size of a house fly.  It lays eggs into the leaf of the host plant.  The egg hatches into a tiny larva.  The larva grows and emerges as a pupa which falls to the ground and emerges as an adult fly.  I haven't seen the of these except the adult fly.

 I put a few leaves in a bottle attempting to see a mature larva and the pupa.

An update on the home that is being built nest to the garage/shop across the road and down the street from us.

Another home is being built in the north west part of Holden.  I have no idea who is building it or who will move in.

There are some cucumber plants growing in one of the raised beds that are doing poorly.  I dug a hole for a slug trap.  The small cup will fit in the hole.

The cup is filled with beer.  I haven't seen any indication of slugs  in the part of the greenhouse.

I planted these Green Arrow peas about a month ago.  I want to plant them in house six in a couple of weeks.

A new plan for house six.  I have changed my mind several times in house six.  Yesterday I saw a video of trellising tomato plants.  In the center of the pictures is a twelve foot two by six.  Two posts will be erected about ten feet a part.  The two by six will be attached to the top of the posts.  There will be five of them.  Each will be twelve feet apart. The overhead wires will rest on top of them.  The twine and tomahooks will hang from the wires.  In the past they have hung from the bows which causes excess weight on them.


Comments and questions are welcome.

Planting & More Beer

This morning I went out to house two to see how it is going.

One of the beer containers had this large slug.  It is about one inch long.  There is not much evidence of the slugs eating the radishes.

I pulled a couple of dozen radishes.  Most of them were free from slug damage.  

It is about time to plant some peas.  I planted one 1206 tray with Green Arrow peas.  There are two peas in each cell.  I watered them well and put them on the heading pads.  

I planted two six packs with burpless cucumbers. 

I covered each cell with some vermiculite and put them in the bucket with water in the bottom.  They soaked up the water and were completely wet.

The sticky traps are filling up with a lot of flying insects.  This one is attached to the bamboo stick.  It is placed in a horizontal position.

I don't know why I didn't think of this idea a coupe of years ago.  The doorway to house three has poultry wire door to keep the cats out.  I put on this hook and eye latch to keep the door closed.  At night I close the storm door during the cold nights.

 We went to Fillmore for some groceries.  I bought a can of beer filled these small portion containers.  I made a small hole and pushed them into the ground so the top of the containers is level with the ground.

I hoed out all of the weeds in house six.  Most were grasses.  The milk weeds , I gave them to the chickens.  They really like them.

I cut two bunches of French parsley.  I made two CSA sacks  with parsley, radishes, and onions.

Comments and questions are welcome.

Eight Inches by Noon

Yesterday's forecast was snow all day. It started snowing this morning at seven and eight inches by noon.

19 January Saturday 
I took a few photos which are posted below.

This a small radish with a chuck of radish missing.  The match give a comparison as the size.  I thought that mice were eating them. I caught a mouse and set out some mouse bait.  Nothing has eaten the bait and still something is eating the radishes.  

I had some cucumbers plants growing and the are beginning to die.

I removed the old cucumber plants and replaced them with the seedlings.

I caught this cat napping in house three.  He has white socks and his tail is missing.  I see him almost every day.

Yesterday, I put enough beer in the can to cover the bottom.  When I looked at it this morning there was some beer but no slugs.  I filled it to the top with beer.

Sunday

When I went out to the greenhouse after church. there was on big slug in the can.

I took it out and got a picture.  It was a little over an inch long.

I found another can and move it a couple of rows to the right, buried it in the soil, and filled it with beer.  The beer foamed up, I topped it off with a little more beer.

Above is how it looked after the foam went away.

Monday

I caught another large slug.

This fuzzy picture is of a small portion container full of beer.  I put it out Sunday afternoon and this morning there were two slugs.  I set it by the pole beans which were badly eaten.

It snowed all day so far.  I made a path across the lawn to the hen house through eight inches of snow.

Here I am standing in front of the garage looking across the driveway to the street.  Here there is seven inches of heavy new snow.

Early this afternoon I shovel eight or nine inches of snow oft the front sidewalk and steps.

Comments and questions are welcome.

Clean Fridge

I woke up early this morning and a thought came to m mind.  Clean the fridge.  What?  Clean the fridge???  It hasn't been cleaned for some time.  As soon as breakfast was over I began to unload the fridge.  The contents of the fridge was on the table and kitchen counters.

I started by filling the tub with water.  I then marked the location in the of each shelf.  I removed the top shelf and put it in the water.  I did the same for all the other shelves until all were in the tub.  While they were soaking, I washed the fridge.

While the shelves were soaking, I washed the inside of the fridge.  I had to do it several time before it was clean.  

Then I washed and dried the bottom shelf and the two trays.  I put them in the fridge.  I did the same for the next shelf and the rest of them.

I loaded most of the food back into the fridge.  There were some spoiled food items hiding in the back which were badly spoiled.  The fridge looks all most new as pictured above.

I wasn't going to do the door.  Carol, gave me a strong suggestion.   I unloaded the door, cleaned it, and put the food back in the door.  Some didn't go back because of spoilage.  There is room for more things on the door and in the fridge.

I was working on the Ward History when the door bell rang.  There was a package of sandpaper for my orbital sander.  I bought in on Amazon.  I got a lot of sandpaper for way less than I could get it locally.  I tried it out on the base and top of the pedestal that I am making.

We drove to Fillmore for some groceries.  We filled the car with gas and bought a couple of ice cream cones.

We bought a can of beer to try to get control of the slugs and snails that are eating the radishes.  I made a small hole in the soil.  I then put the cat food can in the hole and poured in a little beer.  I will find out in the morning if it did and good.

I put out several blue sticky traps a couple days ago.  It looks like I have some fungus gnats and shore flies.

There aphids on the tomato and pepper plants. This is the same picture but rotated 90 degrees.


Comments and questions are welcome

Cold Day

The lost round saw blade is found.

There are people in Holden with tractors that push the snow off of driveways.  I thought that when we got home from the temple that our driveway would be clear of snow.  It wasn't.  Carol and I got the shovels and started on our long driveway.  We cleaned about 2/3's of the driveway.

The temperature has been below freezing since last night. I ice has grown much larger.  The next few picture are of the same ice, but from different angles.

 Yesterday in house two, Robert and Frank buried some cat food cans in the soil and filled them with beer.  Twenty-four hours later then had attracted slugs.  Two had twelve slugs in it the other one had caught six slugs.  There were no snails.

I covered the slug bait with a butter tub placed upsided down.  I put them on when watering.

 I filled these plug cells with potting soil.  The one above is planted with Leeks.  One seed per cell.

 Above is a small tray of curl-leaf parsley.  One seed per cell.

Here is a group of them on the heating pad.

Transplanted  Tasmanian Chocolate Tomato.  These were planted 2 February 2018

Lettuce that was not transplanted yesterday.  It is perking up a little.  Water every day.

I took some hen scratch to  our black hen and discovered that the water pan was frozen solid.  I took it out to house two to thaw out.  There was a large night-crawler under the water contain.  Black hen quickly grabbed it and down it went.

 I got a a gallon of hot water from the house and poured in on the hose bib and PVC stub.  It took about half of the water.  It water began to flow.  I turned the volume down.  The hen was glad to get a drink.

Comments and questions are welcome.