Praying Mantis: They have a voracious appetite and are best known for chowing down on mosquitoes, nocturnal moths, bees, beetles, small lizards and even small frogs. I am very happy if they want to munch on my mosquitoes, moths and lizards. I have been overridden with all three.

Praying Mantis

Ground Beetle: Not to be confused with the nasty Japanese beetle that took down my pines. As nocturnal eaters they munch on slugs, snails, cutworms, and root maggots. I have no problem letting these little guys help me out.

Ground Beetle

Green Lacewing: What a gentle looking fellow with such a big job! Known to control aphids, thrips, red mites, small caterpillars and mealybugs that like to munch away on foliage in the landscape! And as with any meal they like to finish off with a drink. They have a nice drink of nectar collected from flowers like Angelica and Sweet Alyssum.

Green Lacewing

Spined Soldier Bug: Ah, that infamous stink bug known for the foul odor it emits when disturbed. But alas, this little guy too, is a friend of the neighborhood garden. It will destroy for you Mexican bean beetles, Colorado potato beetles, hornworms, cabbage loopers and cabbage worms. Easily one of the vegetable gardener’s favorite workers.

Spidered Soldier Bug

Ladybug: I have always loved Ladybugs ever since my childhood. But it wasn’t until I got older that I realized what a friend to the garden they are. They control aphids, mites, and mealybugs. Known as aphid wolves because they feed on small orange-spotted black grubs. What would I do without them!

Ladybug

Braconid Wasp: Sounds like something right out of the dinosaur age but they too, are helpful to the home gardener. They have a stinger that is intimidating to humans. No worries, they are more interested in munching on caterpillars and sawfly larvae thangoing after people. And if you are growing tomatoes thank these guys for keeping horn worms at bay.

Braconid Wasp

Bumblebee: Who hasn’t seen the bumblebee lighting on a dandelion or an azalea blossom. They flit here and there in the flower heads pollinating away. They would rather be busy at their job than stinging humans. So if you get stung it is because they feel threatened in their territory not because they were are you. I love bumblebees because they are reminder that someone is helping me with pollination.

Bumblebee

Beneficial Nematodes: I must confess that I have heard of these little guys forever and yet never took the time to really learn their job. They live in our soil. And they go after those destructive grubs in the lawn as well as the fleas that want to torture your dog. But what I like most about them is that Japanese beetles are susceptible to being destroyed by beneficial nematodes. Lucky for me, they are turned off to the taste of earthworms and ladybug larvae.

Beneficial Nematodes

Tachinid Fly: Another insect that has a name that sounds like it came out of the dinosaur age. They get after caterpillars, gypsy moth larvae and cutworms.

Tachinid Fly

Earthworm: Last but certainly not least is the earthworm. When I see earthworms I know those little mini composters are fast at work. They create the kind of well aerated soil that I like to call black gold.

Earthworm

There are other landscape friends like butterflies, bats and some birds but for now I am going to be on the watch for these insects and encourage them all to come on into the yard and stay awhile.

Note: All pictures have been chosen from outside sources.

During the late fall and winter months it is time to use dormant spray on fruit trees. I can tell you from experience there is nothing worse than seeing my tree full of fruit only to look closer to find infestation or disease.

So what is dormant spray and why use it? First I would like to mentioned I am not writing about commercially grown fruit trees. I am focusing on the fruit trees that we have in our landscape. Dormant spray is basically a spray that is is applied while the trees are dormant. If applied correctly it will kill fungus and diseases along with killing off any bad pests that are lying dormant during the cold season.

A note here, not all insects are bad. Bees for example are our friends. If we spray too late in the season, say, when the leaves are beginning to bud, we may create a problem for the bees. There will be no pollination therefore leaving us with another problem.

There are several chemicals you can use. Dormant spray can be purchased at your local garden center.

As always, read the labels carefully, more is not good for the trees. There is a organic spray you can use as well for those who like to garden organically. The recipe is:

For one gallon of water:

5 Tablespoons of Hydrogen peroxide

2 Tablespoons of Baking Soda

2 Tablespoons of a Castile soap

Okay, we know why we spray and what we can spray on our trees but, now we need to know when to spray the trees. As I said before when the leaves have fallen off in late fall the first spraying can be done. This can be done late fall around Thanksgiving. If you live in the South, as I do, then closer to Christmas might be better. Always spray on a clear, windless day when there is no threat of rain or snow within the next couple of days.

Do a second spraying midwinter, this is less critical and for those of us who live in harsher climates skipping it altogether may be a real need. Then do a third spraying around Valentine’s Day unless your leaves are budding, as can happen in the southern States. Budding is too late as it will not allow for the bees to visit and pollinate!

If you have found that it is too late to spray not to fret you can do it again next year. For more information on sources see below.

Sources:

http://www.jlgardencenter.com/uploads/handouts/DormantSpray.pdf

http://www.cdpr.ca.gov/docs/emon/dormspray/dormant_fact.pdf

http://www.mcshanesnursery.com/uploads/upload/help_Fruit_Trees.pdf

Some days the weight of the world seems to be too much. I watch too much news or I debate too many negative topics and then whammo, decompression time is needed. And that means right now! I have found five things that keep me grounded.

Gardening:

I love gardening. Whenever some issue needs some sorting out I put on my garden hat, grab my gloves, clogs and tools. Out I go, there is always something to do in the garden no matter what season I am in.

A great thing about gardening is that it is just outside my door. I do not need special gym clothes or shoes to go outside. The fresh air clears my head and after a while I relax. With my dog at my feet I sit on the garden bench to survey our hard work. Mine the garden, hers……keeping the squirrels and lizards at bay. A very symbiotic relationship.

Walking:

This is right up there with gardening for clearing my head and being relaxing. I used to be satisfied just walking in the neighborhood but I need a good long walk so now I go to the local state park. I head out most days for the long walk and stop when my head is clear. My walking companion, my dog, is good for my soul too. A dog is an integral part of my decompressing. When I get home I am ready to take on the world.

Sewing:

I love to sew or do crafts. Cross-stitching is my craft of choice. Something I can do when being a couch potato. I have never been good at just sitting still so there has to be something to do while I am watching TV with my hubby and girl dog. Making clothes or quilting are fun projects too. Sewing is so relaxing. Like gardening you can see what you have produced immediately. It takes my mind of things I can not control.

Research and Writing:

I put these two together because once I start researching then it just has to be written down. It doesn’t matter the topic. It can me anything that has hit my curiosity bone from a quote I heard to full blown historical research. No matter I am out on the Information Highway, pulling out books or whatever to get the answer. I do not quit until I have the answers! I can get so absorbed that I forget time and space for days at a time. But when I process it all I am ready to face the world again.

Writing is fun. I can write for my blog, about a specific topic or as I piecing together ideas for a novella, I have one rolling around in my head right now. I have to be in a “flow” to write so it is critical I have released anything on my mind to get in that space.

All five of these decompressing tools work. The pay off is after I am done I am ready again for another run at life. I call it my internal housecleaning. I have either exercised my brain or my body. Both of which are necessary for a good night’s sleep. Sweet dreams!

“We must always change, renew, rejuvenate ourselves, otherwise we harden”

~Johann Wolfgang von Goethe~

This past summer my husband and I had to decide to take two down and top another. But the real blow came this month we noticed six of the beautiful pines were either sick, overcrowded or diseased. But alas, as I sat forty feet away on my patio in the quiet of the day I heard those nasty little pine beetles munching away with no disgrace of their shameful habit. I knew we had to do the right thing. And so one fine day my husband and I decided to tour the yard to see what exactly was happening.

What we saw was overcrowding that was causing the pines to weaken as they fought for water and nutrients to supply themselves. We saw two or three that had cracked trunks that were a time bomb waiting for a day to fall doing damage to our yard as well as our neighbor’s yard. And we saw two dead pines munched to death by pine beetles. And so we knew it was time to call our “tree guy”, Glen.

Glen came out and looked at that the trees we had marked. “Yep, and oh yeah”, with a nod. And “right I see why you want that overcrowded one out”. I can tell you this not a case of a worker wanting to make a lot off money of us because he gave us a wonderful deal.

And Glen gave us a lesson in pine trees. We asked him if he would tour our yard to look at all the pines to see if any others were in need in the near future of being taken down. Glen knows his business. I think in his prior life he was a tree whisperer because he knew “everything there is to know about pines but were afraid to ask”. For example, we were concerned about the holes we saw in the side of some trees. He pointed out the difference between a damaged tree and one that really is quite fine. Looks are not everything! Then in a soft and easy southern drawl he began to share stories of trees. Showing us what to look for when a tree has gone bad. How to work on overcrowding and how to keep the tree healthy to keep those darn pine beetles at bay. I felt like we had been visited by a specialist and indeed we had!

Glen built his own house. Had been raised in the tree business all his life and is now raising his son who is lead worker on the jobs. I feel like my trees are in safe hands now.

Trees are fundamentally living creatures hence, why I hug, cry and cavort with them. I had to say good bye to those six trees. But the crew were kind about not hurting surrounding trees. And as a tree hugger I was relieved to hear we had no immediate need to take out anymore of my friends! We know any other weaken trees will be taken care of, finally no stress. We looked out over the yard secure in the knowledge we did the right thing for trees. Okay, gotta go hug a tree now! 

“A stricken tree, a living thing, so beautiful, so dignified, so admirable in its potential longevity, is, next to man, perhaps the most touching of wounded objects.”
Edna Ferber

There’s an old, old legend, that’s whispered by Southern folks,

About the lacey Spanish Moss that garlands the great oaks.

A lovely princess and her love, upon their wedding day,

Were struck down by a savage foe amidst a bitter fray;

United in death they were buried, so the legend go

“Neath an oak’s strong, friendly arms, protected from their foe;

There, as was the custom, they cut the bride’s long hair with love

And hung its shining blackness on the spreading oak above;

Untouched, undisturbed it hung there, for all the world to see.

And with the years the locks turned grey and spread from tree to tree.

~Legend of the Spanish Moss

Taking my morning walk I looked up into the trees, enjoying the Spanish moss. I have seen the moss for years in the southern United States but I never really thought much about it. I always thought it was a plant that hung on the trees and leached life from them like the dreaded Kudzu that I see around me. But I was wrong. Really wrong.

In fact it is an air-feeding plant found only on specific trees in the Southern States such as cypress, gum trees, elms, and pecan trees. It is not a parasite nor does it live off the trees as I had thought.

Spanish moss is not propagated by seeds. They propagate from the festoons, the decorative chain or strip that hangs from the trees. They are attached to the trees by wind driven fragments or fragments that birds pass along while carrying pieces to make nests.

And I didn’t know that Spanish moss is and was used to fill mattresses and furniture. At one time a thriving market in the South. It is used because insects will not attack the fibre or eat it. And it is resilient.

Now I have a whole new respect for Spanish moss. It isn’t just stuff hanging on trees. It has a life all of its own and we humans found a way to harness this wonderful plant for our use. It can even be fed to livestock, of course, under the right conditions. The livestock can eat it much like they do hay.

I was so excited with what I learned that I have been singing in my head all morning a song by Ray Charles and Willie Nelson, “Seven Spanish Angels”. The trees I saw were wispy, gentle and angelic. The fall breeze was scattering loose leaves all about as the Spanish moss waved alongside. I will never look at Spanish moss again without thinking of what I learned about this resilient plant.

I have a rain barrel, rain gauge, barometer and weather vane. Okay, I do not check them often to know if the warm southern winds are moving in or we will be getting an inch of rain to fill the rain barrel. But I do watch the weather reports. And I rely on my good old fashion arthritis to tell me when the humidity or colder weather is moving in.

So when I read about “anemometers” I recognized immediately what they were for because I had seen them before. They catch the wind in their rounded cups rotating measuring the speed of the wind. For me I really just need a wind sock to let me know that the wind is starting up or which direction it is coming from.

Living in the humid south I watch the Weather Channel daily during hurricane season so I know what to expect.

I have a barometer and a thermometer combo that works pretty well. I think I rely on the thermometer above all other instruments because I go out every single day rain or shine to walk or work in the garden unless we get a warning to stay inside. First thing I do in the morning is check my “Weather Channel” app to see what to expect and what time sunrise is. Then I am up and rolling. Sometimes I can tell by how I feel how bad it is going to be for the day.

I had never heard of a “psychrometer”. The two measure relative humidity. It has two thermometers. There is a process that sounds a bit complicated. To find the relative humidity you compare temperatures of the two thermometors. If you have used one you know how they work.

I think it is a bit more advanced for me when I am checking weather conditions. However while figuring how this worked I ran across some old timer weather forecasting tools I found very interesting and that are still in use.

One are “weather sticks” that are pretty neat. They work on the theory of air pressure affecting wood branches. However, it is not a guarantee at any time. So if at first you do not succeed then try another tree!

Only you can decide what weather tools you will want to use for your needs. But I think you will find that the tools I have mentioned here are worthy of checking out. Both the psychrometer and the anemometer are very interesting weather tools as are weather sticks.