Sunday, March 22, 2009

8 Deers & Their 2 New Canadian Geese Friends

Deer familyThese are similar kind of Canada geese that brought down the US Airways Airbus 320 bound for Charlotte, N.C. The pilots were forced to ditch the plane in the Hudson River when it ingested Canada geese into both engines shortly after taking off from New York’s LaGuardia Airport. Story link...Let's go and find our friends...
Total 8 deers, click to enlarge the photo below:


Romaine Lettuce

I start growing Romanian lettuce this week, hope to get some yummy organic salad.

Romanian Lettuce is somewhat sensitive to excess light (i.e., the crop gets saturated at 11 MJ/m2/d and levels of 19 MJ/m2/d or higher actually inhibit growth. If grown in high light regimes, the crop requires shading for optimum growth and yield.
Lettuce strongly responds to CO2 enrichment particularly at low light. At low light there is over 50% yield increase between enriched (1,000 mg CO2/kg) and non-enriched (400 mg CO2/kg).
For lettuce, optimum water supply is critical during vegetative and reproductive growth. Water stress, caused by high water demand and high air and soil temperatures, is the main cause for poor growth in the tropics. If exposed to water stress, the crop exhibits slow growth and tip-burn.

Temperature affects plant growth and yield of the lettuce. The threshold night temperature for plant growth is about 50 ºF
providing that day temperatures are at least 50 ºF higher. Optimum growth is attained at night and day temperatures of about 53.6 and 75.2 ºF, respectively. Mean daily temperatures higher than 69.8 ºF promote seed stalk elongation, puffy heads, bitterness, and an increasing tendency toward internal disorders. Temperatures below 55.4 ºF, in turn, sharply reduce plant growth and N uptake.

Saturday, March 21, 2009

They are back...

Those deers are not afraid of people, they will look at you and continue eating, like human beings are invisible to them.

Deer can be a nuisance for home garden

Deers are just as much at home eating wild plants in the woods as they are eating plants in the garden. It is truly amazing how deers' single walk through the yard can result in so much damage. These shrubs are not deer-proof, it starts to grow back after the deers almost kill it.


Friday, March 20, 2009

Happy Sping News

Finally!!!

Vegetable Garden at White House

Vegetable Garden at White HouseThe first lady, who said that she had never had a vegetable garden, recalled that the idea for this one came from her experiences as a working mother trying to feed her daughters, Malia and Sasha, a good diet. Eating out three times a week, ordering a pizza, having a sandwich for dinner all took their toll in added weight on the girls, whose pediatrician told Mrs. Obama that she needed to be thinking about nutrition.

“He raised a flag for us,” she said, and within months the girls had lost weight.

Dan Barber, an owner of Blue Hill at Stone Barns, an organic restaurant in Pocantico Hills, N.Y., that grows many of its own ingredients, said: “The power of Michelle Obama and the garden can create a very powerful message about eating healthy and more delicious food. I don’t think it’s a stretch to say it could translate into real change.”

While the Clintons grew some vegetables in pots on the White House roof, the Obamas’ garden will far transcend that, with 55 varieties of vegetables — from a wish list of the kitchen staff — grown from organic seedlings started at the Executive Mansion’s greenhouses.

The Obamas will feed their love of Mexican food with cilantro, tomatillos and hot peppers. Lettuces will include red romaine, green oak leaf, butterhead, red leaf and galactic. There will be spinach, chard, collards and black kale. For desserts, there will be a patch of berries. And herbs will include some more unusual varieties, like anise hyssop and Thai basil. A White House carpenter, Charlie Brandts, who is a beekeeper, will tend two hives for honey.

The total cost of seeds, mulch and so forth is $200, said Sam Kass, an assistant White House chef, who prepared healthful meals for the Obama family in Chicago and is an advocate of local food. Mr. Kass will oversee the garden.

The plots will be in raised beds fertilized with White House compost, crab meal from the Chesapeake Bay, lime and green sand. Ladybugs and praying mantises will help control harmful bugs.

Cristeta Comerford, the White House’s executive chef, said she was eager to plan menus around the garden, and Bill Yosses, the pastry chef, said he was looking forward to berry season.

The White House grounds crew and the kitchen staff will do most of the work, but other White House staff members have volunteered.

So have the fifth graders from Bancroft. “There’s nothing really cooler,” Mrs. Obama said, “than coming to the White House and harvesting some of the vegetables and being in the kitchen with Cris and Sam and Bill, and cutting and cooking and actually experiencing the joys of your work.”

For children, she said, food is all about taste, and fresh and local food tastes better.

“A real delicious heirloom tomato is one of the sweetest things that you’ll ever eat,” she said. “And my children know the difference, and that’s how I’ve been able to get them to try different things.

“I wanted to be able to bring what I learned to a broader base of people. And what better way to do it than to plant a vegetable garden in the South Lawn of the White House?”

For urban dwellers who have no backyards, the country’s one million community gardens can also play an important role, Mrs. Obama said.

But the first lady emphasized that she did not want people to feel guilty if they did not have the time for a garden: there are still many changes they can make.

“You can begin in your own cupboard,” she said, “by eliminating processed food, trying to cook a meal a little more often, trying to incorporate more fruits and vegetables.”

Wednesday, March 18, 2009

Mr. & Mrs. Deer drop by with the juniors

View from my garden, guess who is visiting? The whole deer family!

Let's count...how many of them? emmmm... 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6!







Mama deer said: "It is getting late (almost 7pm), let's go home...Bye! See you next time!"

Tuesday, March 17, 2009

Plum Tree, Peach Tree, Other Fruit Trees Maintenance

From Flowers to Fruits
My plum tree and peach tree set too many fruits, it needs thinning for proper development.
Plum Tree
Peach TreeFruit Trees Maintenance
- needs to remove:
* weak or downward growing branches
* center and top of the tree/ long shoots
* water sprouts in an open area
* cross or interfere limbs that growing towards the center of the tree
* root suckers
* dense and crowded branches
* dead, diseased, or damaged wood

Pruning guide

Fruit Trees Training and Pruning

Sunday, March 15, 2009

Fruit Tree & Insect Control

Semi-dwarf Plum fruit tree in my garden

Tree size:
Miniature tree = 6 - 8' tall
Dwarf tree = 8 to 12 feet tall
Semi-dwarf tree = 12 to 20 feet tall
Semi-dwarf trees are usually stronger and bear fruit faster than dwarf trees.
Most semi-dwarfing rootstocks do not control fruit tree size. Pruning makes a big difference in size. The best way to keep fruit trees smaller is by pruning during summer/fall.

http://www.fruit-trees.org


Less toxic “dormant oil" to suffocate overwintering pests, such as aphids and mites. INGREDIENTS
1 cup vegetable oil
2 tablespoon liquid soap
1 gallon water

Insect Control: Horticultural Oils

Wednesday, March 11, 2009

Tuesday, March 10, 2009

Multi-budded fruit tree blossom

I ordered a new Fuyu persimmon tree from online nursery, it has blossomed this week.
I found out that the tree is bi-sexual :D and multi-budded.
A bogger posted a comment that it is not a persimmon.
It has both male and female flowers. Female flowers are white color, but the same tree also has pink-tinged male flowers. So, I guess I paid the price for a persimmon tree, and received a multi-budded fruit tree, and found out about it a year later. What a great online deal! Multi-budded tree is usually cost more than persimmon. LOL!!!Reading:
http://www.crfg.org/pubs/ff/persimmon.html

Monday, March 9, 2009

Prevent Japanese Beetles

Watch out for Japanese Beetles this spring/summer they are o.5 to 1 inch long with a dark brown head and the body is shiny bluish-green. The wing covers are a metallic copper, which shines various colors in the light and the head is bluish-green. It will eat most anything: flowers, fruit trees, roses and all berries...endless damage in the garden. My goal for this year is no more Japanese Beetles damage; I will catch them early before they destroy all the plants.
Image Source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Popillia

Predators: Starlings love Japanese beetles as snacks! Native birds will feed on the larvae. You can help the birds along by turning the soil in autumn to expose the larva. Chickens will be another option, but it won't be allowed in the community with HOA :-(

Repellent plants: Catnip, chives, garlic, tansy and rue. Plant garlic around garden area to repel Japanese beetles.

Control Methods:

* Good plants for trap crops include: evening primrose, soybeans, wild grapes, African marigolds, borage and knotweed!

* Make bait traps of water, mashed fruit, sugar and yeast. Place on the perimeter of the garden at least 1 inch off the ground in plastic jugs with an entrance hole cut at the top. Choose sunny spots and strain the bodies out of traps every evening.

* For easier handpicking : In the morning spread out a sheet under infested plants. Shake the plants and the beetles will fall onto the sheet. Dump them into a bucket of soapy water. Dew on their wings in the morning keeps them from flying away. The cooler air also makes them more lethargic.

* Use pheromone traps keeping them at a distance from victim plants so you won't attract new beetles.

* Use interplantings of four o'clocks (Mirabilis), larkspur, white geraniums, red (and dwarf) buckeyes whose flowers attract and poison the beetles. The leaves of the castor bean plant also poison them. These plants are poisonous to people to so be careful using them around children or pets!

* Milky spore disease known as Bacillus popilliae can be used against the grub stage as a most effective long term control. This is best done on a wide scale treating entire infested areas in neighborhoods or grasslands. Complete control may take a few years. Once it does take effect the control can last up to 15 years!

* Japanese Beetle Trap and Bait
The following bait and trap method is to be used during the height of the Japanese Beetle season.

Ingredients:
1 cup water
1/4 cup sugar
1 mashed banana
1 pkg yeast

Dissolve sugar and yeast in the water. Mix the well maxhed banana into the sugar water. Put all ingredients in a gallon milk jug. Place the jug (with the top off) in an area where Japanese Beetles gather. The fermentation and odor of the bait attracts the beetles which get in but not out.

* Trap crops for the beetles are African marigold, borage, evening primrose (oonthera), four o'clocks, knotweed, soybeans, white roses, white and pastel zinnias, wild grapes and blackberries.

* Nematodes: Another control for the grub stage is to apply beneficial nematodes to the infested area. These are applied at a ratio of 50,000 per square foot of targeted area.

* Botanical Control: Pyrethrin, ryania or rotenone.

Readings:
How to Get Rid of Japanese Beetles
http://www.getridofthings.com/get-rid-of-japanese-beetles.htm
GREAT articles posted by Sara's "the herb gardener blog":
http://theherbgardener.blogspot.com/2008/04/getting-rid-of-japanese-beetles.html
According to Sara, the best way is to catch Japanese Beetles early "Trap and kill these first beetles and place them in a bucket of water to which you have added a couple of tablespoons of dish soap. The rotting beetles will send another scent indicator to other beetles: STAY AWAY, and the soap will discourage mosquitoes and other pests from using the water as a breeding ground."

How to Make Your Own Japanese Beetle Trap from dkmommyspot.com

Get a one-gallon plastic milk jug and cut the top off. Not too big of an opening. Leave the handle on too. Now mix 1 cup of water with 1/4 cup of sugar and a packet of yeast (a teaspoon will do.) Mash a banana and stir that around in there too. Hang this adorable contraption from the infested tree about 3 feet off the ground.

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