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Worm Free Cabbage Crops? Check out Neem Oil

Monday, August 6th, 2012

Cabbage

I’ve done battle with the caterpillars of the small white and yellow cabbage butterflies for as long as I’ve gardened. The most destructive caterpillar, known as the Imported Cabbage Worm, is from a white butterfly native to Europe called the Cabbage White Butterfly (Pieris rapae).  These insects have only been in North America since the 1860′s, but they like it a lot on this side of the ocean and are a truly destructive pest.

The small green caterpillars of this butterfly will decimate unprotected cole crops.  Their presence is very easy to see.  They eat huge holes in the leaves of the brasiccas, they like to burrow into the center core of cabbages, and they leave trails and piles of frass wherever they occur.

A lot of gardeners use BT (Bacillus thuringiensis) as an organic control.  BT is widely used but I’ve left it alone mainly because of issues relating to its use in genetic engineering and several other possible problems, an overview of which you can read about here:

My best success has been using floating row covers of agricultural fabric.  The row covers have some problems, however.  The fabric tears easily and the moths find their way into and under the covers through the holes and any edges that might not be secured closely to the ground.  The covers are a pain to maintain and keep in place.  And it gets quite a bit hotter and more humid under the row covers than in the open air.  Brassicas prefer it cooler and drier.

Neem Oil

Then we found neem.  I’d heard about neem oil over the years.  Three years ago at a Garden Writers Conference in Oklahoma City, Geoff and I attended a presentation where the origins and insecticidal properties of this natural product were explained in depth.  And two years ago, at the MOSES Organic Farming Conference in La Crosse, Wisconsin, Geoff met Usha Rao of The Ahimsa Alternative,  and we obtained a supply of neem oil to test in our own gardens.

Neem oil is a vegetable oil pressed out of the fruit and seeds of the neem tree, Azadirachta indica, a fast growing tree of the mahogany family that is farmed in India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh, as well as throughout a lot of Africa.  All parts of the tree have useful properties and many people in India regard the tree as sacred.  Within the oil is an active ingredient Azadirachtin, which disrupts the digestive and molting processes of insects that feed on leaves where the oil is present and they eventually die after ingesting the neem.

I’m using a mixture of one tablespoon neem oil, 3/4 tablespoon of liquid horticultural soap, and one tablespoon of seaweed extract in a gallon of water.   The seaweed is there to help the neem mix better with the water and stick better to the plant leaves.  And it also has its own beneficial properties in the foliar feeding of plants. After the initial spray, I spray after rains or after I have to water the plants.  I’m presuming rains and watering may wash away the neem’s effectiveness.  The solution needs be thoroughly mixed.  Concentrated neem oil can burn plant leaves, and the neem oil will coagulate in colder water.

Also, while generally the neem is safe in use around beneficial insects, you should not spray it directly on them, so avoid spraying it when insects are pollinating squash flowers, for example.

Broccoli

I am happy to report that the results appear to be excellent.  I’ve got uncovered brassicas of all types almost totally free of insect damage and I’m pretty sure I’ll get to harvest all without any major insect losses.  It’s interesting, because the butterflies are present, they lay their eggs, the eggs hatch, but then the life cycle ends soon after the caterpillars start feeding.

Neem is supposed to be an all-around useful insecticide, but I haven’t figured out how to make it truly work well on all my cucurbits.  It appears to be quite effective against squash bugs, but I lost several plants to vine borers, which I can understand, as the vine borer caterpillar is protected inside the stem of the plant.  The neem spray seemed to do  nothing to protect against early damage from cucumber beetles, which destroyed several melon and squash plants almost as soon as I transplanted the seedlings into the beds.

Neem seems to be a very useful approach to a lot of garden pests, however, and the upside is that it is very low in toxicity and potential environmental concerns.  I’m going to keep working with it.  If it only gave me good, worm-free cole crops, it would be well worth its cost.

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Overhead Irrigation System for a Backyard Garden

Wednesday, July 4th, 2012

Watering the Garden

We have not had significant rainfall for six weeks.  I was told that June was the driest recorded here since they started keeping records.  Today and tomorrow will be among the two hottest days in south central Wisconsin since the weather service started logging meteorological data.  103 was reported as a high today, highest ever for July.  The all-time high temperature record here was 104 in August of 1988.   Tomorrow may be hotter yet.

In most of the 26 years I’ve lived here, I’ve not had to worry much about watering my garden.  Rain just fell with enough regularity to count on.  Not every year, for sure, but mostly the rain has been there when we needed it.

This year is different.  Hotter and drier than anything we’ve ever seen.  So I have no choice but to water regularly.  I’m quite happy with this simple system I use to get water down pretty much where I want it.

Overhead Irrigation System

Components, in addition to hoses with quick-connects, are a plastic milk crate, an oscillating sprinkler, and metal spring clamps.  I got my sprinkler at my local Ace Hardware (Ace is the place!).  I really like the design of the new oscillating sprinklers.   Precise control of the arm movement is super easy.  The newer models have thumb tabs to control the arm movement and one can lay down a water pattern with precision.

I’m watering frequently and the garden is looking good.  It’s easy for plants get stressed in these unusual weather conditions, but so far, with my slick overhead irrigation system, all is well in our garden.

 

 

 

 

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It’s Wisconsin. It’s March. It’s Summer!

Sunday, March 18th, 2012

The average March high temperature where I live is 42 degrees.  The average minimum is 24, with an average mean temperature of 32 degrees.  Today, a high of 82 is predicted.  We’ve had highs of upper 70′s to over 80 for the past week.  The lows have been just below 60.

I don’t know if this portends oncoming climatic disaster, but the warm weather is sure making it easy to get a jump start on a lot of this year’s preparation tasks in the garden.  I’ve been taking advantage of the warm weather to clean out my beds of last year’s growth.  It is something I’d have to do anyway, but it’s more pleasant working in a T-shirt.

In the past week I’ve pruned and cleaned out the raspberries, cut back all last year’s asparagus fronds and weeded the asparagus bed, pulled out all the corn stalks from last year’s two beds of corn, and cut down all the stalks in the Jerusalem artichoke bed.  Yesterday, I hauled most of the debris to this year’s new compost pile and worked in the contents of one of the 55 gallon drums of household compost that will fire up and help break down the new pile.

Cold Frame and Compost Piles

But before I went to work on the compost, I moved my cold frame and seeded it with a mix of salad greens.  I first had to harvest the greens that had already sprouted in the frame, left over from last fall.  There was more than enough for Judy and I to enjoy a very nice spring salad of spinach, arugula, mache and lettuce.

After moving the frame to the new area I that had cleaned and raked up, I seeded it with several mesclun salad mixes, various lettuces, spinach, arugula, endives and mache.  I watered it down, and with luck, we’ll be harvesting greens in a few weeks.

Old Compost - New Compost Pile

My new compost pile will reside where I had a three year old pile that was almost used up.  I had previously sifted 6 five gallon buckets of compost to empty the old pile and cleaned out and raked flat the area.  I laid down several inches of stalks and dry material and alternated layers of stalks with a couple 5 gallon buckets of the sludge from my compost barrel.

I’m getting much lazier about diligently following any rules for my compost piles.  I rarely even turn the piles any more.  I now have three piles:  the new one, last year’s, and a pile two years old that is pretty close to being mostly broken down without ever being turned.  I’ll sift that one into buckets and anything that won’t go through my one inch screen gets will get tossed back into the new pile.

As the year progresses, I’ll keep dumping green  material, mostly weed harvest, onto the new pile.  I always have a supply of compost if needed for adding to a bed or for making some soil mixes.  I know my method is not perfect for killing weed seeds because I don’t get it to temperatures hot enough, but I live with my weeds.  I believe that weeds are actually a very good thing to have in the garden and you have to control them just enough so they don’t get the upper hand.

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Early Riser

Tuesday, February 7th, 2012

Snowdrop

Here’s a snowdrop that’s shown up over a month early.  A lot of snowdrops and crocus have sprouted with our unseasonably warm weather.  I’m going to drop some leaves over them to see if I can help them hang on until their normal blooming time later in March.

Early blooming due to warm spells can be a real problem.  Tender new growth can be frozen when the temperatures return to really cold.   I worry about my fruit trees where new buds that come out too early may get frozen.  That could eliminate fruit production for the year.   As I’ve mentioned before, a warm winter is not necessarily all good.

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Climate Change Brussels Sprouts

Friday, January 6th, 2012

January Sprouts

The weather in Wisconsin has been super freaky.  With highs of 50 yesterday and again today following a December with no snow and exceptionally mild temperatures, a lot of the locals are saying, “what the hey, this ain’t all bad!”  I have to say yes and no.  It’s kind of scary, and from a gardener’s perspective, in most ways not so good.

I love a deep snow cover on my garden beds.  The snow offers insulation and moisture.  And too many frost-free days can force perennial plants and trees to bud early.  If a cold snap does come after plants put out some tender new growth, serious damage can follow.  So while I’m enjoying the unusual warmth, I’m actually hoping things get back to normal.

An unexpected bonus of the warm weather was a January harvest of Brussels sprouts.  I’d given up for dead the mangy looking plants in the picture, but when I was checking things out in the garden this afternoon I found a nice harvest of sprouts in very good shape.  It did get down to six degrees a couple nights ago so I thought the sprouts would have succumbed to frostbite, but tonight we’ll enjoy fresh sprouts in January.  Hooray for global warming?

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Burning with Boss

Sunday, December 4th, 2011

Our Woods

I posted recently about leaf burning and why I don’t think it’s such a great idea, even if it is allowed, but I was careful to mention that I’m not at all opposed to fires.  Being a relative land baron out here on my almost rural four acres, I would have some major disposal issues if I could not burn prunings, deadfall, and  other natural debris.

Just a little over half our property is wooded.  You can see a neighbor’s house to the east of us in this picture, but if the leaves were still on the trees you wouldn’t know the house was there.  The woods are a great screen from the traffic that goes by on our front road, which is a US Highway and the commuter route between Madison and the town of Jefferson, about 9 miles east of us.

I won’t earn any merit badges for forest management.  I do minimal work in the woods, but I do have to take down any dangerous dead or dying trees, and the deadfall into the lawn area is significant.   I’m also waging constant war against the forest as it encroaches into the yard and garden area, so there are always plenty of pruned branches to be disposed of.

Burning with Boss

So several times a year we have small to large fires to dispose of the trees, branches, and prunings.  It was cold and damp today and a good day for a small fire.  I kept feeding the fire for about an hour while Boss the cat gave me a lot of help. Tomorrow or the next day, when  the ashes are cold, I’ll shovel them up and mix them into  the compost pile.

 

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When Autumn Leaves Start to Fall

Saturday, November 12th, 2011

In the village that borders us a few blocks to the west and south, leaf burning is prohibited, but it is allowed and practiced as a seasonal rite in our township.  I’m not advocating a ban on burning, but I really wish the neighbors understood what they are wasting.  While I was working hard today to get as many leaves as I could into my garden, I could see at least four smoke trails in the neighborhood.  Too bad for the leaf burners, they could be making some beautiful compost for free.

I spent a lot more time weeding my garden this year than I should have because I did not do a good job last fall of getting my beds totally covered with leaves.  I’m determined not to make that mistake again.  Since I took the picture above I’ve drug in several more tarps full of leaves.  The south beds are now almost all completely and deeply covered.  I’ll keep dragging in more until I either run out of leaves or the weather puts an end to my efforts.

I began covering my garden beds with leaves about seven or eight years ago.  It pays off in many ways.  Weed growth is slowed down through the winter and the beds are noticeably softer in the spring.  In many instances all I have to do is rake back the leaf cover and start planting.  The beds that do not get planted right away have a thick leaf mulch to keep weeds from sprouting, and as I rake the leaves off the beds they break down in the paths and continue to suppress weed growth.  Of course, the most important benefits are the free fertilizer and compost the leaves provide as they decompose.  The tilth of my extremely clayey soil is noticeably improved.  Every year my beds get softer.

Raking leaves and dragging them into the garden is not the easiest  of chores.  This year I’ve employed mechanical assistance.  In years past I was dragging tarps full of leaves from the yard to the garden using only my brute strength.  I may still be a brute but my strength is fading, so this year I used the lawnmower and its 18 horses to do the heavy hauling.  It worked wonderfully.

And soon I’ll hear old winter’s song, but I know the autumn leaves are in the garden, where they belong.

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Aerial Combat in Cambridge

Sunday, October 16th, 2011

Turkey vultures are extremely common in Wisconsin, but it’s rare to see them flying directly overhead in my yard.  Our wooded property is the main residence of an extended family of crows that controls the neighborhood skies.  The crows never allow vultures, owls, hawks or other larger birds to secure the local airspace or even intrude into it for very long.

This afternoon there must have been  a major road kill on US Highway 18 which is the north border of our four acres.  I was working in the garden when at least a dozen vultures began circling overhead.  They were so close and so low to the ground my first thought was, “they’re coming after me”.  Since I’m not dead yet, I knew that was probably not true.  It was the best look I’ve ever had of these wonderful flyers.  Hang gliding humans pale in comparison to the vultures’ ability to effortlessly ride the air currents.

More vultures showed up.  There were now at least twenty circling directly overhead.  I was wondering where the crows were when I heard a few caws.  It wasn’t the raucous cacophony I expected, just a continuous back and forth of their familiar signaling.

Then I saw the crow formation.  At first I thought it was another group of vultures, but they were way more organized.  The crows had scrambled, like Spitfires in the Battle of Britain.  There were about fifteen birds,  grouped tightly, and while they didn’t attack the vultures directly, they took control of their airspace.  The vultures climbed to a higher elevation and headed west.

I really missed having my camera by my side.  I went to the house to get it, but the action was over by the time I returned.  I took a picture of a solitary vulture hanging around to check things out but it was already at an altitude out of range for my camera to get a good shot.  A few minutes later only a couple crow sentries remained in the mulberry tree at the south end of the garden cawing the all clear to the rest of their family.

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More True Life Adventures

Sunday, November 14th, 2010

I was digging horseradish roots out of the compost area when I uncovered a little spotted salamander.

They seem out of place here.  I would expect them in much wetter areas, but I come across them frequently so I guess they like the garden surroundings.

Judy was cleaning up our leek harvest nearby so I put the salamander in the wheelbarrow she was using while I fetched the camera.  I took the picture and returned the little creature back to where I had found it.  Then I went back to work on the horseradish.

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Easy Fruit Fly Traps — Or, DIE, BUGS, DIE!

Friday, August 6th, 2010

Well, it’s harvest time again, and the fruit flies are starting to find their way into the kitchen. They have also managed to find their way back into my worm bin, and I’m not totally cool with that. I don’t think Phil minds too much, but I’m not terribly fond of the little buggers. So now I guess it’s time to set up the traps again.

There are plenty of different techniques for making fruit fly traps, but this one has worked pretty well for me.

Start with a glass (or Mason jar, or any other similar sized container). The one in the picture has a nice stable bottom, which is why I like to use it. Pour a little apple cider vinegar in. I often cut it with a bit of water, but it really doesn’t matter. Optional: you can add a tiny drop of dish soap to break the surface tension. That last part is probably totally unnecessary, but hey, anything to kill the little guys sooner, right?

Next, take a sheet of paper. I usually cut an 8.5″ x 11″ sheet in half. The one in the picture came from a notepad. I don’t actually know if the paper has to be white, but I’ve never not used white (at least on the inside “funnel” part). Curl the paper and tape it into a funnel shape, leaving a small hole at the bottom. I cut the corners to round off the top the funnel — another unnecessary step, but it’s my trap, and I’ll make it how I want to make it.

Set the funnel in the top of the glass. Make sure there’s a gap between the vinegar and the bottom of the funnel. Tape the funnel to the glass to ensure there are no gaps that would let the flies escape. Usually two pieces of tape (one on either side) will do.

I made the trap in these pictures yesterday. This is the trap I keep on top of the worm bin, so yes, Phil has a lot of flies right now. But, as you can see, the trap is quite effective. The trap will last quite a while and will hold a surprising amount of flies, so I only change it out for fresh vinegar and paper when I get too grossed out by it or if the paper gets too covered in frass. I have also read that you can use other things for bait, such as wine, beer or a piece of fruit. I never liked the idea of a hunk of fruit, because it wouldn’t actually kill the flies, just trap them, and it may even allow them to breed more. And I want ‘em DEAD!

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