Original Air Date: June 2, 2018

Garden Fortress: Beasts, Bugs, Blights, Oh My!  Weeds, Hot Days, Cold Nights, Wind, Hail, Yikes!

There are so many elements that can in some way spoil your hard work in the garden.  There are beasts, bugs, blights, viruses, bacteria, weeds, soil imbalances and fertilizer needs. You need a sort of garden fortress to protect your plants.

Beasts

The voracious appetite of a ground hog can level a new crop of green beans in the blink of an eye. Chipmunks will steal you almost ripe strawberries just before you get there, bowl in hand and mouth watering for a treat.  Mice, moles, as well as chipmunks can eat the bottom half of you root veggies.  I have had almost a whole 4’x4’x bed eaten from below. 

Birds are more of a problem with berries than with veggies.  I've watched birds fly off with a blueberry in his beak and back in minutes to steal another one.  I remember vividly the first time I saw that the ripe strawberries in the garden where gone to a chipmunk, “I can share, how much can they really eat?” I thought. Well they will eat them all, so I found out.  And come back for more! The birds will steal a few blackberries but the chipmunks don’t seem to like the thorns, so they leave them alone.  I have had chipmunks scale a dwarf apple tree and take a bit of not one be several ripe apples.  At least he could just eat a whole one instead of nibbling on a few apples. Sheeesh!  And once a chipmunk scaled a trellis to eat Sugar Snap Peas. 

Not Just The Small Animals Either

As if the little creatures were not enough of a bother, the last two years a bear has been knocking over out compost bins. This last fall the bear destroyed three bins completely, we had to recycle them.  They cost about $100 each so it was an expensive attack.  The deer generally leave us alone until fall when they like to level out Brussel Sprouts.  One year it was the night before our thanksgiving dinner.  I went out to pick them fresh for our feast to find almost all of the stalks stripped.  The deer will also level the Swiss Chard and the Collards overnight if there is any left.

Bugs

That’s just the beasts.  The bugs are a whole ‘nother story! The infamous Cabbage Worm and now the Midge attack the Cole crops along with the Cabbage Root Maggot. Young plants are regularly attacked by cutworms, slugs, flea beetles and root maggots.  If you have ever watched a Horned Tomato Worm feasting on your plants, you will agree that they are truly monstrous!  They must be the inspiration for horror movies. 

I had one infestation of aphids the literally ate a bed of Chinese Cabbage I had in a hoop house.  I check in one weekend, everything was fine, the next weekend the plants were brown and dried out.  Yipes!  The weird thing is that I never saw them coming and by the time I noticed the damage they were moving to the next thing.  I will admit that I never have had a plague of locust!  I have had leaf miners attack my spinach, but the plant usually outgrows the problem. Colorado Potato Beetle lay bright orange eggs under leaves of potatoes and eggplants. It took us three years to get the Asparagus Beetle under control in our patch. Japanese beetles really eat hardy on my green beans and my Blueberries.  I manage squash vine borer by growing most of my cucurbits on trellis’ that seems to avoid the problem. 

Blights, Wilts, Fungi, Viruses, Bacteria, Mildews. Oh My!

In our region Late Blight is the most destructive of all of these, wiping out a whole crop of tomatoes or potatoes overnight.  Farmers and Gardeners alike can see their hard work vanish with no hope of recovery.  The most popular garden vegetable, the tomato, is affected by lots of wilts and diseases.  Fortunately Hybrids and NEW breeds have been developed to resist many of those diseases.  Already there are a handful of varieties are being goffered ...