Backyard Gardeners

[Bob Green]

Those are some awesome looking tomatoes both quality and quantity. The only thing left growing in my garden is Asian Long beans, eggplant and okra. Tomato production was poor this year. I had good luck with my Cherokee Purple early on getting eight or nine nice big tomatoes but the vine cracked badly during a wind storm and the plant died. Cherry tomatoes never seemed to get going. On the good news side, yellow squash and zucchini had tremendous production.

[weezie]

Holy samoleans have we had snakes in abundance this year!
I've been approaching the patch with real apprehension.
What makes them all of a sudden appear in such numbers?

[budwom]

Holy samoleans have we had snakes in abundance this year!
I've been approaching the patch with real apprehension.
What makes them all of a sudden appear in such numbers?

the apocalypse, evidence by the Tigers winning a doubleheader yesterday. If that isn't a sign of The End of Days, nothing is!

[CameronBornAndBred]

Some of you may remember the greenhouse that I built in the winter, with the intention of turning it into a butterfly house in the summer. I planted lots of milkweed around the garden, and last week noticed that the garden fencing and the roof of the greenhouse were covered in monarch chrysalises. I carefully removed those and put them inside.

MonarchChrysalis.jpg


Today I opened the door to this scene.


EmergingMonarchs.jpg

There are over 20 chrysalises inside the butterfly house, I'm guessing they will have all emerged in the next couple days. After I take photos, each emerging batch gets to fly free through the open door.

[jacone21]

That is awesome! Great job!

[Bob Green]

Morning harvest of grey zucchini and straight neck yellow squash. I grew the zucchini from seed while the squash came from a starter plant I bought at Norfolk County Feed and Seed:

IMG_3437.jpg

[Bob Green]

My backyard squash patch:

IMG_3421.jpg

This photo is from a couple weeks ago. The plants are much larger now.

[bundabergdevil]

My backyard squash patch:

IMG_3421.jpg

This photo is from a couple weeks ago. The plants are much larger now.

Nice.


We’ve got sweet, jalapeño and habanero peppers this year along with an assortment of herbs.

We do a CSA at a small family farm so get a nice weekly seasonal produce mix, too.

[BigWayne]

Last year, I had a lot of problems with my tomatoes. One of the big ones was gophers so this year I have them all in gopher baskets.
Looking good so far, especially because I got lucky and killed a big fat gopher with a shovel.

[-jk]

Last year, I had a lot of problems with my tomatoes. One of the big ones was gophers so this year I have them all in gopher baskets.
Looking good so far, especially because I got lucky and killed a big fat gopher with a shovel.

How hard was it rounding up the gophers and stuffing them into the baskets?

-jk

[budwom]

How hard was it rounding up the gophers and stuffing them into the baskets?

-jk

I need to know, too. I've been using my black lab for gopher control, a basket would be nice!

[BigWayne]

How hard was it rounding up the gophers and stuffing them into the baskets?

-jk

https://gopherbasket.com/

Turns out it is a local company. I guess maybe we are the epicenter for gophers in addition to the 1989 quake.
I'm using the gallon size ones for the tomatoes and the quart size ones for basil, padron peppers, and japanese eggplant.
Zucchini is left unprotected as they have not seemed to be targeted by the gophers.
The gopher did suck down some unprotected pole beans and chives before I got it.

[budwom]

^ from our deck I can watch various gophers at work in three different yards, sometimes our own.

[Section 15]

I need to know, too. I've been using my black lab for gopher control, a basket would be nice!

Rather than killing gophers with a shovel, try planting marigolds on the edges of your garden. The smell of the flowers repels rodents: rabbits gophers, etc. We have used this technique for many years and have watched rabbits hop right up to a bed of lettuce and then hop away.

The only creature that isn't bothered by marigolds apparently are bears:

bear in garden.jpg

[BigWayne]

Rather than killing gophers with a shovel, try planting marigolds on the edges of your garden. The smell of the flowers repels rodents: rabbits gophers, etc. We have used this technique for many years and have watched rabbits hop right up to a bed of lettuce and then hop away.

The only creature that isn't bothered by marigolds apparently are bears:

bear in garden.jpg

If I could repeatedly kill gophers with a shovel, I would be a rich man. I just got lucky he was where I was digging.
Marigold trick won't really work here. It usually doesn't rain here from some time in May until the first rain in October, though it shockingly did this morning. All of my tomatoes are on drip systems where only the tomato plant gets watered.

[BigWayne]

I need to know, too. I've been using my black lab for gopher control, a basket would be nice!

Best tool I have found is the gopher hawk. Took me a while to figure out how to place it correctly, but have unfortunately had a fair bit of practice.
gopherhawk.jpg

Tomato planted in gopher basket:
tomato_gopher.jpg

[aimo]

Best tool I have found is the gopher hawk. Took me a while to figure out how to place it correctly, but have unfortunately had a fair bit of practice.
gopherhawk.jpg

Do they make those for squirrels? Or neighborhood cats?

Asking for a friend.

[budwom]

Do they make those for squirrels? Or neighborhood cats?

Asking for a friend.

good question. The resident foxes and fishers around here make short work of cats, you can't have an outside cat here, period..but the gophers seem to endure nicely. Might constitute too much of a tussle for a fox, those gophers are pretty robust.

[duke79]

I need to know, too. I've been using my black lab for gopher control, a basket would be nice!

good question. The resident foxes and fishers around here make short work of cats, you can't have an outside cat here, period..but the gophers seem to endure nicely. Might constitute too much of a tussle for a fox, those gophers are pretty robust.

Yea, we're plagued with woodchucks (or gophers, as some people call them) on our property. I HATE those animals - they destroy the vegetable and flower gardens. You would not believe how much time I have spent over the years trying to get rid of them. I feel like Bill Murray in the movie Caddy Shack. I've tried trapping them in Hav-a-heart traps over the years but it is not that easy to catch them on those traps and, if you do manage to trap them, they are NOT happy campers and will try to attack you through the trap. I keep telling my wife that I need a 22 rifle to "exterminate" them but she (rightly) thinks I should not own a gun.

[-jk]

Yea, we're plagued with woodchucks (or gophers, as some people call them) on our property. I HATE those animals - they destroy the vegetable and flower gardens. You would not believe how much time I have spent over the years trying to get rid of them. I feel like Bill Murray in the movie Caddy Shack. I've tried trapping them in Hav-a-heart traps over the years but it is not that easy to catch them on those traps and, if you do manage to trap them, they are NOT happy campers and will try to attack you through the trap. I keep telling my wife that I need a 22 rifle to "exterminate" them but she (rightly) thinks I should not own a gun.

Is a woodchuck a gopher or a groundhog? Or does it matter?

My grandparents battled a groundhog for a couple years before my uncle dispatched it with a 22.

-jk