Several more to go! The center garden got all the attention today. The side areas will have to be worked over the next week or so, but most everything there is ready to be pulled anyways. The center beds looked like they would keep producing peppers for a bit if staked, so I did that as well as pulled out all the broken storm damage and other flattened stuff.
It was like foraging for food out there - here's today's forage picked up off the ground :)
Below is what the center garden looked like right before Irene...
Here's what the "center garden" looks like now. All that's left are bell peppers, Poblanos, one tomato plant and some Zinnias.
Bug Fun... don't freak out! FYI, below these bugs are pretty much neither a pest nor a beneficial. These are Milkweed Bugs, a true bug, and their sole source of food is pretty much the Butterfly Weed plant. If you grow Butterfly Weed you may have seen them before. They certainly look menacing LOL, but won't bother any of your plants in the garden. They feed on those seedpods of the Butterfly Weed plant, which helps control the spread a bit, they do spread like wildfire every year, but are really pretty and of course you need them for the Monarchs. You can kill them if you want, but there are so many seedpods produced and gazillions of seeds anyway, I say let them be, there are certainly more offensive insects out there to go after, like the ones that actually eat MY food :)
This is just one plant.... there are many more that look the same! The bugs won't show up until it's about done flowering, so late summer is when you see them.
Here's Butterfly Weed in early summer...
We're exhausted and sweaty from working in the humidity cleaning up for what seemed like all day...imagine my surprise when I walked in for a bite to eat and saw that it was only 12:31 pm! Ugh...
Another gem from today... snuck up on Loch to see what he was doing so intently in the yard....
I wonder how long he'll keep trying!
Still listening to generators around us, really makes me feel lucky this time around. I felt kind of guilty last night when I let the dogs outside and noticed the street behind us was still pitch black, I had to turn off the tv so the neighbors wouldn't see the glow, I don't want to rub it in since I know all too well what extended power outages are like!
Wow you sure worked hard on that garden it looks very neat now. I think the heat is getting to Loch. Why else would he be trying to make a fire?
ReplyDeleteAh, to be young and have a great imagination.
I still freaked out a little. I am just really really sick of bugs right now. Unless of course they are bug eating bugs, then bring them on.
ReplyDeleteThose are actually attractive bugs, as bugs go. I just am not a fan of LOTS of bugs - of any kind - all in the same place. I love Loch's concentration. It will be so interesting to see where he ends up! I am so ready to just mow down my garden and get ready for next year.
ReplyDeleteWow! You got hit by a hurricane and you still harvested more than me! What's a girl gotta do?
ReplyDeleteSo did he ever get that fire started? Too cute!
You can keep those bugs. Yuck
Repaired garden's lookin' pretty good, Girl! Ya just can't keep a good gardener down. ;o}
ReplyDeleteIs Loch still at it or did you haul him inside by now? Whadda guy.
Does it strike you as cool that the bugs on the Butterfly Weed and the Monarch butterflies have the very same coloring??
Glad you all are safe and had little damage to your home and garden. Now, you have punched the hurricane card for this season. No more allowed.
ReplyDeleteSparkless, I can't tell you how nice it was to see Loch doing that, normally when I go into the house I find that he has snuck back inside while I wasn't looking to play a video game.
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Jane, I think that's why I left 'em out there, I'm so tired of battling - I looked them up to make sure they weren't staging some kind of coup for next year and then said , whatever, it's not worth messing with them LOL
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Susan, me too! This week I will be thinking about putting fall stuff in, like some well-behaved lettuce and chard :)
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APG, oh no! Now I feel bad for posting that LOL... hopefully next storm it will drop that stuff into your garden :)
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Mama Pea, haha yep Loch's in bed now! No fire ever got going LOL. I never thought about the bugs' coloring, but now that you mention it...!!
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Lorie, yes we fared really well compared to others - I just peeked out back and see that the neighbors behind us got their power back tonight! Hope you fared well too, I still have a lot of blogs to catch up on since I've been outside all day.
Wow! Your hurricane hit garden looks much better than mine! Maybe we need a good storm... well, maybe not!
ReplyDeleteJudy
Looks like you may have some to feed your family for a bit out of the garden...great shots of the bugs...they are interesting looking.
ReplyDeleteI still have to clean up our yard, which is littered with leaves and fallen branches. I've been procrastinating because the mosquitoes are unbearable right now. We were hoping that the storm would have driven them away but it's as if it brought even more here.
ReplyDeleteGood golly, girl! You are a total go-getter! Good for you, not letting the world get you down. I loved the video of your kidlet. We have those same bugs on our milkweed patch. After Hubby told me what they were, I stopped stepping on them. Oops!
ReplyDelete~~Lori
PS Glad to hear you are alright!
Judy, we definitely were spared any big damage, I'm kind of glad the garden went kaput LOL
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City Sister, hello! I was surprised at that harvest, I thought I had gotten it all before the hurricane but there were still more things hiding :)
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Thomas, here too the mosquitoes came out in full force after the storm, I was covered in bites from the day after cleaning up!
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Dirt Lover, the bugs certainly look menacing all posse'd up like they were going to wage war on something LOL, in this case I guess looks are decieving, they can just stay put, I'm tired of chasing insects this year so it's a good thing they won't eat my garden!
I'm so happy that you didn't get hit with a monster hurricane.
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