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It originated with TikTok, right? Every weird bit of news or advice I've come across seems to be something somebody made up and posted there, and no matter how outlandish you'll find hundreds of people who claim it's all perfectly true 🙄
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I dug my garlic today and although the tops looked fantastic I'm disappointed with the size of the bulbs. But then when I was digging I saw how despite my attempts to improve it my soil is still basically hard builder's clay, so it's no wonder I can't get anything to yield well there... sigh, I sometimes wonder why I bother.
But hope springs eternal, I've planted some bush beans where the garlic was in hope of taking advantage of the big rainfall we are supposed to get from the remnants of Beryl.
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So much rain here in MN this year... I decided to try the mosquito lawn spray service since I'm pretty sure we will be at Def Con 1 malaria levels by July 4th. They tout it as being "safe for people, pets and plants". Our kids and dogs are gone so I feel less uneasy about doing it. Plus, my Mom still enjoys gardening but has a lot of brush and woods on her small property. Does anyone have any experience with this? A relative of mine got West Nile virus in AZ. He was in the 1% who had it so bad that he got neurological damage and had to relearn essential ADLs. He's recovered now but...yikes. Arizona + mosquitoes. Go figure.
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I still have hope for my peppers 🫑.
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It's that time of year when all the wonderful flowers of June fade away and the hope for the garden fades with it. Powdery mildew has arrived and I expect Japanese beetles are just around the corner, the hot, dry weather stresses plants, and the $%#@ squirrels finally found one of the two sunflowers they have missed up until now (sigh)
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cw,

They are hanging on by a thread but I am still hoping they will come back.
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Yay! where there's life there's hope NHWM!
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Nacy,

Yeah, it’s stifling here!
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My peppers are still growing but I don’t know if they will flourish or not.
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🙂 What did the alien dandelion say to the Earth dandelion?

Take me to your weeder!
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cw,

They are sitting in the pot looking pathetic, a few peppers and no leaves. I don’t know if they will come back or not. We’ll see.

It is super hot here. My husband stayed with me in the hospital, even though I told him that he could go home.

So, they weren’t watered. I think he thought it was okay because we had a lot of rain previously.
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Did they perhaps get dried out while you weren't able to watch them? Whatever happened don't write them off yet, a little TLC might get them back on track (but don't overdo it)
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Thanks, Nacy.
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Nacy,

I hope so. Going for follow up care. I have over 20 test results in my portal right now. Will discuss with my doctors.

I have to wear a heart monitor for a month.

I am still having a couple of symptoms.
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I have no idea what is going on with my peppers. When I got home from my stay in the hospital, all of the leaves were falling off. Of well…I tried to grow peppers. 🫑
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Call me crazy for putting this much effort into it, but we buy a product at Lowe’s or Home Depot that is mixed in with the birdseed to make it so hot nothing but birds will eat it. We bake the seed on a cookie sheet or other pans at about 225 degrees for 30-40 minutes with the hot stuff, maybe named Squirrel Away? The baking makes the sees unable to germinate when some falls to the ground. So a capful of the liquid heat and some baking and no critters and no germinating seed mess. It’s worked for years
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No squirrel feeder is worth fifty dollars says this old bat. I feed my squirrels over the neighbor's fence so Frieda the foster doesn't get the nuts. Currently the squirrels have nipples, so babies in their nests I think.

I have a garden (small) that is a jungle of blooming high cineraria, brugmansia, jasmine, california poppies, foxglove.

I leave in two weeks for a month on Puget Sound with the DD, and am letting the partner watch over the yard, as he does yearly for a solid month. I want to try to clear out what I can of the spent blooms and yesterday filled one Lowe's garden waste bag and two huge greens containers (the tenants and ours).

Worked all day and had myself at last down on the ground with the proverbial "I cannot get up". Had to use the nearest tree (the brugmansia with it's yellow trumpet blooms) to pull myself to my feet. Have a blister on my thumb.

Nothing more strenuous than the Golden Gate Park dog park today, and eating things bad for me while listening to podcasts.

I hope I just "go" before I cannot get down into the earth. (wait, you DO get down into the earth when you go). I WILL NOT hire out this work I so love, let them have the fun, and pay them 50.00 an hour (the going rate on NextDoor here to do it while nanny helpers for moms only get about 35.00.

I will be gone June 25/July 25 and I never take ANY social media of ANY type with me, nor a computer. I do have a few friends here whose email I have on phone, should I fall in the Sound and have time to type in a message. But otherwise you kids are FREE OF ME FOR A MONTH, as happens ever year.

I do not want to hear too much celebration about that fact.
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I once had a homemade baffle that kept out 95% of the squirrels but then they decided to launch themselves at it from a nearby tree, since it was really too far away they usually fell but they did manage to smash the feeder to bits in the process, thereby reaping their reward.
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cwillie, I have been using a squirrel-proof birdfeeder for years. It's a cylinder shape with a cage on the outside of it so that when a squirrel jumps on it the weight causes the cage to decend and they are blocked from getting at the feed. It needs to be far enough from the post so that the squirrel can't reach over and grab the seed without actually being on the feeder. The cage spring tension can be adjusted so that even the smallest squirrel will cause it to go down. It's very similar to this one, but not my exact model: https://www.amazon.com/Squirrel-Outdoors-Protection-Cardinal-Chickadee/dp/B0CJ96ZKG2/ref=sr_1_7?crid=3JRG5P5R7HSO5&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.VrgxfoNdIGkwCVEGF0q7SkKLV93S87bgrq4Vzg7kAmt9-xGMIfXh8A2MQqx0Zm6V5RPh5F-JVG_pj0A16NZ1MP3LNogadrLvoKx99Zg11-KgGQn8qJv09iO2v8Ex3x5nO_Yn6v9_PrhhVwGlIjF4vID_Wc8WZRAGem6HHA06dgQ64SzidgQYxAgffc5H6nOgsxNYBAriNKgYFSubrFYz_EK-5vnyyeXJ_k4uLxPx1s5bmcpPz0kT_7qaWrmdH6iK5jYagYCwNyoht944M01BpMTDvI8Q9Vn0dhEBMEYFOnM.uijOULRRPqL4-3EjHxyJTOssUqcp0tQFcQ8nMcLm9kw&dib_tag=se&keywords=squirrel+proof+bird+feeder&qid=1718111058&sprefix=squirrel+proof+bird+feeder%2Caps%2C105&sr=8-7 I've had mine for a long time, maybe even 10 years or more. However the squirrels do love drinking the nector out of my oriole feeder, like a bunch of drunken sailors.
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There is no such thing as a squirrel proof bird feeder

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hFZFjoX2cGg
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My neighbor builds amazing bird houses. He’s really talented in woodworking. He gets so angry when the squirrels eat the bird seeds.

He started placing metal sheeting around the trunks of his trees so that the squirrels can’t get to the bird houses.
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I've never successfully grown sunflowers here, if the squirrels don't dig up the seedlings they climb the stalk and destroy the flowers.
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Nacy,

I would gladly take it. I would swap some of my peppers for a sunflower! 😊
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Nacy,

I love sunflowers! 🌻
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Thanks.

I am not going to wait until they turn red. I can’t wait to taste my peppers!🫑

They aren’t quite ready to pick yet. I know what I want to make with them. Stuffed peppers.
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Yeah, green peppers are just unripe peppers, most will turn red but some will turn orange, purple or yellow.
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My husband asked me about red peppers. He wanted to know if we let the green peppers continue to grow, do they turn into red peppers?

I told him that I think that is the case but that I wasn’t completely sure of my answer.
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ITRR,

I am sorry that you lost your tomato plants.

7 years is a long span of time. That’s fabulous!

I really want to try my hand at growing tomatoes. We do get our fair share of rainfall.

My favorite tomatoes here are creole tomatoes. They are absolutely delicious! I love creole tomatoes, Roma tomatoes and cherry or grape tomatoes.

My dad grew tomatoes. Grandpa too. Grandma would can them. I know nothing about canning.

Grandma had a fig tree in her backyard. I ate the fresh figs right off the tree. She had so many figs that she canned fig preserves. The preserves were good too.

Are tomatoes prone to insects? I wish that I would have let daddy teach me about gardening when I was younger.

He offered to show me shortly after we moved into our home. I wasn’t as interested then. I was busy with other things.
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Cwillie, I know, it's our nemesis in other parts of my yard as well. Need, there's an older neighborhood in Vero Beach, FL that is full of live oaks and it's such a pretty drive. I'm up in Zone 4... I'll look up the jasmine ground cover.
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Creeping Charlie is my nemesis 😠. But it is kinda pretty when it's in bloom 🤷‍♀️
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