First-Timers: An Update From Alison
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- July
- 29
I got a nice note from Alison Lazarus, a first-time gardener in Harrison, with an update on how her new garden is growing. I’ve got a nasty groundhog of my very own, so I’m totally sympathetic.
“Hi Bill,
I thought I would send you a mid-summer update. We’ve had an
eventful July. We had a tenacious and voracious groundhog get into
the garden and do some serious damage.
I’ve sent a few pictures of some of his activities. He decimated the
lettuce, broccoli, brussels sprouts, spinach, yellow beans, peas,
spinach, cucumbers and melon.
No more carrot tops.
Brussels sprouts decimated.
Lettuce to the core.
He did this all over the course of a few days. We kept adding more defenses but nothing worked until—-we bought a Hav-a-Heart trap. Put in a few apples and voila, 2 days later we caught our culprit red-footed. (Don’t worry, we released him in a nice woodsy area a little further up county).
Since then the lettuces and melons are coming back, Brussels sprouts
are trying and I’ve bought a few replacements for some of the other
plants.
On the plus side, I’ve attached a couple of photos of my Tuesday
night harvest.
The berries are delicious. We are eating them as fast as we pick them. I harvested my first roma tomato tonight. The little yellow tomatoes are my favorite so far.
I’ve got early blight on some of the tomato plants as well as
branches that are too heavy with fruit and splitting. As I told you,
I didn’t really do a great job of pruning and staking my tomatoes
this year and will have a better understanding next year.
I’ve also noticed some white flies near the tomatoes—got to deal
with those this weekend. And I think I’ve got powdery mildew on my
zucchini. Just when I thought things were getting easy as the
weeding has wound down, now the pests begin.
But we are enjoying the harvest in the meantime.
Cheers,
Alison”
That Tuesday night harvest looks fantastic! Nice work. Any other first-timers with updates? Email me at wcary@lohud.com or add a comment here.
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on Wednesday, July 29th, 2009 at 8:26 am by Bill Cary.
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Bill Cary grew up in Louisville, Ky. His gardening was limited to growing parsley and impatiens on the windowsill of Manhattan walkups until the mid-1990s when he bought a rundown old chicken farm on 8 acres in the Hudson Valley. Now he spends his weekends chasing deer, hacking away at invasive shrubs and vines and wondering why he doesn`t have more meadow and less lawn.
Hi Alison: My husband and I have a fenced Veggie Garden in our backyard in Tarrytown. I have a suggestion for keeping the groundhog (emphasis on “Hog”) out of your veggie garden. It looks as if your fence is of soft material (like deer fencing). The groundhog can easily push under it. I would suggest replacing it with something more sturdy. Our fence is made out of flexible green wire fencing material, which we bought at Home Depot 9 years ago. It is 5 ft high and we bought a large enough roll to surround our 15’ x 18’ veggie garden and secured it with green metal posts at each corner and also in the middle of each part of fencing, then my husband made and installed a gate with a lock. We then bought a roll of 12” high hardware cloth, which is very stiff and strong, and installed it at ground level with earth staples right up against the green wire fence on the inside so that if a groundhog tried to push under, he would meet very strong resistance all along the entire fence – and the green wire is too flexible for him (or a racoon) to climb up. So far, so good – no critters (other than birds who fly in and out looking for worms) have gotten into our veggies. I hope this suggestion proves useful to you. Good Luck with the rest of the season. Mary Murphy
Thanks Mary. This is great. I like the idea of a fence that’s too flexible for critters to climb. What’s it made of?
Alison –
If I were you, I would not ever mention ”(Don’t worry, we released him in a nice woodsy area a little further up county).”
It is illegal to move / transport these critters within NY State.
You need to use a certified wildlife professional to dispose of your trapped animal.