Alyssum AKA Carpet of Snow: Plant it With Your Vegetables...

I had white-flies last year. My garden also gets infested with aphids. I am cutting down on nondiscriminatory insecticides. I will probably use Sevin Dust around the base of Zukes and Squashes. No massive dusting.

So how do you kill aphids and creepy larva etc... predatory insects. The scent of alyssum attracts Hover Flies and Parasitic Wasps. Those insects are good and feed on the aphids. They may not do anything to white-fly larva but I bet any soft bodied insect is a treat for them.

I planted alyssum around my kales and cabbages and tucked plants throughout my garden beds. I will also be enhancing my wild flower bed closest to my raised beds. I am compiling a list of flowers that attract good insects. You'll notice the clip below also mentions cilantro.

 http://oregonstate.edu/dept/ncs/newsarch/1998/May98/alyssum.htm
Above is one of many articles about predatory insects.

Here is a clip:

The researchers observed an increase of beneficial predators of aphids, in a commercial broccoli field interplanted with alyssum to attract aphid predators, hover flies and parasitic wasps. Green peach aphids and cabbage aphids inflict millions of dollars of damage on broccoli crops in the northwest. 


By researching biological control of broccoli pests, the OSU scientists hope that someday growers may be able to save money and reduce the impacts on human health and the environment by reducing the use of chemical pesticides. 

"Many broccoli growers spray chemical insecticides to combat these aphids," explained Micaela Colley, a recent M.S. graduate of the OSU Department of Horticulture. "Natural predators may prevent a pest outbreak above the economic threshold, or reduce them so a 'softer' insecticide regime may be effective." 

Colley, working with John Luna, assistant professor of horticulture at OSU, conducted her experiments on Stahlbush Island Farm near Corvallis in 1997. She compared the relative number of hover fly predators on pure broccoli stands to those interplanted with patches of alyssum or cilantro, known attractants of hover flies. She also looked at aphid populations in stands of broccoli only compared with interplanted broccoli. 

Hover fly adults are known to feed on the pollen of cilantro and alyssum and other flowers. Many species of hover fly larvae feed on aphids. Scientific evidence that the planting of flowers attracts hover fly adults exists for other regions including the United Kingdom, New Zealand and California, said Colley.

A Response to a Question about Container Strawberries and Brown Crowns.

The Question:

I am doing container gardening this year and I am a rookie. I planted my strawberries from a bag about 10 roots & crowns per bag (very similar to the pic of the one in your lap) about 2 weeks ago but I planted the crowns just below the soil and they are not coming up. Is there any way I can save them? I uncovered the crowns today and they are all a really dark brown does that mean they have already rotted? Please help this rookie gardener.

The Answer:

Strawberries from bags are tricky because a lot of them are dead from the start. If they were green, and then planted below the crown line, only to brown... there is good chance they are dead. There isn't much more you can do than uncovering the crowns.

That being said... if your days are in the 60's and the nights aren't freezing, you should see sign of growth in another 7 days from all the healthy crowns. If you don't see growth, it is time to replant.

The other thing I do is look for root crowns that have growth when you buy them at the store. A lot to times the strawberries start growing a lot of green in the store because of the warm temperature and lights. The ones I planted didn't fare well either. That is because I probably left them in the bag and in the dark a bit to long. If you planted the crown slightly below the soil level, a strong plant would have been okay.

If you are using a container similar to my strawberry container, it is also a good idea to plant crowns around the sides and edges. And buy one or two of the large healthy pint container strawberries and plant them in the middle of your container. They not only will grow but will send out runners later in the year you can move and use.

Garden Update: The Freezing Nights Break

Finally! The freezing nights are gone for now. I have been transplanting my tomatoes to cups. I really pushed the amount to time they stayed in the cells. I just don't have the space to manage all the plants when I can't get them outside. As my wife says, "every year the weather is a problem." True. I guess I need a green house. I will let that one sit a while.

All my radishes are up. I posted a blog on how I test old seeds. The radishes that were 1 and 2 years old are up. I think one pack didn't spring yet. I had to replant my peas. The cold weather was abnormally cold and they rotted. I actually dug up peas that were rotted. On a good note, the peas I put in cells are up. I will transplant them. Let's see if tranplanted peas are problematic.

The spinach is up. The white flies are gone from my wintered kale. I am waiting on beets and carrots to show their faces. I have exotic melons sprouting under the grow lights. I am in the process of hardening off my tomatoes. It is a lot of work moving plants in and out but it is actually great exercise.

I plant to build a very primitive plastic sheet cold frame to allow my tomatoes to stay out over night. I prefer 50 degree nights but there will be a lot of 40 degree nights. I hope to build a system that buys them a few degrees.  I'll blog the process with pictures.

I also planted potatoes in containers and in a plastic bag. A blog of potato planting will be arriving soon.

Good luck to all!

Aspirin and Tomatoes: Disease and Pest Control with Salicylic Acid

I spent some time last year using aspirin to preventatively manage tomato diseases. I was not vigilant about the routine, but can say my aspirin treated tomatoes did better than the untreated tomatoes. Early blight is a disease that gets tomatoes in my area. Last year the blight came, but it appeared to do a lot less damage to the treated tomatoes. The treated tomatoes also seemed to recover more quickly. This year I intend to follow a strict routine of aspirin watering. All I can say at this point is there seemed to be some benefit to using aspirin. Enough of a benefit, that I will revisit its use as a preventative disease measure this year.

I read that the salicylic acid found in aspirin binds to a receptor site in the cells of the tomato plant. Essentially, the salicylic acid mimics the chemical trigger(s) that sets off the natural defense response in tomatoes and other garden plants. It is technically called the salicylic acid-binding protein 2 (SABP2) gene. It was discovered by scientists at the Boyce Thompson Institute for Plant Research out of Cornell University.

The use of aspirin (for the salicylic acid) to grow healthier tomatoes has scientific bases. Spraying or watering plants with an aspirin solution triggers their natural defense systems that fight bacteria, fungi, and viruses. What you are doing by using aspirin in your garden is triggering the tomatoes to fight off diseases and threats early. You are turning on all the natural defense systems of the tomato plant before a threat actually arrives.

Last year I planted my tomatoes with aspirin in the soil and also directly watered the leaves with the aspirin solution. The watering, over the season, was more random then scientific. I am not going to plant with aspirin this year but I am going to stick with a regular aspirin watering routine. I may just water the foliage of the plant with a watering container or I may use a sprayer. I don’t think it matters how you deliver the water and aspirin to the leaves. I plan to plant the tomatoes as I normally do and let them grow for 4 weeks. At four weeks, they will get their first dosing of aspirin water. I will follow up with dosing each plant every 2 weeks. Each plant will get drenched. I will stop dosing the plants come September.

The mix that I am going to use is one regular strength aspirin per gallon of water. The strength of a regular aspirin is typically 325 mg. The aspirin should not be safety coated. I will add just under1 teaspoon of dish soap to the gallon of water. I do this, in theory, to help stick the water to the plant. I don’t believe it is needed. The plant will be able to absorb the salicylic acid through its leaves and through its roots. From what I understand the salicylic acid will easily find its way to the plants receptor sites.

If you want to try this out on your tomatoes, I suggest leaving some untreated. In theory you should be able to see a difference. The tomatoes will have to be planted in different locations in your garden. The treated tomatoes will have aspirin water running all over the immediate garden area. All plants that have roots in the treated area will be getting the aspirin treatment.

*Some studies say it fights off insect pests too. I can't confirm that.

Tomatoes are Stuck in Their Cells: Hardening Off

I don't have much choice but to keep my tomatoes in the seed cells right now. The cold weather has prevented me from getting other plants outdoors. Typically I can put the foil trays with cupped plants outside during the day and put them in my garage at night. This gives me a lot of extra room. Along with the cold nights, we have had cold days of 45 degrees or less. That is just too cold for the lavender, rosemary, oregano, and other plants I want out in 55 or 60 degree days. This week has averaged 10 to 15 degrees below normal temperatures.

So I have a back log of plants now. Some of my tomatoes are sucking the nutrients out of soil in their cells. I can definitely say Miracle Grow potting soil beats Jiffy seed starting mix. The Jiffy gave me water absorption problems and it has no fertilizer. The Miracle Grow absorbs water and the tomatoes in that product are nice and green. They are all getting liquid fertilizer as I write.

So what to do... well I can try to harden off my tomatoes in the seed trays. They should get 1 or 2 hours of early or late full sun. Even though it is cold, full afternoon sun can burn them. And yes a few leaves got burned. I used the translucent painter's plastic cloth again to block the full afternoon sun. I wanted the plants to get light and get wind blown. The burns came when I didn't use the plastic drop cloth.

Behind it are my steps and the tomatoes.

The tomatoes and other cupped plants