Category Archives: Gardening

Pollination in your garden (Wally Richards)

February 19, 2023 Pam Vernon Leave a comment

Most plants flower to produce seeds so their line will continue through their off spring.

When it comes to our gardening efforts we want plants such as tomatoes, zucchini and pumpkins to produce fruit which in every case contain the seeds for the next generation of those plants.

When pollination does not happen then the fruit will only develop a little and then rot.

Pollination is the act of transferring pollen grains from the male anther of a flower to the female stigma.

The goal of every living organism, including plants, is to create offspring for the next generation. One of the ways that plants can produce offspring is by making seeds.

Every year I receive enquiries about what is wrong with my zucchini/pumpkin/melon/cucumber?

They flower and the fruit appears and then it goes yellow and rots?

The reason is that the female stigma did not receive a few grains of pollen from the male flower anther.

When it comes to the likes of pumpkins, melons and zucchini I always hand pollinate to be sure of a fruit set.

Best done in the morning where you check your plants for female flowers.

That is the flower that has the embryo fruit behind the petals.

When you find one or more then you look for a young male flower (which does not have the embryo fruit) but has anther that is covered with pollen.

I prefer to pick the male flower and remove the petals exposing the anther.

Then I rub the anther against the stigma and thus pollinating it and setting the fruit.

Bees, bumble bees and some other flying insects may do this for you as there is a little nectar that the flowers produce to encourage the flying insects to visit and move pollen from flower to flower.

Now things don’t always work as you would like them to work and sometimes a fruiting plant does not produce any flowers.

This can happen if the plant does not get enough direct sunlight, there is not sufficient energy to produce flowers,

It can also happen if the plant is well fed and well watered instead of flowering it will vegetate producing lots of new foliage minus any flowers.

I call them Fat Cats, well fed and very lazy.

If this is the case with any Curcubitaceae family member which is a large family that includes melons, cucumbers, zucchini and squashes you can take male pollen from say a pumpkin flower and fertilize a female zucchini flower to set the fruit.

It could also mean that there is a lack of potash so it pays to sprinkle some Wally’s Fruit and Flower Power onto the soil at the time flowering should start.

Then we have Self-pollinating, self-fertile and self-fruitful all mean the same thing.

You can plant a self-fertile tree and expect it to pollinate itself and set fruit alone (for example, peaches, pie cherries, apricots).

Self-fertilization, fusion of male and female gametes (sex cells) produced by the same individual.

Self-fertilization occurs in bisexual organisms, including most flowering plants, numerous protozoans, and many invertebrates.

Tomatoes are not pollinated by bees instead it is air movement on a sunny day that will do the job.

In a glasshouse or even outdoors its a good idea in the middle of a sunny day give the plants a gentle shake to set the fruit.

To grow tomatoes in the cooler months or though winter you need types that will produce pollen in the colder times to have fruit set. Summer growing tomatoes will survive with protect but may not produce fruit.

Winter ones are Russian Red and Sub Arctic Plenty (from Kings Seeds) World’s earliest tomato. Bred for the U.S. Greenland military bases to endure extremely cold climates.

Producing concentrated clusters of medium, good flavored, red fruit that ripen almost simultaneously. A very small plant with compact habit so excellent for anyone interested in growing in pots. Determinate.

Blossom end Rot on tomatoes is the dark patch under the fruit that is the result of lack of moisture to move the calcium at fruit set time.

The fruit sets but the bottom has the dark patch.

After picking the bottom part can be cut off and the rest of the tomato eaten.

If not done the whole tomato will rot on vine or in a container after picking.

Tomatoes grown in containers are prone to this problem as they dry out quickly in hot weather and need watering like two or three times a day. Alarge saucer under the container that is full of water will help.

Corn is another one that depends on lots of sun and a bit of a breeze to move the pollen from the male stalks at the top down onto the ‘silks’ of the female cobs.

Planting lots of sweet corn plants near but not too close to each other will help.

On a still sunny day you can shale the plants to allow the pollen to drift down onto the silks.

Corn varieties will easy cross pollinate if grown near to each other so keep your pop corn, ornamental corn and maize types well away from your sweet corn.

To sum up with fruiting vegetables and fruit we want them to be pollinated and set fruit for our food chain.

But in our flower garden the reverse applies we don’t want the flowers to be pollinated because once that happens the petals fall off and a seed pod forms.

If like on lilies you were to carefully cut off the male anthers to prevent pollination then your flowers would last a lot longer.

Once the flowers on a plant have set then if you cut them off the plant (we call it dead heading) then the plant is likely to produce more flowers as it wants to produce seeds.

We do that with roses to encourage a second flush and not only do we cut off the dead flower and rose hip (that is the seed pod) we cut back the stem a little to encourage new growth which can also produce new flowers.

Some gardeners use a small soft brush to collect pollen from male flowers to Fertilise the females and that is a nice way of achieving fruit set.

Fruit trees that flower but produce no mature fruit because of a lack of pollinators such as honey bees or bumble bees it pays to use a brush between some of the flowers on a sunny day to set some fruit on the lower branches.

Idea of planting flowering plants to attract honey bees may bring then to your bee loving plants but not to your fruit tree as bees are selective and generally speaking will work one type of flower only at any given time.

Bumble Bees are not so discrmitant and will work several different types of flowers as available.

Figs are very different: The crunchy little things that you notice when eating a fig are the seeds, each corresponding to one flower. Such a unique flower requires a unique pollinator. All fig trees are pollinated by very small wasps of the family Agaonidae.

The pollinators of fig tree flowers are tiny gall wasps belonging to several genera of the hymenopteran family Agaonidae. Gravid female gall wasps enter a developing syconium through a minute pore (the ostiole) at the end opposite the stem)

The wasp is long gone by the time the fig crosses your lips. Figs produce a chemical called “ficin” that breaks down the wasp bodies.

Nature is so resourceful.

Phone 0800 466464
Garden Pages and News at http://www.gardenews.co.nz
Shar Pei pages at http://www.sharpei.co.nz
Mail Order products at http://www.0800466464.co.nz

New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990. Part II of the Act covers a broad range of Civil and Political Rights. As part of the right to life and the security of the person, the Act guarantees everyone:

1The right not to be deprived of life except in accordance with fundamental justice (Section 8)

2The right not to be subjected to torture or to cruel, degrading, or disproportionately severe treatment or punishment (Section 9)

3The right not to be subjected to medical or scientific experimentation without consent (Section 10)

4The right to refuse to undergo any medical treatment (Section 11)

Furthermore, the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990 guarantees everyone: Freedom of Thought, Conscience, and Religion.
This includes the right to freedom of thought, conscience, religion, and belief,
INCLUDING THE RIGHT TO ADOPT AND HOLD OPINIONS WITHOUT INTERFERENCE (Section 1)

Photo: pixabay.com

Farming, Gardening

Surprising facts (and cover up) about copper (Wally Richards)

February 12, 2023 Pam Vernon 3 Comments

On a brighter note (well kind of) with impending storms and things on the horizon … latest from Wally Richards … EWR

Recently a reader sent me an article which I found very interesting so I will share this with you……..

Iron gardening tools versus copper gardening tools: What we were never taught.

Iron or Copper Equipment in Farming In the 1930s

A Walter Schauberger was invited by King Boris of Bulgaria to examine the reasons for the great decline in that country’s farming production.

During his trip through the countryside he noticed that in the areas populated by the Turks, the harvests were more plentiful than elsewhere. It was here that the old wooden plough was still used.

The rest of the country had replaced these with modern iron ploughs imported from Germany as part of a general modernizing of Bulgarian agriculture.

The first steam ploughs had also been introduced. Schauberger drew the logical conclusion that the reduced cropping was a consequence of the introduction of iron ploughs,

but it was not until later that he developed his theory of the detrimental effect of iron machinery on agriculture. His work with water jets gave him a new perspective on the problem.

It was shown that if a small amount of rust was added to the water in these experiments, no charge developed; the water became ’empty.

He abstracted this finding to the use of iron ploughs and thought their effect on harvest yields must relate to this.

When the iron plough moves through the soil, it becomes warm, and the disturbed soil is covered with a fine dust of iron particles that quickly rust. He had previously noticed that iron-rich ground was dry, and that the turbines in power stations ‘discharged’ water.

The conclusion of all these observations was that iron had a detrimental effect on the water characteristics within the soil; it expelled the water and ‘drained’ it of its power.

When the steam plough, and later the tractor plough, were introduced, the situation worsened as a result of the increased speed with which the blades moved through the soil.

Walter Schauberger has said that water disappears from fields that have been ploughed in this way, for straightforward physical reasons; the iron plough’s rapid passage through the soil cuts through the fields magnetic lines of energy,

causing an electrical current to occur in the same way that a coil in an electric generator rotates in a magnetic field.

This, in turn, leads to an electrolysis in the soil which separates the water into oxygen and hydrogen.

The electrolysis also damages the microscopic life in the soil and this leads to an even higher temperature occurring in addition to the iron blades’ friction with the soil. It is especially with iron that these phenomena occur.

With ploughs of wood, copper and other so-called ‘biologically magnetic’ materials, the soil’s magnetic field is not disturbed.

The conclusion that Schauberger drew from these observations, was that another material other than iron should be used for farming equipment.

His attention focused on copper. Copper rich soils retained their ground moisture well, and so he began to experiment with copper ploughs as well as other equipment made from copper.

To begin with he merely covered an iron plough’s cutting surface with copper sheeting and made tests with this.

The tests took place under controlled conditions, dividing the field up into segments, some of which were ploughed with the prevailing iron machinery and some with the adapted copper machinery.

The results proved very favorable to the copper, which showed a 17-35 per cent increase in harvest.

A large firm, Farmleiten – Gut Heuberg, near Salzburg, showed an increase of 50 per cent.
On a hill farm outside Kitzbuhl tests showed an increase in the potato crop of 12.5 times the quantity sown.
Throughout there was an increase in quantity, but also a marked increase in quality.
The baking potential of corn was increased, and potatoes were not attacked by the Colorado beetle, though neighboring potato fields ploughed in the more usual way were still attacked, and the nitrogen requirements of the soil were reduced.

During 1951-52 controlled tests with the copper plough were made by the Farming Chemical Test Station in Linz. The tests concerned the cultivation of oats, wheat, kohlrabi and onions.

Certain sections were worked only with iron machinery, others with iron machinery and added copper sulphate, and a third area with only copper machinery.

In certain tests the copper sulphate was exchanged with pure copper dust. A significant increase was observed in these tests also.

Rumors of these successes spread to farmers around Salzburg where many of the tests had taken place, and they started to call the copper-wonder ‘the golden plough’.

It was manufactured in large quantities but soon considerable opposition arose from an unexpected quarter.

In 1948 Viktor Schauberger had signed a contract with a company in Salzburg for the production of a large number of ploughs.

Then suddenly one day he was visited by a high official from Salzburg’s treasury office. The latter arrived in an elegant car, and the following ensued: the treasury director:

‘There has been a rumor that the Salzburg town corporation has carried out successful tests with your ploughs, and, naturally, this is of interest.

But now I must ask you face to face – what is is worth to me, if I support you?’ Schauberger said: I don’t understand what you mean.

You are from the treasury, you have nothing to do with support I have paid my fees for the test and everything is complete.’ The Treasury director went on: I must make myself clear.

The fact is, I have an agreement with the nitrogen industry whereby if I can stimulate the farmers to use more nitrogen than usual I receive a royalty for each sack being sold.

If now the farmers were to change to the copper plough the demand would permanently diminish, and thus I need royalties from your ploughs as compensation.

Can’t we come to an understanding as old friends and make a good deal for us both?

‘ Schauberger replied furiously: ‘I have only one thing to say to you – you are a greedy rascal – a thing I should have understood at once – when as a representative of the people you drive around in a luxury car.’

It was after this exchange that there was a surprise termination of the contract from the company that was to have provided the ploughs.

Representatives from the local agricultural society also started to warn farmers against using the copper plough as it could cause over-production which would give lower prices.

Thereby their production and use were totally halted. In 1950, Schauberger, together with engineer Rosenberger, however, obtained a patent on a method of coating the active surfaces of farm machinery with copper. End

Interesting how iron can effect the soil and crop production.

Moral of the story; Corruption is always in the higher places and we see the same today all over the world.

Phone 0800 466464
Garden Pages and News at www.gardenews.co.nz
Shar Pei pages at www.sharpei.co.nz
Mail Order products at www.0800466464.co.nz

New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990. Part II of the Act covers a broad range of Civil and Political Rights. As part of the right to life and the security of the person, the Act guarantees everyone:

1The right not to be deprived of life except in accordance with fundamental justice (Section 8)

2The right not to be subjected to torture or to cruel, degrading, or disproportionately severe treatment or punishment (Section 9)

3The right not to be subjected to medical or scientific experimentation without consent (Section 10)

4The right to refuse to undergo any medical treatment (Section 11)

Furthermore, the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990 guarantees everyone: Freedom of Thought, Conscience, and Religion.
This includes the right to freedom of thought, conscience, religion, and belief,
INCLUDING THE RIGHT TO ADOPT AND HOLD OPINIONS WITHOUT INTERFERENCE (Section 1)

Food, Gardening, News, Therapeutic Products Bill

PLANTS AND YOUR HEALTH (Wally Richards)

January 19, 2023 Pam Vernon Leave a comment

Readers that have followed my weekly columns and books will be well aware of how I have combined gardening with health.

I know that naturally grown vegetables and fruit will be very beneficial to your health and well being and when you add all the 114 known minerals to the growing media then the same food plants will be super healthy and taste so good.

The minerals can be obtained from using Wallys Unlocking your soil (minerals from rocks) Wallys Ocean Solids (Minerals from the blue waters of the ocean) and Magic Botanic Liquid (MBL which is minerals from prehistoric times).

The most benefit from your produce is obtained by eating raw or only lightly cooked.

The fast way to obtain maximum goodness is by converting healthy foliage into a drink we call ‘smoothies’

This is achieved with a very high speed blender which smashes the molecules of the plant material used allowing for easy assimilation into your body when you drink the green liquid.

Take the leaves of edible plants such as lettuce, carrot tops, celery, wheat or barley grass, silverbeet etc.

There are also a number of weeds that are edible such as Puha or Rauriki, dandelion and Stinging nettles.

Every plant has some beneficial properties even ones that are not normally eaten.

For instance there are about 3 or 4 different coloured carrots you can grow and each one has their own health benefits.

I always add a banana to my smoothies as it gives a nice palatable flavour.

We know that for thousands of years people in different areas of the planet learnt about plants growing in their area which they could use for their health and medical purposes.

I read one time that there is a plant or plants some where on the planet that will cure any ills of humans; in some cases we just have not found that plant yet or have the knowledge of how to use it.

Much of the pharmaceutical medicines was originally found through the old remedies of various plants people had used for generations.

The original chemists had jars of all sorts of dried plants and minerals which they would use to make up the concoctions that added recovery from sickness.

We hear about Chinese medicines, Indian medicines and even Maori medicines most of which were derived from locally grown plants and herbs.

A problem arises as Big Pharma cannot make money out of natural remedies as they cannot be patient. So if you know your herbs and herbal lore the poor pharmaceutical companies are not able to take your money with their concoctions.

Recently we saw during the holiday break our beloved Govt once again trying to implement a bill to ban the traditional use of herbs and plants for your well being. This is their third attempt at doing so and again removing another of your rights to be able to treat yourself and look after your own heath.

Andrew Little (Little brains I think) introduced the Therapeutic products bill see… https://www.beehive.govt.nz/release/therapeutic-products-bill-introduced

The Therapeutic Products Bill replaces the Medicines Act 1981 and Dietary Supplements Regulations 1985 with a comprehensive regulatory regime that is (said to be) fit for the future.

Labour having failed twice in the past to pass legislation because of public outcry are using a different tact to make it happen..’The Bill establishes a new regulator within Manat Hauora – Ministry of Health, headed by an independent statutory officer,

with a wider remit than the medicines regulator Medsafe.’

This person can deem any plant, herb, fruit and vegetable as beneficial to your health and thus ban the use of it, the growing of it and the import of it.

The only benefit of this has to be for the pharmaceutical companies and removes our freedom of choice to take what is traditionally safe natural remedies to what are often not safe pharmaceutical medicines.

In 2017 Labour opted for a prohibited list of 300 common herbal ingredients.

More well know on these included Aloe Vera, Comfrey, Belladonna, Hibiscus, Jasmine, Snowdrop, Juniper, Mustard, Worm wood, Cinnamon, Almond, Grapeseed, Ipomoea, Neem, Eggplant, senna and Valerian.

Many of these plants, herbs and spices like Cinnamon, Mustard are currently sold in shops. So how on earth did they get onto a prohibited list?

The answer lies in attempts to gain control of our food supply.

Natural products that are beneficial to health cannot be patented, but synthetic copies can be.

To make this work, the products that grow in gardens need to be banned.

Already I see Senna which is a natural aid for constipation is not easily obtainable in NZ.

Labour and the Ministry of Health did not make this list up, the list was supplied by the International Coalition of Medicines Regulatory Authorities (ICMRA) of which Medsafe is a member.

ICMRA is largely funded by the pharmaceutical industry whose interests they serve.

If we wish to be able to continue to freely chose herbal medicines and supplements without government interference, we will need to speak up.

Go to this Link https://www.parliament.nz/en/pb/sc/make-a-submission/document/53SCHE_SCF_BILL_130084/therapeutic-products-bill before February 15th.

Write to your MP and complain that the appointment of a regulator amounts to an open ended blank cheque to control the use of products used by more than 50% of our population without fully specifying the principles he should use.

Many of us do not realise what uses there are for many plants we grow in our gardens and while researching for this article I discovered https://medicinalseedkit.com/kit/

Have a look, I was amazed the wealth of information that is there.

For instance Chicory : This is the wild plant that Native Americans used to look for more than any other.

They’d harvest and use chicory to make a natural painkilling extract for a wide range of physical discomforts, especially stiff and achy joints. And so can you!

The root is rich in chicoric acid (CA), a plant compound with potent anti-inflammatory and analgesic properties but no risk of addiction.

If our pharmacies ever run dry, having even a small patch of chicory growing in your own backyard will provide relief. There are many more such as:

Chamomile – The Natural Antibiotic

Evening Primrose – A Natural Remedy for Skin and Nerves

California Poppy – Better Than Sleeping Pills

Feverfew – Nature’s Aspirin for Fevers and Migraines

Knowledge is power over your destiny and well being and it should never be taken away from you by Government regulations not in our interest.

An over reach of power by the Government.

If you want more information try https://hatchardreport.com/category/natural-health/

Make a submission, write to your local MP.

I have on both counts and if you would like a copy of the email I sent to most of the Labour MP’s just ask and I will send you the copy.

You can alter it to suit and use it in your words to the MP’s.

If enough people complain then you maybe we will be still able to still grow your lemon tree (good for colds).

No more broccoli (Some kids will be happy) as it is a great source of antioxidants and may enhance your health by reducing inflammation, improving blood sugar control, boosting immunity, and promoting heart health.

Why Is Broccoli a Superfood? fiber, vitamin C, vitamin K, iron, and potassium.

The list goes on.

Phone 0800 466464
Garden Pages and News at www.gardenews.co.nz
Shar Pei pages at www.sharpei.co.nz
Mail Order products at www.0800466464.co.nz

New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990. Part II of the Act covers a broad range of Civil and Political Rights. As part of the right to life and the security of the person, the Act guarantees everyone:

1The right not to be deprived of life except in accordance with fundamental justice (Section 8)

2The right not to be subjected to torture or to cruel, degrading, or disproportionately severe treatment or punishment (Section 9)

Image by Gerhard from Pixabay

Gardening

TIME TO PLANT FOR WINTER (Wally Richards)

January 16, 2023 Pam Vernon 2 Comments

December, January, February are the best months for planting vegetables and flowers for winter food and colour.

The reason is you need to catch the longer day light hours to obtain reasonable growth.

The day light hours are progressively diminishing but during these months there is ample time to get plants to a mature state before winter sets in.

Once it chills down vegetables which are mature or near mature, will hold nicely in the garden for you to harvest as you require.

There is a problem from my experience is that seedling nurseries don’t produce winter type vegetable plants and flowers until we are just about into winter. By then by then you have lost the growth of the longer day light hours.

Chances are that they will sit and sulk during winter then bolt in the spring to flower.

Many gardeners prefer to buy seedling in punnets or cell packs to plant which is very expensive even if you are getting a head start in comparison to growing from seed.

That is only an advantage at the start as seed sown vegetables, sown at the same time as transplanted seedlings from seedling packs, will out grow the transplants and give you a superior plant.

The key is not to sow seeds in containers to transplant but to direct sow where they are going to grow and mature.

Nature is by far the best plant grower from seed that I know of; just look at the crops of weeds that Nature has germinated in your gardens.

I am going to show you now the very best way to direct sow and grow seed in open ground or in raised gardens.

Select a sunny area of either of the above and remove all weeds that are currently growing there.

Rake the soil over to obtain a nice level area of friable soil.

Over this you sprinkle blood & bone, sheep manure pellets and Ocean Solids.

Alternative or as well as you can use any animal manures you have available.

Lightly rake the above to mix with soil or growing medium.

Then place about 4 layers of newspaper or one layer of thin cardboard to suppress any weed seeds that are likely to germinate. Wet down the paper or cardboard.

Next spread a layer of good purchased compost and I recommend Daltons Compost as its not just a bag of rubbishy bark with some lime and fertiliser thrown in.

(Some contains green waste that has herbicides in it as well which is no great help in establishing your plants.)

You are now ready to sow seeds of crops suitable for this time of year sowing

You need to do a bit of research on the Internet for mail order seeds from Egmont Seeds or Kings Seeds

Look at all the types available in say cabbages to see which ones are for winter growing/harvesting.

Buy the ones that suit you and the season best.

Open pollinate seeds are preferred ones to buy and g row as they will mature at different times rather than all at once. You can also note the recommended plant spacing distances on the ones you are buying.

Normally there are a lot of seeds in the packet and you are only going to sow a few of them at one time.

The packets with spare seed in them can be placed in a glass jar with a lid and placed in your fridge to keep well for future plantings.

Say the spacing is 30cm apart then you are going to put 2 seeds 15cm apart on top of your purchased compost and then spray them with Magic Botanic Liquid (MBL) before lightly covering them with the compost.

Leave for a day and then lightly water the area. Repeat lightly watering each day or if drying out quickly twice a day.

After a few days or a week or more you should have a strike with lots of the sown seeds sprouting.

Allow them to grow about 5 cm tall and spray them weekly with MBL.

Once they are at about 5 to 8cm tall you are going to cull out the crop.

Where two seeds have both germinated together select the stronger looking one and with a pair of scissors cut the weaker one off at ground level.

Allow all the other seedlings to grow and water to keep soil moist. As we are at say 15cm apart and not the preferred 30 cm we wait till the foliage of all are starting to touch each other

then we harvest the young plants to leave growing plants 30 cm apart (or what ever is the ideal spacing according to the seed packet info.)

The harvested young plants can be eaten/cooked in any suitable way.

If you have ample room and you want to plant for succession then repeat sowing as above in a months time and even a late sowing a month later in March.

That is it till the spring.

I can foresee that purchased vegetables are going to become very expensive over the next year or more for several reasons.

Imported chemical fertilisers that the commercial growers use are in short supply and much dearer than they used to be.

There are already and will be more crop failures from flooding or droughts and growth is slower because of the lack of direct sunlight from overcast and cloudy days.

If you have heard about the proposed ‘Dimming of the Planet’ to offset global warming by creating hazy skies and then if you are aware it; this has nothing to do with global warming but everything to do with slowing food crops growth so you have to eat Bill Gates Lab grown food or starve.

There is a lot of truth in the saying ‘Control the food and money and you control the people’.

I learnt of a recent problem in the Philippines were a kilo of onions is now the equivalent price of $20 NZD. Reason I believe is the flooding in northern parts of Philippines where the weather is a bit more like ours and a lot of food crops are grown there.

One Filipino friend going back for a holiday said she is not taking chocolates as normal but a suitcase of onions.

Taking about Philippines and their food stuffs we have a Philippine/Asian food distribution centre here in Marton which you can order non frozen food stuffs on line and have them sent to your home with your gardening requirements.

Have a browse at http://www.0800466464.co.nz/74-philippine-products

You are likely to be surprised at how better value many items are compared to Supermarket brands of similar products. Spaghetti sauces for instance are very popular with Europeans and about half the price of NZ brands.

Also save money in your gardens by seed sowing vegetables as I have described above.

Those people that took my advice in earlier articles about having a few chickens on their property will now be enjoying the fresh eggs daily and not paying about $10.00 a dozen at the supermarket.

Its just a sign of things to come I think.

ALSO DONT FORGET OUR CURRENT PROMOTION TILL END OF MONTH..

All Neem Products (Neem Oil, Neem Granules and Powder all sizes) 20% off

Wallys Super Pyrethrum 20% off

Wallys White Fly sticky Traps 20% off

Wallys Super Compost Accelerator 600 grams 20% off

Wallys Ammonium Sulphamate 2kilos 20% off

Wallys Cat Repellent 200 grams 20% off

All the rest of our products (except bulk ones and Asian food stuff ) 10% off.

Place orders on our mail order web site at www.0800466464.co.nz and place in comments ‘PEST SALE’ so I know to do the discounts when I will phone you.

I will apply discounts and Shipping (if any) before I phone you with the total.

Then we either do Credit/Debit card over phone or I will email you bank transfer details.

If in North Island and order comes to $100 after discounts then free shipping.

In South Island $150.00 after discounts for free shipping.

The total does not include bulk items such as 12kilo BioPhos, 13kg Ocean solids and 10 kg Unlocking soil (Freight is always charged on bulk products)

The above offer is valid till 31st January…

1The right not to be deprived of life except in accordance with fundamental justice (Section 8)

2The right not to be subjected to torture or to cruel, degrading, or disproportionately severe treatment or punishment (Section 9)

Image by Alexey Hulsov from Pixabay

Gardening

Time to deal to those garden pests (Special offers – Wally Richards)

January 3, 2023 Pam Vernon Leave a comment

( See at end of article for New Year Sale Details…)

Wishing you a Happy New Year Gardening.

Now the weather has settled a bit and temperatures are better (But still a bit chilly at times) Insect pests will multiply rapidly unless you instigate early controls.

If you look at when you are successful in eliminating one adult female insect, that will prevent somewhere between 100 to 300 more of the same pests to invest your plants.

For instance using the yellow sticky white fly traps; hang one near your tomato plants and within a few days the number of whitefly and other flying pest insects caught on the trap’s sticky surface will be dozens.

The sticky traps are worth their weight in gold for pest control.

Plants such as tomatoes, cucumbers, pumpkins, egg plants, capsicum and courgettes will likely have under the older leaves a lot of young pests.

Inspect the oldest leaves looking over and under and if there are a good number of pests remove the leaves from the plant and place in a plastic bag and seal.

This will greatly reduce the pest problem.

There will likely be pests on the upper/newer leaves but a spray of Wallys Super Neem Tree Oil with Wallys Super Pyrethrum will take care of these.

These combined sprays should only be applied only just before dusk for two reasons, Neem Oil in sunlight or with UV on a cloudy day can burn foliage.

Pyrethrum is quickly deactivated by UV/Sunlight and when expose to than will be ineffective within a couple of hours.

Pyrethrum sprayed just before dark will be active all night affecting any pests that come in contact with it. Pyrethrum is a quick knock down affecting the insects nervous system and thus killing it.

Neem Oil on the other hand will last for up to 7 days, slowly decreasing the effectiveness due to sunlight.

Its action is anti-feedent and once a pest insect consumes some Neem it stops eating for ever.

Adding Raingard to the above sprays will prolong the effective life of them and prevent the sprays been diluted by rain or watering.

For control of guava moth and codlin moth the most effective way is to spray the fruit with Wallys Super Neem Tree Oil with Raingard added.

This puts a layer of Neem Oil over the fruit so that when one of the moth’s grubs tries to eat their way into the fruit they are stopped at the first bite. Repeat spraying the fruit with Neem oil and Raingard added every 14 days till harvest.

Leaf hoppers, aphids, caterpillars and mealy bugs are simply controlled with the spray above applied late in the day.

One of the problems is re-infestation from other plants nearby or from over the fence.

Unless the other plants nearby are also sprayed you will never win.

Spider Mites are best controlled by sprays of sulphur or as we used to do in days gone by, Sulphur powder dusted over the plants that have mites.

At this time of the year you may have the cherry slug or pear slug eating holes in the leaves of those trees. If so spray the foliage with Wallys Liquid Copper with Raingard added. The pests cant handle copper and drop off and die.

Mealy bugs live in the root system of plants and the adults are found in the canopy. Spraying the canopy will take them out but not affect the ones in the root system.

Apply Wallys Neem Tree Powder to the top of the mix in containers that are affected and Wallys Neem Tree Granules to the soil in the root zone of plants affected.

Pest problems on citrus trees are very easily fixed by sprinkling Wallys Neem Tree Granules from the trunk to the drip line. Lightly water to get them started and normally within 6 to 8 weeks the citrus tree will be free of pests.

The smell of Neem granules/power is also a great deterrent as the Neem smell camouflages the natural smell of the plant and pests looking for their host plant by smell cannot find them and fly on by.

In glasshouses Wallys Neem Granules on the soil or on top of the mix in containers will reduce insects pests from been lured in from the smell of their host plants.

Little pouches made out of curtain netting and loaded with Neem Granules before hanging in fruit trees that are subjected to codlin and guava moth attack. Used in conjunction with the Neem Oil sprays on the fruit should mean you have plenty of unaffected fruit for your use.

Cats can be a pest in gardens as they use them for their toilets and Wallys Cat Repellent is the most effective way to prevent them fouling gardens or other areas.

Crop cover also called Bug Mesh is the best control of keeping white butterflies off your cabbages and brassicas. Hoops made out of rigid alkathene pipe with crop cover over them.

Weeds are another garden pest and a safe to use spray is Wallys Super Compost Accelerator which you can use to compost weeds where they are growing.

A few years ago a chap from UK phoned me and asked about getting ammonium sulphamate in NZ.

I had not heard of it and asked whats it for.

He told me in England you purchased it, dissolved it in water and sprayed it onto weeds to compost them where they are growing. The weeds think its nitrogen and readily take it in where it completely composts the living weeds and then coverts to nitrogen so no harm on soil life or yourself.

The most effective rate is 200 grams per litre of water sprayed on a sunny day when the soil is on the dry side. Given ideal conditions the weeds are composted very quickly in some cases with an hour.

Available as Wallys Super Compost Accelerator in 600 gram jar (makes 3 litres of full strength spray) or in 2kg jar named Ammonium sulphamate making 10 litres full strength spray.

If used at say 100 grams per litre of water the composting takes longer but on most weeds still very effective. A good choice to use instead of possible cancer causing chemicals.

One of the interesting aspects of the composting is if watered over oxalis foliage and into the soil where the bulb is, it will compost the bulb and bulblets in the soil. Repeat when new oxalis foliage appears till the area is free of the pest weed.

When used at rates of say 60 to 80 grams per litre of water it does not affect some strains of grass but can compost some broad leaf weeds in lawns. Experiment as to what rate it composts weeds but not affect you lawn grasses.

Unlike herbicide lawn weed killers that you cant compost the lawn clipping because of the reside in the cut grass that would effect herbicide sensitive plants (roses, Tomatoes, Beans) there is no problem with ammonium sulphamate composting the clippings which will only speed up the composting.

Wishing you a pest free New Year.

To help to make it so we are offering you a special discount of 20% off the following pest control items:

All Neem Products (Neem Oil, Neem Granules and Powder all sizes) 20% off

Wallys Super Pyrethrum 20% off

Wallys White Fly sticky Traps 20% off

Wallys Super Compost Accelerator 600 grams 20% off

Wallys Ammonium Sulphamate 2kilos 20% off

Wallys Cat Repellent 200 grams 20% off

All the rest of our products except bulk ones 10% off

Place orders on our mail order web site at www.0800466464.co.nz and place in comments ‘PEST SALE’ so I know to do the discounts when I will phone you.

I will apply discounts and Shipping (if any) before I phone you with the total.

Then we either do Credit/Debit card over phone or I will email you bank transfer details.

If in North Island and order comes to $100 after discounts then free shipping.

In South Island $150.00 after discounts for free shipping.

The total does not include bulk items such as 12kilo BioPhos, 13kg Ocean solids and 10 kg Unlocking soil (Freight is always charged on bulk products)

The above offer is valid till 31st January…

The first 25 orders into the web site will receive a free autographed copy of Wallys Glasshouse Gardening for New Zealand.
Make your summer free of pests and order soon.

Regards and Happy New Year

Wally Richards

Problems ring me at 0800 466464
Email wallyjr@gardenews.co.nz
Web site www.gardenews.co.nz

Phone 0800 466464
Garden Pages and News at www.gardenews.co.nz
Shar Pei pages at www.sharpei.co.nz
Mail Order products at www.0800466464.co.nz

1The right not to be deprived of life except in accordance with fundamental justice (Section 8)

2The right not to be subjected to torture or to cruel, degrading, or disproportionately severe treatment or punishment (Section 9)

Image by jumyoung youn from Pixabay

Gardening, News

How to grow potatoes in buckets for beginners

January 2, 2023 Pam Vernon Leave a comment

DIY Garden Ideas

Potatoes contain vitamins, minerals, starch ….. eating potatoes fight cancer, increase glucose loading capacity, reduce plasma cholesterol and triglyceride levels… Porous and dry soil helps potatoes grow well. Using old plastic paint buckets to grow potatoes is a great idea, it’s easy to make and saves money. You use 2 old plastic paint buckets, 1 of which you cut holes around 4 sides to later harvest potatoes, then punch holes for drainage. Next, you stack the old paint bucket that has been cut on the remaining one. It is better to plant the potatoes in the sand so that they germinate and then plant them in an old paint bucket After 3-4 months you can already harvest the first batch of potatoes and have a delicious and nutritious meal from the potatoes. Follow us: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/5T1TV Twitter: https://twitter.com/namtrinhhau Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/ideas2034/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/john_ideas_…

Food, Gardening, News

A Christmas message from Wally Richards

December 25, 2022 Pam Vernon Leave a comment

Here it is Christmas day and I am writing this short weekly article today because I was too busy yesterday mowing lawns and tidying up gardens for Christmas.

So I hope you are having a pleasant day and a chance to hopefully forget the woes of the past year.

As the Chinese say, ‘Have an Interesting Life’ which some take as a curse because an interesting life is not an easy one.

It is full of problems as well as good times which in comparison a life without the ups and downs is very boring.

As us gardeners know, problems are just challenges in the garden, things to resolve and sort out.

Having successes against the odds is wonderful and very satisfying.

I always get a thrill when seeds I have sown burst forth as young seedlings out of the growing media.

Life has been born anew.

As I wrote a week or two ago this summer so far has been dismal with too many cloudy skies and too few blue skies.

I see today in Marton we have some blue in between the clouds so that means some direct sunlight.

That will make the farmers & commercial growers happy as they are looking for growth.

I am happy to say that my first vine ripened tomatoes were picked this week and were delicious.

That’s a lot better than paying between $7.99 and $8.49 a kilo from Supermarkets.

I have been eating and giving away cucumbers both telegraph and green types which I see are selling for $2.00 to $2.90 each.

Lettuce at this time of the year should be about a dollar each but no they are closer to $4.00 each.

So hopefully if you have been following my articles over the last period of time you will also be enjoying your own salad crops. More possibly so if you have a glasshouse.

This now is my third year of growing garlic and no garlic rust thanks to the cell strengthening products.

I scoured seed/cloves from about 3-4 places for planting and the best certainly was the big fat cloves which I can feel in the soil have produced good size bulbs.

A few have started to flower so cut the flower spike off so all the goodness will go into the bulbs.

No hurry to lift them yet so will leave until the tops show signs of dying back.

Sprays weekly with Magic Botanic Liquid (MBL) with Mycorrcin added will help produce better crops on all vegetables.

I smiled the other night about the shortage of strawberries this time of the year that I saw on the News.

I have big beautiful strawberries rich in flavour available as a dessert every couple of nights of the week.

That’s thanks to regular sprays of Mycorrcin and MBL along with an occasional feed of My Secret Strawberry food.

I have to go harvest a few shortly to put on the pavlova.

When we purchased this place in Marton a few years ago I was so surprised that an old 1920 house on a quarter acre section did not have one fruit tree, not even a standard (must have) lemon tree.

Well on last count I have now 36 fruit trees and two brambles.

(Some were in 100 litre drums from Palmerston North) moved here and are still sitting happily in their drums which makes them easy to move around. In the open ground I added more varieties of fruit trees and ones in their third season are now producing nice small crops.

I will have to keep them under control in time to come; so there is not a jungle of fruit trees.

On the back by the rear fence is a giant macrocarpa, must be many years old and along the same fence line on the other side are some ornamental deciduous trees which send up suckers all over the place.

This means that no open ground vegetable gardens as they would be robbed of goodness during first season.

Instead all vegetable gardens are raised and on concrete to prevent robber roots.

My challenge this year is to have as much vegetables growing all year round to ensure food safety as much as possible, plus far better taste and healthier to eat than the chemically grown expensive vegetables from the supermarket.

Also I will once again try to establish a passion fruit vine, this time in a lean to glasshouse I have.

It has been about 50 years since I last had a successful passion fruit vine growing in a place I lived.

Not that I don’t try every so often.

Mind you 50 years ago in Palmerston North it was a different world with hot blue sky summers and frosty cold winters.

I saw on social media this week a picture of young children in the middle of the road somewhere in suburbia on trikes, bikes and on foot playing from back in 1950’s and the caption said : “We had no idea how good we had it and no clue that we were the last ones.”

Never a truer Analogy of then and now.

It is hard to believe how much things have changed and obviously to us that have lived in the best times that the now is like a different planet and people.

Where did this thing called Woke come from?

I remember back when people used to dance such as foxtrots and rock and Roll now the dancing looks like semaphore signaling?

I suppose they might have seen a clip of young people doing what was called ‘Hand Jive’ while sitting around a dance hall. I was thinking back recently to a house in Domain Street where I grew up in, it was a little cottage house on a very small section with only enough room for me to have a small vegetable garden.

But in the house there was a coal range which supplied hot water, heating with cooking top and oven.

All of that for most of the day from a shovel full of clean burning cheap coal.

The best scones ever came out of that oven and a kettle or soup would be kept hot on the steel top.

The house has long gone and along with neighboring homes for a motel complex now.

Enough reminiscing instead keep gardening and hoping that the year ahead will be an improvement on recent past.

“Where there’s life there’s hope” is attributed to J.R.R. Tolkien whose character Samwise Gamgee declared it in The Lord of the Rings. In another of Tolkien’s famous quotes, “A single dream is more powerful than a thousand realities.”

Merry Christmas and I will catch up with you before the New Year.

Phone 0800 466464
Garden Pages and News at www.gardenews.co.nz
Shar Pei pages at www.sharpei.co.nz
Mail Order products at www.0800466464.co.nz

1The right not to be deprived of life except in accordance with fundamental justice (Section 8)

2The right not to be subjected to torture or to cruel, degrading, or disproportionately severe treatment or punishment (Section 9)

Image by Aline Ponce from Pixabay

Gardening

POLLINATING FLOWERS OF FRUITING PLANTS (Wally Richards)

December 18, 2022 Pam Vernon Leave a comment

Pollination can be a problem for gardeners when it does not occur naturally.

Various plants use different modes of pollination from attracting insects such as bees to move the pollen to air movement or vibration.

Often we think of the honey bees as the main pollinators, which for a number of plants and crops they surely are, but then there are bumble bees, native bees, flies, moths, butterflies and other insects which can all assist in the pollination process.

A number of native plants have white flowers to attract the moths at night as New Zealand did not originally have other pollinators other than our native bees.

The wind, or more to the point, breezes are also responsible for moving the pollen in some plants to complete the fertilisation process.

A good example of this in the vegetable garden is sweet corn, the pollen is formed on the male flowering heads at the top of the plant with the female corn tassels below, given a light breeze and the pollen dust falls to the tassels below or to the corn plant next door.

This is the reason we plant corn in clumps, fairly close to each other to ensure that a good set is achieved and the cobs are full.

Each one of those fine tassels that form on the ears of corn are connected individually to a embryo corn seed and each tassel needs to receive pollen to fill the cob completely.

Those cobs that only have a number of mature seeds with misses means that those misses did not receive pollen from the tassel.

When I grow corn I like to do a bit of hand pollination on a sunny day when the tops are laden with pollen. This is simply done by running your hand up the male flowers and dumping the contents on the female tassels below.

It helps ensure fuller cobs at harvest time. Also 2 weekly sprays of Magic Botanic Liquid makes for better, bigger sets on the cobs.

When nature and elements don’t do the pollination for you, then this is where you the gardener, can step in and do the job yourself.

Some plants are what we call ‘self fertile ‘which means that the plant will ensure that it will set seed without the need of another plant of the same species being anywhere near. Many of these are breeze pollinated.

The rest of the plants of various types are likely to need another similar plant nearby to ensure a good fruit or seed set.

These other plants are often referred to as pollinators and without one you will still get some fruit setting, but no where as good as if you had a pollinator also. Many of these will be pollinated by bees or other insects.

Then again in some plants such as with Kiwi Fruit you have a situation where some plants are male and some are female and then you need at least one male in close proximity to about 1 to 5 females.

Where room is limited we have overcome the problem of having to plant two separate kiwi fruit vines by grafting a male and female onto the same root stock.

Even then there is no guarantee that you are going to achieve a good fruit set as it requires bees to visit both the male and female flowers to move the pollen.

Because of the varroa mite, which has destroyed most if not all the feral bee colonies there may not be any honey bees around your gardens any more.

Then it comes down to the bumble bee and native bees along with other insects to do the job.

Chemical Insecticides such as Confidor also has caused all pollinators populations to decline.

Another problem may occur where the possible pollinators are elsewhere in the garden collecting nectar and leaving your tree alone even though its in full flower.

You can help to attract the possible pollinators to your target tree by dissolving raw sugar in hot water and adding more water and then spraying the sweet liquid over your target tree.

Another problem can occur if a plant is in a too shady situation where it does not get sufficient sunlight directly on the plant to initiate flower buds or if the buds form, they buds don’t open into flowers.

We often see this on roses in the shade which don’t flower well and also on flowering house plants that are too far from natural light to flower properly, such as flowering begonias.

Cold conditions can mean a plant such as a tomato will flower but not produce pollen, thus the flowers fall off after a few days. Cold setting types are best for those colder times.

Also if it gets too hot then tomatoes will not set fruit and that can be seen at times in glasshouses.

Tomatoes are not pollinated by honey bees, but the vibration from a bumble bees wings does the trick as they fly near the plant.

A light breeze on a sunny day when the flowers are pollen laden does the job and generally speaking tomato plants outdoors will set fruit well.

In glasshouses and similar sheltered areas the plants may fail to set and this can be overcome on a sunny day by simply tapping the stake or trunk of the plant to cause a vibration.

A very important aspect in the flowering fruiting cycle is to have ample potash available to any flowering/fruiting plant.

A monthly sprinkle of Fruit and Flower Power on the soil in the root zone will greatly assist.

Pumpkins, zucchini and melons have both male and female flowers on the same plant and the pollen needs to be moved from the male to the female.

If you have good populations of bumble bees around then they normally do the job for you otherwise you will not have a crop.

The female flower is easy to determine as they have the embryo fruit behind the flower, the male does not.

To ensure a good fruit set I like to, on a nice sunny day, pluck a male flower off the vine that has ample pollen and after removing the petals rub some of the pollen onto the centre part of the female flowers.

If the fruit is not pollinated it will still grow for a time but then rot off.

Passion fruit can be another one that a bit of hand pollination will help ensure a good crop.

Too much nitrogen in the form of man made fertilisers or animal manures can cause plants to vegetate which means they produce lots of growth but little or no flowers.

If this is happening then apply Fruit and Flower power to kick in the flowering cycle and stem the rapid growth.

Some plants such as bougainvillea need a bit of stress to give a great show of flowers.

If you feed them well and supply ample water they tend to grow all over the place and not flower.

Instead let them dry out for a time to kick in the flowering cycle and don’t feed them much either.

As a gardener you need to remember that most plants only flower to reproduce themselves by seed.

When their lives are threatened then they quickly go into a flowering cycle.

The best example of this is a number of annual weeds that grow lushly in the spring when there is ample rain but as soon as the soil starts to dry they start to flower.

On our vegetables such as cabbages and silverbeet we need to keep the soil moist because if we allow it to dry out too much the plants will bolt or in other words, go to seed prematurely.

One last aspect is potatoes, early types will be mature and ready to harvest when the tops start to flower.

Late types will be ready when they have flowered and the tops start to die back.

Often you may see that fruit not unlike tomatoes form on the potato tops, these are the fruit which are not to be eaten as they are poisonous, these fruit contain potato seed

1The right not to be deprived of life except in accordance with fundamental justice (Section 8)

2The right not to be subjected to torture or to cruel, degrading, or disproportionately severe treatment or punishment (Section 9)

Image by Ralph from Pixabay

Food, Gardening, News

GROWING WOES IN THE GARDEN (Wally Richards

December 13, 2022 Pam Vernon Leave a comment

Comment: Note, those that wield the weather weaponry, that also are paying farmers world wide to plow in their crops … would not want the herd to be successfully growing their own food. Saving the planet? I don’t think so …I received recently a fruit and veg update from one of the local supermarkets (who incidentally are on the pig’s back so to speak with the plandemic and lockdowns – recording ‘excess profits’). Here’s an excerpt:

Kia ora,

A couple of weeks ago, we got in touch to let you know what was happening on our growers’ farms, orchards and paddocks, and what that means for you. As we all gear up for holiday shopping, we thought we’d share another update on how we’re working directly with Kiwi growers to get the very best fresh fruit and veg into our stores.

A rainy December:

With rainy weather and limited sunshine across the country, particularly in the upper North Island, many of our local growers are facing challenges with crops ripening up, and with getting the right conditions for harvesting.

We have direct relationships with our growers, and we’re talking to them every day to help find solutions to these challenges. But you might notice supply looking a little lighter in your local Countdown. Thanks in advance for your understanding.

It goes on with other dismal statements and predictions … watch this space.

EWR

Here is Wally’s article anyway … and do keep gardening with that Kiwi can-do attitude! Same applies to anywhere on the planet of course 🙂

For most of the country it was a dismal spring and now we are into the first month of summer things have not improved much. Weather and conditions do vary across New Zealand depending on your region and even your own property if you have a micro-climate, but overall there is thread of similar.

I spoke this week to an agriculture/farm supplier representative and he said that growers and farmers were complaining about growth of plants and pasture. So lets look at the facts, we are only about 10 days away from the longest day which means we are hitting 16 plus hours of day light which should mean maximum growth of plants with blue skies.

But we are not getting nice blue skies, lots of cloudy or overcast days and a fair bit of rain as well.

Temperatures for this time of the year are not great either and not our more normal warm temperatures day and night.

So lack of direct sun light and fluctuating temperatures do not bode well for plant growth.

Wet feet and lower soil temperatures is another plant growth factor.

Plants need adequate moisture, adequate nutrition, suitable temperatures, long hours of direct sunlight and CO2 to grow.

Currently the planet’s CO2 levels are about 416 ppm.

You may not be aware of this but some commercial growers have in their glasshouses CO2 generators to increase the growth of their crops.

Most experts agree that 1,500 ppm is the maximum CO2 level for maximum plant growth, although any CO2 level between 1,000ppm and 1,500ppm will be very good. So a low amount of 416ppm is only half of what gives good growth.

Here is an interesting fact…The amount of CO2 in the atmosphere was reduced by about 90% during the last 150 million years. If this trend continues CO2 will inevitably fall to levels that threaten the survival of plants, which require a minimum of 150 ppm to survive.

Does that ring any bells?

Half of the world’s oxygen is produced via phytoplankton photosynthesis. The other half is produced via photosynthesis on land by trees, shrubs, grasses, and other plants.

You know the old saying? ‘Breath out and make a plant happy’

I am surprised at the slow growth of vegetable plants in my gardens at this time of the year.

In my glasshouses growth is better as they offer better protection from the environment so tomatoes are doing great, cucumbers and good but chili plants are slow.

Chili love hot temperatures to really grow well.

Seeds sown in raised gardens are slow to germinate or rot out because of lower soil temperatures.

Outside seedlings of lettuce, carrots and pak choy are slow and that is how it is in my part of Marton.

Home gardeners will keep on growing their plants no matter what the conditions are like and do what we can to improve the results.

I would suggest a weekly spray of molasses and Magic Botanic Liquid (MBL) to help improve vegetable growth. About a table spoon of molasses dissolved in a litre of hot water then 10mils of MBL added.

Give a small side dressing of Wallys BioPhos once a month.

If you have access to manure make up a compost tea by placing any animal manures into a plastic rubbish tin and filling two thirds full with non-chlorinated water.

Place about 50mils of Bio Magnus Fish fertiliser into the brew (This has live beneficial microbes which will increase their populations in the brew) You can further increase their population growth by adding Mycorrcin or molasses to the brew.

Stir and airate regularly, get a paddle to stir and a jug to fill and lift up high over the barrel then pour contents back into the brew. This gets oxygen into the brew.

Every so often take out some of the brew and water into the soil by where your plants are growing.

Add more manure and other components with more non-chlorinated water and you have a neat home made fertiliser for your crops.

Here is a interesting thing to do, take a plastic 2 litre cordial bottle, half fill with non chlorinated water, add to this about 10mil of Bio Magnus Fish fertiliser and a teaspoon of molasses, place cap on and give contents a shake.

Place outside some where in sun light and check often.

The populations of microbes will rapidly grow and the bottle will balloon and if left will explode when the plastic fractures.

When the bottle has expanded a bit then release pressure by removing cap.

Pour contents of bottle into your gardens for great benefit to the plants.

You as a home gardener can do things to help increase the growth of your crops which is not available for commercial growers to do.

Their answer is to apply dressings of nitrogen to the soil to force growth which is a problem for them currently as Nitrogen fertilisers are in short supply and what is available is much more expensive than normal.

So if you think $10 a cabbage is bad worry about it more when its $20 or $30.

There is currently a world shortage of food which as the months go by appears to be getting worse.

I have read calls for people overseas that have lawns to dig them up and plant vegetables.

Of course in many places and even here in NZ having a lawn is not a thing when the sections are small and the house takes most of the land you own anyway.

Woe is the loss of the good old quarter acre section which with a few chickens you could supply about 50% plus of your food chain for a small family.

Even though currently the growing conditions are not as good as normal for this time of the year at least they are better than they will be in a few months time.

For those that have room now is the time to start planting winter crops of brassicas, cabbage etc, if you like leeks they should already be in.

About every 2-3 weeks plant another small planting of the crops such as two or three of each so you have succession to harvest in winter.

If you are looking for a gift for Christmas then a copy of my Down to Earth Gardening Guide or my Glasshouse Gardening for New Zealand might be an idea.

I will autograph and place a message with the persons name/names in the book.

A gardener recently during a phone conversation told me of an old Chinese Saying:

To be happy for one day, Get Drunk.

To be happy for one week, Get Married.

To be happy for life, Get a Garden.

Phone 0800 466464
Garden Pages and News at www.gardenews.co.nz
Shar Pei pages at www.sharpei.co.nz
Mail Order products at www.0800466464.co.nz

1The right not to be deprived of life except in accordance with fundamental justice (Section 8)

2The right not to be subjected to torture or to cruel, degrading, or disproportionately severe treatment or punishment (Section 9)

Gardening, News

December Gardening (Wally Richards)

December 5, 2022 Pam Vernon 1 Comment

This week I received two emails which maybe of interest to some gardeners. The first was from a gardening couple, which read:

Hi Wally, Your advice and weekly email’s worked great. I got first in the Veggie Section and my wife won in the Rose categories. Jerry.

What can I say? If you use natural products that enhance the soil, giving the plants all the possible minerals that they may need to be healthy and stop using chemicals that are harmful to both soil, plants and yourself.

Over the years I have received a few similar stories about how gardeners have turned their gardens into award winners by simply observing and using the above information.

The second email is of concern this time of the year and it read;

Hi Wally, I have a problem with a brown beetle infestation. I was finding the leaves of my newly planted plum trees and almond tree were getting stripped bare almost. I wasn’t sure what it was but think the culprit is this brown beetle.

I have since found hundreds (literally) in one of my raised beds and quite a few wherever I have placed the garden mix I bought a month ago.

Is there something I can do to get rid of these beasties? They are now attacking my raspberry plants and feijoa trees. Because they are in the soil – and potentially quite deep (some of them were 20cm deep) – I’m not sure how to fight them. Please help!

The writer sent me an amazing photograph which shows hundreds of these brown beetles drowning in a container of water, along with photos of her plants badly damaged.

The beetle is the Grass Grub beetle and this is the time of the year that they emerge from pupating deep in the soil to feast on the foliage of a number of plants, mate and lay eggs back in lawns for future generations.

In my first book, Wally’s Down to Earth Gardening Guide, I suggest a trap to aid control of these pests.

Here is an extract from the book:

‘Grass grub adults emerge in October, and are active until about mid-December, depending on weather conditions and exactly where they are in New Zealand. The cooler the temperature, the later they emerge.

The adults will start to emerge in mild conditions, when the soil temperature reaches about 10 degrees they then mate, fly, eat and lay eggs in the short space of time between dusk and early evening.

As they tend to fly towards light, you are most likely to know they’re there when the flying beetles hit your lighted window panes.

This very attraction for the light has become one of our best weapons in controlling the pest in its adult stage. You can set up a grass grub beetle trap by placing a trough, such as the one used when wall-papering, directly underneath a window near a grassed area.

Fill the trough with water to about two-thirds of its capacity, then place a film of kerosene on top of the water. Put a bright light in the window, the beetles fly towards the lit window, hit the glass and fall into the trough.

The kerosene acts as a trap, preventing the fallen beetles from climbing out.

You can extend this method to areas away from the house by using a glass tank, such as might be used for an aquarium.

Place the empty tank into a tray containing several inches of water (and the kerosene), and position a light inside the glass tank.

By adding a sheet of ply or something similar over the top of the tank, you will ensure that the light shines only through the sides of the tank above the waiting water and kerosene.

It is better to use a dome-shaped battery-powered light rather than an ordinary torch for this job as the bigger light makes the trap more effective.

If the tray and tank are raised off the ground and placed on something like a table, you will get an even better result.

However you set up your beetle trap, this is a very good method to dispose of the pests. Simply get rid of all the beetles caught the next morning.

Run this system (call it Wally’s Grass Grub Beetle Catcher, if you like) from just before dusk to about 2 or 3 hours after sunset.’

Spraying the plants that are been attacked with Wallys Super Neem Tree Oil will help to also control the populations.

This should be done late in the day after the sun is off the plants. When a beetle chews on a leaf they get some Neem into their gut and that shuts off their ability to eat.

Problem arises, if there are hundreds of beetles then there needs to be hundreds of bites.

With the likelihood of more beetles emerging every day it is an on going battle over the next month or two.

Another way is to go outside just after dark with a torch and check your plants for beetles.

If you see a good number on any plant then a spray at that time with Wallys Super Neem Tree Oil and Wallys Super Pyrethrum added, sprayed to hit the beetles rather than the plant itself.

Another very good natural spray to use late in the day is a solution of Wallys 3 in 1 for Lawns.

This is a combination of Eucalyptus oil and Tea Tree oil, nice to use and deadly on pests.

If you repeat your nightly spraying and use a light trap also, then you will make a big dent in the grass grub beetle populations and thus suffer less damage to your plants and lawns.

The season is still poor weather wise which helps keep insect populations lower than normal but care should be taken with your potatoes and tomatoes by placing Neem Tree Granules on the soil in the root zone and spraying the plants occasionally with Wallys Super Neem tree Oil.

Visit your local garden center to obtain some good ideas for Xmas Presents.

Phone 0800 466464
Garden Pages and News at www.gardenews.co.nz
Shar Pei pages at www.sharpei.co.nz
Mail Order products at www.0800466464.co.nz

New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990. Part II of the Act covers a broad range of Civil and Political Rights. As part of the right to life and the security of the person, the Act guarantees everyone:

1 The right not to be deprived of life except in accordance with fundamental justice (Section 8)

2 The right not to be subjected to torture or to cruel, degrading, or disproportionately severe treatment or punishment (Section 9)

3 The right not to be subjected to medical or scientific experimentation without consent (Section 10)

4 The right to refuse to undergo any medical treatment (Section 11)

Furthermore, the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990 guarantees everyone: Freedom of Thought, Conscience, and Religion.
This includes the right to freedom of thought, conscience, religion, and belief,
INCLUDING THE RIGHT TO ADOPT AND HOLD OPINIONS WITHOUT INTERFERENCE (Section 1)

Gardening, News

ENCOURAGING CHILDREN TO GARDEN

November 22, 2022 Pam Vernon 4 Comments

We need to encourage our children and grandchildren to appreciate Nature by including them in some gardening activities.

I believe that young children have a natural infinity with plants and insects when they are allowed to explore our gardens.

Children learn many things by mimicking their parents and are often keen at a young age to assist in various gardening activities.

I remember as a toddler spending many hours in the garden collecting caterpillars off the cabbages and feeding them to our chooks.

I also can still remember how good it felt to be part of Nature back then and the same feeling pertains today when I work or wander around gardens.

Plants that ‘move’ have a fascination for children and a great one for this is Mimosa pudica, the Sensitive Plant, which folds up its leaves when touched.

They are easy to germinate from seed, grown as a pot plant for a windowsill. (Available Kings Seeds)

Nice pink flowers also. As the plant matures it has thorns on the branches which incidentally are another attraction for children.

Cacti with their prickles often appeal to young boys and I had a small collection when I was young and still keep a few.

Two awesome plants for children to grow are Giant sunflowers and Giant pumpkins.

Giant Sunflowers; these extra tall sunflowers will grow up to 5 metres tall.(17 odd feet) Grown in full sun in soil that has excellent drainage and lots of manure.

The giant pumpkins can be monsters which in some cases will weigh over 1000 pounds at maturity. (Half a ton)

If I was going to grow giant pumpkin, here is what I would do:

Obtain the Giant pumpkin seeds from a seed supplier. (Atlantic Giant is the type of seed you need again Kings Seeds)

Pick an all-day-sunny area, then dig a hole about a spade depth and width, chop up the bottom of the hole, so the soil is loose, then fill the hole with chook manure to about two thirds full.

(Other manure could be used if chook manure is not obtainable, but chook is best)

Fill the rest of the hole with a good compost and soil mix, 50/50 making a small mound about 12cm tall above the filled in hole.

Place three seeds in the mound and wet them down with Magic Botanic Liquid (MBL), (20 ml of MBL to 1 litre of water.)

Water the mount to keep moist with plain water and then every 2 weeks with the MBL.

Overseas the biggest record vegetables have been achieved with products very similar or the same as MBL. Spraying the foliage of your Giants every 2 weeks with MBL (10 ml to a litre) will also assist in a bigger healthier plant.

When the seeds germinate select the two smaller ones and carefully remove letting the best one grow on.

After your pumpkin is established and growing well, give them a drink using Wallys Cucumber Booster, once a week.

This is a high nitrogen product that is a combination of sulphate of ammonia and potassium nitrate, which you dissolve in water.

Cucumber Booster is excellent for any plants that enjoys a boost of nitrogen after establishment. It is used for growing cucumbers, pumpkins, zucchini and gourds.

The MBL and Cucumber Booster can be combined for watering into the soil near the base of the plant.

Because of the weather patterns we are experiencing, after you plant your seed, cut off the base of a 2 to3 litre plastic fruit juice bottle and place this over the mound, with the cap removed.

This will give your seed and seedling its own little glasshouse. This is removed once the seedlings germinate prior to culling out the two.

With the Giant Sunflower a tall strong stake should be put in the ground at seed planting time on the edge of a mound as described previously..

This will be needed later to give extra support to the plant.

Another interesting thing to do is once the sunflower gets up about a metre tall, plant 3 or 4 climbing bean seeds at the base of the plant.

These will grow up the sunflower and also provide extra nitrogen for the sunflower.

It is a lot of fun plus a great way to get the children away from the TV and video games, showing them there is more to life than a screen.

Some garden centres run competitions for the tallest sunflower and the biggest pumpkin with various prizes for the winners.

Aphids are likely to be found on your roses at this time and they can easily be controlled with a safe spray of Wallys Super Pyrethrum. Spray very late in the day just before dusk to obtain the best results.

Stone fruit trees that had the curly leaf disease will now be producing new leaves free of the problem. The damaged leaves will fall off over time.

You can if you like, spray the newer leaves a couple of times with potassium permanganate and Raingard just to be sure, but if the disease has finished for the season the sprays will not make much difference.

A spray of Vaporgard without the potassium permanganate would be more effective in allowing the tree’s remaining leaves to gain more energy from the sun, which is needed to produce a good crop.

Codlin Moths will start to be on the wing about now so obtain a pheromone trap from your garden centre so you can monitor the best time to spray.

A number of gardeners have found that a spray of Super Neem Tree Oil and Raingard over the young apples, applied about 5-7 days after an influx of moths into the traps, has resulted in only a very small scar on the mature apple, where the grub took its first and only bite.

(Note Wallys Super Neem Tree Oil has been cleared by EPA to sell again, just waiting on the new approved labels to arrive later this month)

Repeat spray 7 days later and then wait for another influx of moths before repeating.

Add Raingard or MBL to the spray to assist and extend the control period.

Tomatoes should be doing well if in a sunny, sheltered spot. Only remove laterals on a sunny day when it is not humid or moist.

Spray the wound immediately with Liquid Copper to prevent disease entering the wound resulting in the possible loss of the plant.

Ensure that the tomato plants are well supported on stakes during windy times. If you are concerned about blights spray the plants with Perkfection as a preventative, once a month. The same applies for your potatoes.

For general health of any plants, especially roses and food crops, a two weekly spray of MBL and Mycorrcin works wonders. Spray both the soil and the foliage.

Avoiding the use of chemical sprays and fertilisers is a must for healthy gardens and plants.

Phone 0800 466464
Garden Pages and News at www.gardenews.co.nz
Shar Pei pages at www.sharpei.co.nz
Mail Order products at www.0800466464.co.nz

1The right not to be deprived of life except in accordance with fundamental justice (Section 8)

2The right not to be subjected to torture or to cruel, degrading, or disproportionately severe treatment or punishment (Section 9)

Image by Raksa R85mm from Pixabay

Gardening

No dig garden using cardboard (Wally Richards)

November 13, 2022 Pam Vernon 2 Comments

I’m currently doing this with my garden plot. Brilliant idea. Especially if you’re a bit past digging extensively! EWR

Cardboard boxes are everywhere.

A lot of products are transported in cardboard boxes, most products we ship out are in cardboard boxes.

Supermarkets have heaps of medium to large cardboard boxes which they often put into a cycling bin as a friendly way of disposing of them.

During the week I chanced to have a chat with a gentleman that is doing similar as our company with a range of products to enhance your gardens.

During the conversation he told me of a method that he suggests to people and gardeners for starting or extending their vegetable gardens.

A method using cardboard that I had never thought of.

I have in the past suggested using cardboard as a mulch to suppress weeds which works very well.

This method is using cardboard to convert part of a lawn area into a productive vegetable garden very simply and very quickly.

In the past when I have converted a lawn to a growing area I have lifted the turf taking the top 50mm of turf off in squares, stacking them somewhere, grass side down, to rot down.

Then I would dig over the bare soil before raking off nicely for planting.

A bit of work but it made a new growing area.

Now this new way is that you firstly mow the area that you want to convert as low as the mower will let you.

You then cover the area with cardboard over lapping to ensure a total coverage of the area.

Do this on a calm day as it is difficult to do when it is windy.

Over the cardboard you put a layer of purchased compost about 20mm thick and lightly water to settle into place.

The reason for the purchased compost is that it will be weed free as long as it did not come from a re-cycling source.

I prefer Daltons Compost as it is good quality and herbicide free.

Most of the others I wouldn’t give you tuppence for as many are just fine bark with some nutrients added or bark with recycled garden wastes.

Once you have the cardboard and compost down then it is time to put minerals and nutrients onto the layer of compost.

I suggest Wallys Unlocking your Soil, BioPhos, Wallys Ocean Solids, Wallys Calcium & Health, Blood & Bone, animal manures, chicken manure, sheep manure pellets and Bio Boost. (As many as available)

Then we are going to place over these products a further layer of compost 40 to 50mm thick.

You need to choose a area that is fairly sunny and well away from trees, shrubs and vines as you are creating a great food source for your vegetables and those other bigger plants will try and robe your garden creating lots of fibrous feeder roots in the plot.

The first season will be ok but the fol,lowing season it will be full of roots and nothing will grow.

To help prevent this happening and to ensure your vegetable plot has good drainage make a trench around the plot area about to a spade depth.

This will allow surplus water to drain into the ditch where it will evaporate from sun and wind.

It will also help prevent some robber roots happening.

You could lay fence palings on top of this trench to allow a place for the wheels of your mower to ride on when cutting the rest of your lawn.

Give them a couple of coats of acrylic paint to seal in the tanalised chemicals.

If you only make your plot about a metre wide then you can work the area from one side.

If more than a metre wide you need to have a mowing strip on the far side to work all around the bed.

You should avoid walking on the b ed as it compacts the growing medium.

One time I did several parallel vegetable beds about a metre wide with lawn in between them at the width of my mower. This allowed me to mow between each growing bed and a nice place to work the gardens from.

I love the idea of cutting the lawn low, covering with cardboard to suppress the weeds and then covering that with goodies and compost. Instant vegetable plot.

On existing vegetable gardens that are currently empty except for weeds the same can be done.

Cover the area with cardboard as above, then the other things ready to plant up.

The cardboard will break down over time and the worms and soil life love it.

Then the following year you may want to put new cardboard down over the bed and repeat as above.

If you have a garden with say oxalis this will bury the plants and tubers and make gardening easier for a while.

Go to your local supermarket and ask them for their used cardboard cartons or help yourself out of the dumpster.

If you happen to be near where we are in Marton then I can supply you with some large cardboard boxes to use.

We are getting g close to Christmas and if you are looking to plant up containers to give away as Christmas gifts then you better get started so they have a bit of time to settle in before you given them away.

Phone 0800 466464
Garden Pages and News at www.gardenews.co.nz
Shar Pei pages at www.sharpei.co.nz
Mail Order products at www.0800466464.co.nz

RELATED:

Here is a video from Charles Dowding’s YT channel demonstrating this method. For those like myself who like a visual demo. There are other related vids at YT that are also helpful if you search. EWR
New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990. Part II of the Act covers a broad range of Civil and Political Rights. As part of the right to life and the security of the person, the Act guarantees everyone:

1The right not to be deprived of life except in accordance with fundamental justice (Section 8)

2The right not to be subjected to torture or to cruel, degrading, or disproportionately severe treatment or punishment (Section 9)

Photo: screenshot Charles Dowding YT channel

Gardening

Dealing with pests in your lawn (Wally Richards)

November 6, 2022 Pam Vernon Leave a comment

There are three insect pests that are the main problem ones in lawns; grass grubs, porina and black beetle grubs.

The affect they have on your lawns depends on the number of the pests in a given area.

A few, will hardly be noticed, where a good number per square foot will damage the grasses and be easy to see. Damage can be seen by bare spots, brown, dead areas or discolored grasses.

Birds are a very good indicator that there are grubs in the lawn when they spend their time scratching and pecking in certain areas.

I have gardeners ringing me up about this time of the year to say they have grass grubs in their lawns or that they have dead spots.

My first question is, how do you know you have grass grubs?

They usually reply that there is dead areas or that birds are ripping certain areas apart.

Nether of these are a good indication that there are currently grass grubs actively eating roots near the surface.

If there are dead areas which have appeared in the spring or early summer then it is likely that grass grubs did cause the problem by eating the roots of the grasses in the autumn and into the winter.

The grasses would have appeared ok in the winter, even though they had little root system left, because they were not actively growing.

In the spring when they started to grow on the root system left, which was insufficient to support the grass, thus it browns off and dies.

In the meantime the grubs have burrowed deep into the soil to pupate and then emerge about October to December as beetles.

There may well be a few grass grubs in the lawn at this time and by lifting some turf you can soon find out and how many there are per square foot.

If there are a few like 1 to 5 then its hardly worth while bothering with a treatment, a greater number would be worth while to treat.

Most likely the reason the birds are working the lawn is for porina caterpillars which live in the soil. Porina come up in the early part of the evening to feed at the base of the grasses.

These are easy to control by firstly mowing the lawn to allow the spray you are going to use, to reach the base of the grasses where they feed.

Then in late afternoon mix Neem Tree Oil at the rate of 5mils per litre of warm water and apply that to your lawn area. Using a lawn boy will do the best job to get a good coverage.

(Note EPA has just about completed our application under the new requirements for all Neem Oils and we should be back selling later this month.)

That night when the grubs come up to feed they will get a dose of Neem and that turns off their ability to ever eat again.

If the birds eat them they will not be affected and worms in the soil will be ok too.

The time to treat for grass grubs in the lawns is in the autumn when the soil is moist and they are feeding near the surface. The other time is when they are beetles which is about now.

With porina they can be treated all year round whenever they are present.

Treatment for grass grubs and black beetle grubs can either be a strong chemical one or a safe natural one such as Wallys 3 in 1 for lawns which is a mix of Eucalyptus and Tea Tree oils.

This will not harm wild life, pets or worms, where the chemical ones will.

To treat the grass grub beetles you can use the method described in my first book, Wally’s Down to Earth Gardening Guide, extract;

Grass grub adults emerge in October, (as beetles) and are active until about mid-December, depending on weather conditions and exactly where they are in New Zealand.

The cooler the temperature, the later they emerge. The adults will start to emerge in mild conditions, when the soil temperature reaches about 10 degrees, they then mate, fly, eat and lay eggs in the short space of time between dusk and early evening.

As they tend to fly towards light, you are most likely to know they’re there when the flying beetles hit your lighted window panes.

This very attraction for the light has become one of our best weapons in controlling the pest in its adult stage.

You can set up a grass grub beetle trap by placing a trough, such as the one used when wall-papering, directly underneath a window near a grassed area.

Fill the trough with water to about two-thirds of its capacity, then place a film of kerosene on top of the water.

Put a bright light in the window, the beetles fly towards the lit window, hit the glass and fall into the trough. The kerosene acts as a trap, preventing the fallen beetles from climbing out.

You can extend this method to areas away from the house by using a glass tank, such as might be used for an aquarium.

Place the empty tank into a tray containing several inches of water (and the kerosene), and position a light inside the glass tank.

By adding a sheet of ply or something similar over the top of the tank, you will ensure that the light shines only through the sides of the tank above the waiting water and kerosene.

It is better to use a dome-shaped battery-powered light rather than an ordinary torch for this job as the bigger light makes the trap more effective.

If the tray and tank are raised off the ground and placed on something like a table, you will get an even better result.

However you set up your beetle trap, this is a very good method to dispose of the pests.

Simply get rid of all the beetles caught the next morning by flushing down the toilet or feeding to chooks.. Run this system (call it Wally’s Grass Grub Beetle Catcher, if you like) from just before dusk to about 2 or 3 hours after sunset.

We know now how to make the grubs’ preference for light work against them, but light can also work in their favour.

If you have un-curtained windows in rooms which are lit at night, you will find grass grub beetles from yours and neighboring lawns will be attracted to the area during the early hours of the evening.

Street lighting is probably the worst offender, and people with areas of lawn near street lights often find those are the parts worst-affected by grass grubs.

The beetles will eat the foliage of various plants such as roses, beans and citrus while on the wing.

Those plants that are being eaten can be sprayed with Neem Tree Oil.

If the populations of beetles are very high then in the early part of the evening take a torch and check the plants that are being eaten.

If you see lots of the brown beetles then mix up a spray of Wallys Super Pyrethrum added and go out and spray the pests.

The pyrethrum is a quick knock down and should wipe out good numbers of them.

The more beetles you can kill means less damage to your lawns next year.

Phone 0800 466464
Garden Pages and News at www.gardenews.co.nz
Shar Pei pages at www.sharpei.co.nz
Mail Order products at www.0800466464.co.nz

The right not to be deprived of life except in accordance with fundamental justice (Section 8)

2The right not to be subjected to torture or to cruel, degrading, or disproportionately severe treatment or punishment (Section 9)

Image by JayMantri from Pixabay

Food, Gardening, News

Some useful gardening tips (Wally Richards)

October 31, 2022 Pam Vernon Leave a comment

For most of the country it has been a poor spring and slow start of the growing season.

We have the daylight hours, in fact we are now only about 7 weeks away to the longest day of the year.

It is the temperatures that are the problem, we are not getting the constant warm temperatures during the day and night.

That does not matter to hardy plants and vegetables that can be grown outdoors all year around such as cabbages. (On line shopping today New World whole cabbage $9.99 at Countdown $7.69)

Lettuce between $3.00 to $4.00 each?

Wow, I currently have so many lettuces that I give then to my chickens.

Not only that as a result of letting one lettuce (Drunken Woman my favorite) go to seed, it self seed giving hundreds of seedlings.

Some of which I have transplanted and currently have lettuce from small seedlings to mature plants going to seed.

I don’t bother growing much cabbage, broccoli or cauliflower as they take longer to mature and we seldom use them anyway in preference to Bok Choy which is much quicker to mature and takes less room.

Silverbeet is an excellent vegetable to grow as it has high nutritional value and you harvest only the outer leaves for use as it will keep producing till it goes to seed.

Whether you grow in open ground, raised gardens or in containers you can produce hardy vegetables that will not only be inexpensive compared to current cost of purchased vegetables but will also have great flavour be free of chemical poisons.

The stuff you buy from Supermarket is not only bloody expensive but are chemically grown and sprayed with chemicals thus having little goodness and a bland flavour.

If it tastes good without having to use condiments then it is good for your health.

Basically no matter how you grow you apply natural products to the soil/growing medium such as any animal or chicken manures, blood & bone, sheep manure pellets at the base.

Garden Lime such as Wallys Calcium & Health, minerals from Ocean Solids and Wallys Unlocking your soil.

Then over this a layer of Daltons Compost. (Most others I do not trust because they can contain recycled green waste which maybe full of herbicides).

Then into this you plant seeds or seedlings and spray them every week with Magic Botanic Liquid (MBL) they will grow twice as fast and twice as big and be very advantageous for your health and budget.

I expect that vegetables in the supermarket are only going to get dearer because of high cost of imported fertilisers, cost of chemical sprays to keep the plants looking perfect on the shelves and the cost of diesel.

Because of the milder temperatures heat loving plants are not fairing very well.

My tomato plants grown in a plastic house in the Auto-pot system are doing ok but plants that like much more heat such as cucumbers, capsicum and chili are sitting and sulking even with the high quality nutrient they have to grow with.

I hate to think how poorly these plants wound do in open gardens along with pumpkin and other cubits.

They would really sulk until the temperatures became better which is most unusual for weather after Labour Weekend in NZ.

If, as some predict, we are heading into a solar minimum which reduces the global temperatures to the extent of a mini-ice age or worse then that would be far worse for food growing than a global warming.

Most of you will have planted or are planting tomato plants currently, if in a glasshouse you will have better results than out doors. Outdoors you need a very sunny, sheltered spot for best results.

Treat the soil with the products mention but don’t use Calcium & Health instead buy some Dolomite.

Tomatoes and Potatoes like a slightly acidic soil pH.

Now this is important to get the best results out of a tomato plant; you make a deep hole and plant it deep, up to the bottom leaves or even deeper.

The reason is that a tomato plant will produce roots all the way up the trunk and often on a more mature plant you will see knobs near the base of the trunk which are beginnings of roots.

If that is seen then mould up growing medium so the root system is increased.

The bigger the roots to feed, the better the plant.

You can place a little of Wallys Neem Tree Powder in the planting hole and sprinkle some of Wallys Secret Tomato Food with Neem Granules on the soil.

That will assist in deterring whitefly especially in a glasshouse as well as feed the plants.

The Secret tomato food contains a good amount of potash which I have noticed lacking in other brands, likely because potash is expensive.

If your tomato, capsicum, chili do not have ample potash then your fruit will lack flavour.

Wallys Secret Tomato Food with Neem Granules was created on the request of a specialist tomato grower who wanted the very best tomatoes.

He told me many years ago that he had tried all the brands but none of them produced really great flavored fruit.

So along with fertiliser experts we created the product, Wallys Secret Tomato Food which over the last 15 plus years has been well sort after by people that love to grow the best tomatoes possible.

There are two types of tomato plants; Indeterminate and Determinate the first is tall growing and is actually a climber the later is a bush type which is short with a wide spread such as dwarf types.

In the Indeterminate type there are very large fruiting ones such as Boy o Boy which can produce fruit weighing 500 grams. Some you need only one slice to cover sliced bread!

To do that you need to not only remove the laterals but also reduce down the amount fruit per truss to get a monster tomato.

Laterals form between the trunk and the leaf branch and in Indeterminate tomato plants it is best to remove them otherwise you get a plant that requires lots of staking and support.

On a determinate plant the laterals are often left on to make the plant bushier and produce a lot more trusses and thus a lot of smaller fruit.

If you allow a lateral to grow about 8cm long you can strike it as a cutting and get free extra tomato plants.

If last season your tomatoes were affected by the tomato psyllid that we wrote about recently then you need to use Wallys Cell Strengthening Kit to protect your plants and be able to harvest tomatoes like you did in the past.

Phone 0800 466464
Garden Pages and News at http://www.gardenews.co.nz
Shar Pei pages at http://www.sharpei.co.nz
Mail Order products at http://www.0800466464.co.nz

New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990. Part II of the Act covers a broad range of Civil and Political Rights. As part of the right to life and the security of the person, the Act guarantees everyone:

1The right not to be deprived of life except in accordance with fundamental justice (Section 8)

2The right not to be subjected to torture or to cruel, degrading, or disproportionately severe treatment or punishment (Section 9)

3The right not to be subjected to medical or scientific experimentation without consent (Section 10)

4The right to refuse to undergo any medical treatment (Section 11)

Image by Urszula from Pixabay

Gardening, News

Psyllids in your garden and how to deal with them (Wally Richards)

October 24, 2022 Pam Vernon Leave a comment

Psyllidae, called the jumping plant lice or psyllids. (Note much of the following is from Internet research)

They are a family of small plant-feeding insects that tend to be very host-specific, each plant-louse species only feeds on one plant species or feeds on a few closely related plants.

Of current concern to tomato, potato, tamarillo, capsicum and chili gardeners is the new psyllid commonly known as the tomato/potato psyllid.

This psyllid comes from Central and North America where it breeds primarily on potatoes, tomatoes and other plants in the potato family, Solanaceace.

It also breeds on kumara, which is in the bindweed family, Convolvulaceae.

It was first found in New Zealand in 2006 and has spread throughout New Zealand.

This psyllid may transmit a bacterium, Candidatus Liberibacter solanacearum that causes a disease in its host plants.

The tomato potato psyllid occurs on its host plants in gardens, and crops in greenhouses and on farms.

The tomato potato psyllid breeds all year, though the time from egg to adult (generation time) is longer in the winter when it is cold, than in the summer or in a heated greenhouse.

Adult tomato potato psyllids are small insects similar in size to aphids. They have wings and look like small cicadas with a distinctive white band on the abdomen. The two pairs of transparent wings are held over their abdomen.

Tomato potato psyllid eggs are yellow and attached to leaves by a thin short stalk. The eggs may be laid on all parts of the leaf and plant stem, but are often found on the leaf edge where they are most easily seen.

Nymphs hatch from the eggs. They are flat and scale like, and have three pairs of legs and sucking mouthparts.

They settle on young leaves, mainly on the underside. Although they can walk, they spend much of their time motionless with their stylets inserted into the plant feeding on the plant sap.

There are five nymphal stages, each is called an instar. buds. Adults emerge from fifth instar nymphs.

The length of time needed for nymphal development depends on the temperature and is shorter when it is hotter.

The tomato potato psyllid inserts its maxillary stylets into the phloem, (the plant vessels for transmitting sap from the leaves to other parts of the plant.)

The sap has a high volume of water and sugars, more than the insect needs.

It excretes the excess water and sugar, which is called honeydew. The tomato potato psyllid coats the droplet of honeydew with white wax before ejecting it.

Leaves can become covered with these white wax coated droplets that are called psyllid sugars.

Like some other Hemiptera (sucking bugs), the tomato potato psyllid can transmit plant pathogens to plants.

Tomato potato psyllid is the primary vector (transmitter) of a bacterium, Candidatus Liberibacter solanacearum, which causes a disease that may weaken plants and reduce yields and quality of crops.

Plants infested with the psyllid may exhibit symptoms of a disease, psyllid yellows.

The disease symptoms initially appear in response to psyllid feeding and is presumably a physiological reaction to feeding and saliva secretions by the tomato potato psyllid.

On tomatoes, the disease symptoms are the yellowing and stunting of the growing tip and a cupping or curling of the leaves.

Many flowers may fall off the trusses of infected plants and fruit that develop may be small and misshapen.

On potatoes, the foliar symptoms are a stunting and yellowing of the growing tip and the edges of the curled leaves often have a pink blush or purple colour.

After a while infected potatoes develop a scorched appearance and plants may collapse prematurely.

Potato plants that are infected at an early stage, develop numerous small tubers. Tuber quality is also affected when the plants are infected at a later stage.

The disease is referred to as zebra chip because when the affected potatoes are fried they exhibit dark stripes where the areas high in sugar burn.

In New Zealand, the bacterial disease is usually less of a problem on outdoor capsicums, chilli and egg-plant.

Tomato potato psyllid breeds all year, especially in the warmer parts of the country and in greenhouses. In these situations, all life stages may be found all year round. In other areas, non-breeding adults may be found on plants.

Adults feed on leaves and can mate more than once. A female can lay up to 500 eggs over a 21-day period, but in the field it is more likely to be around 200 eggs.

The number of eggs laid also depends upon the host plant. The rate of development of nymphs is dependent on temperature.

The psyllid develops between 15°C and 32°C with optimum development at 27°C.

In a greenhouse with an average temperature of 18°C psyllids takes 33 days to complete their life cycle.

In New Zealand there are to 7-8 generations per year in the Auckland region.

In New Zealand’s winter, the numbers of psyllids are low and development is very slow.

Adults and nymphs can survive short periods of sub-zero temperatures. In New Zealand’s spring numbers on infested plants will begin to build up and reach a peak in late summer/early autumn.

Adult psyllids have wings and in North America can spread long distance by air. In New Zealand, dispersal tends to be more limited, 100 m or more in three days. They will invade new areas and plants, especially in summer.

From my experience its a temperature to numbers game, when given the ideal temperatures.

One adult laying 500 eggs can mean in about a month you have a population of 250,000 adults

Initially sprays will help control but as numbers rapidly increase you would need to spray every day and still lose the battle.

That was the point I reached about 3 years ago and watched my tomato plants and tamarillos die in front of my eyes.

The following season I treated my tomatoes and other host plants with silicon drench and sprays and in one season completely wiped out the psyllids from my glasshouse and gardens.

The silicon treatment which I call the ‘Cell Strengthening Kit’ makes the plant’s cells too tough for the psyllid nymphs to piece and feed and they soon starve to death after hatching.

This breaks the life cycle and there are no new adults to replace the old ones when they die.

Information on the kit is available on our mail order web site at www.0800466464.co.nz

More info on the pest at http://www.gardenews.co.nz/product.html#The%20Potato%20and%20Tomato%20Psyllid%20control%20with%20Cell%20Strengthen%20sprays%20and%20drench

With our Silcon products you can once again grow tomatoes, potatoes and other affected plants.

or phone me for more information.

Phone 0800 466464
Garden Pages and News at www.gardenews.co.nz
Shar Pei pages at www.sharpei.co.nz
Mail Order products at www.0800466464.co.nz

1The right not to be deprived of life except in accordance with fundamental justice (Section 8)

2The right not to be subjected to torture or to cruel, degrading, or disproportionately severe treatment or punishment (Section 9)

Photo: pixabay.com

Food, Gardening

Phosphorous for your garden (Wally Richards)

October 21, 2022 Pam Vernon Leave a comment

When we buy plant foods or fertilisers for our gardens we see on them the letters N:P:K followed by numbers which indicate the amounts of each of these elements. The NPK stands for Nitrogen, Phosphorus and Potassium.

Nitrogen provides growing power and helps make plant leaves and stems green.

Nitrogen is used to form basic proteins, chlorophyll, and enzymes for the plant cells. In short, a plant can’t grow without it.

Phosphorus stimulates budding and blooming. Plants need phosphorus to produce fruits, flowers, and seeds.

It also helps make your plants more resistant to disease. Phosphorus doesn’t dissolve like nitrogen. The soil will hang onto phosphorus, not releasing it into water.

Potassium promotes strong vigorous roots and resistance to disease.

Potassium is a nutrient your plants need for good internal chemistry.

Plants use potassium to produce the sugars, starches, proteins and enzymes they need to grow and thrive. Potassium also helps your plants regulate their water usage, and better withstand the cold.

I believe of the three elements its the phosphorus that is least understood by some gardeners.

In the distant past phosphorus was obtain from manures especially bird or bat droppings called guano. Phosphorus was also obtained from Reactive Rock Phosphate which is a hard phosphatic rock.

In most soils it dissolves very slowly.

To make the rock phosphate more readily available to plants it was discovered that a process using sulfuric acid, early in the 1900’s,

would breakdown the reactive rock phosphate so a new agricultural fertiliser was created called Super or Super Phosphate.

It became a boon to agriculture and farming with tons of Super been spread to cause fast growth in fields and crops.

Unfortunately like a number of discoveries such as DDT and Asbestos, there was a hidden price to pay.

Super phosphate kills soil life and with their demise leads to unhealthy plants/grasses.

Not only that, it is now known that Super laden plants and grasses can cause health problems in stock including cancers.

(Chlorine and acidic products also destroy soil life including earth worms. Overt time through continued use soil becomes inert or lifeless)

I read a very interesting book some years ago called ‘Cancer, Cause and Cure’ written by an Australian farmer, Percy Weston.

Percy observed the results of the introduction of Super on his farm and the changes that occurred.

If you are interested the book can be obtained by mail order. The book made me reconsider the use of Super phosphate in garden fertilisers.

Interestingly I have never been an advocate of Super phoshate and to the best of my knowledge have never purchased it as a stand alone fertiliser for my gardens.

Though I have on odd occasions in the past used General Garden Fertilisers.

Fortunately I have always preferred sheep manure pellets, animal manures and natural products as my general plant food.

Now days I avoid using chemical fertilisers or chemical sprays including any herbicides anywhere on my property.

But I have noticed in the past, that even though I have obtained good healthy crops and plants, there is some factor that appears to be missing and the crops are not as lush as I feel they could be.

I have often thought that I am not getting sufficient phosphorus in my composts and mulches.

This caused me to do a bit of research on the Internet and found to my delight a company in New Zealand who make a product called BioPhos.

They take the rock phosphate and break it down naturally with micro organisms making it as readily available to plants as Super phosphate is.

The company sent me a email booklet and it showed trials that proved that not only did BioPhos work as well as Super, but actually better as it did not have a ‘peak’ growth on application and gave a much longer sustained release of phosphorus to plants.

Instead of killing soil life it actually supplies new micro organisms to the soil which carry on breaking the natural phosphorus down, meaning that only one application is needed per year unless you are cropping during the winter as well.

Some rose growers and rose societies recommend using BioPhos for better, healthier roses. BioPhos contains phosphate, potassium, sulphur and calcium at the rates of P10:K8:S7:Ca28.

It is pH neutral and used at the following rates; New beds work in 100 grams per square metre, the same with lawns but water in to settle.

Side dressing plants; seedlings 8 grams (a teaspoon full) around base of the plant or in the planting hole.

Same for potatoes (which do well with phosphorus) Sowing beans peas etc sprinkle down row with seeds.

Roses and similar sized plants 18 grams or a tablespoon full around plant or in planting hole.

Established fruit trees etc, spread at the rate of 100 grams per square metre around drip line or where feeder roots are.

Apply to vegetable gardens in spring and a further application in autumn if growing winter crops. Can be applied to container plants also.

Gardeners that use Biophos for the first time around their gardens often contact me tell how much their gardens have improved within a few weeks of using the product.

Maybe because the gardens are missing phosphate and a sprinkling gives the plants what they have been wanting.

1The right not to be deprived of life except in accordance with fundamental justice (Section 8)

2The right not to be subjected to torture or to cruel, degrading, or disproportionately severe treatment or punishment (Section 9)

Photo: Image by Ville Mononen from Pixabay

Gardening, News

Spring in the garden: things we might miss or forget (Wally Richards)

October 14, 2022 Pam Vernon Leave a comment

It is an very interesting spring and start to the new season.

Most of us are saying where is spring? It is already into October and not much springy in the air.

Mind you before the Polar Blast that had us adding another layer of clothes and lighting the fire we did have some not too bad days.

Hopefully those mild days were sufficient to bring some of the pests out of their winter hiding places to be stuck dead by the cold blast.

If in spring we have an early start with sunny days and warm temperatures, then it turns to custard with a few days of bitter cold then all the pests that came out will shiver to death and our pest problem will be significantly reduced.

It then will be into the new year before their numbers multiply and cause problems.

It is now not long before Labour Weekend arrives and that is the New Zealand Traditional time for planting out the tender plants such a tomatoes and Impatiens.

More tender plants such as cucumbers should not be planted till the weather really settles otherwise they just sit there and sulk.

If you do early plantings of non-hardy plants then only do a couple or so and then two to three weeks later another little planting.

Follow that pattern and you cant go wrong.

It is a timely reminder to check grafted fruit trees, ornamentals and roses.

Grafted means they are growing on a similar family plant’s root stock.

This is done for several reasons such as preventing suckering, giving what is supposed to be a better plant such as High Health in Roses and also to determine the end result size of the tree.

The root stock can and often does start producing foliage and if that is allowed to grow then the energy from the roots is grabbed by the root stock’s development and likely at some time the tree that is grafted onto the root stock will fail and die.

Normally it is fairly easy to see the union where the tree is

connected to the root stock.

So any foliage that appears there on the root stock should be rubbed off or cut off to prevent it growing bigger.

Sometime the foliage may appear from under the soil near the trunk. Once again remove.

I have come to understand that grafted stone fruit trees are very likely to have curly leaf disease as the graft is a weakening aspect of the tree’s health and vigor.

I learnt this week an interesting thing; apparently if a person receives a transplant organ then over time that person may start to develop characteristics and even memories of the donor.

Which make s me wonder if a grafted tree starts to show aspects of the tree it is grafted too?

Dwarf stone fruit are the worst to have curly leaf problems.

If you grow a peach, nectarine or plum from a stone then apparently because it is on its own root system it will be far less likely to have curly leaf disease and maybe also less or none of other problems.

With roses we some times see what is often called a water shoot which is a strong upward shoot from near the base.

I think the recommendation is to cut them off but on one occasion I let it grow and with some cosmetic pruning over a couple of seasons turn a bush rose into a standard.

A reader today asked about her compost bins which are made out of tanalised timber.

She asked ‘Would the tanalised timber be harmful to the compost and would it be ok to use the compost on the vegetable garden’?

Tantalized timber has some nasty chemicals in them (Ask any older builder that has worked with tantalized timber for years about how they are faring)

I also learnt from a building inspector that tantalized fence palings that I screwed to my steel warehouse

(To attach steel cages onto for gas bottles and instant gas hot water unit) would overtime eat into the steel and cause corrosion.

So if the chemical can do that to colour steel what are they going to do to your food crops that will take up the chemicals that leach into the soil/compost?

Not a healthy outlook for sure.

The answer is to give the tantalized wood that has been cut to the right size a couple of coats of acrylic paint before assembling to seal the chemicals in.

This is also applied to raised gardens when using tantalized timber.

Container plants indoors and outdoors over winter required much less water but now as the day light hours increase and temperatures rise they will require more moisture.

A problem arises though in that the growing medium, when it became dry causes tension that does not allow the water to penetrate.

So when you water not all the mix/root system gets any moisture and you have a dry spot.

Water rather than staying in the mix a lot of it will run out into the saucer.

There are two ways to solve this problem.

Container that are not too large should be taken and plunged into a tub of water submerging the whole pot. It will start to bubble away which is the air being forced out of the medium as the water replaces the dry air pockets.

When the pot stops bubbling lift up and let the surplus water drain out before returning to its saucer.

That means next time you water the plant will get all the benefit.

If you have a large container that you cannot plunge into a tank of water then what you do is this.

Fill your watering can with warm water and then give a good squirt of dish washing liquid into it.

Lather up with your hand to make the water nice and soapy.

Water the soapy water into the container mix and this will break the tension and allow water to wet the whole mix till the same happens again.

Hanging baskets are prone to having tension and not getting a proper drink. This is especially so with hanging baskets outdoors.

Plunge into a tub of water and watch them bubble. During the summer outdoor baskets should be plunged once a month.

Another big problem with container plants is root mealy bugs and the easy way to fix is to sprinkle a little of Wallys Neem Tree powder over the mix then cover with a little more potting mix.

The powder with become mouldy as it breaks down and look unsightly.

Under a layer of fresh mix you will not see it.

Something extra which I received this week that you may find interesting/shocking?

https://www.debtclock.nz/?utm_campaign=20221007_newsletter_jordan&utm_medium=email&utm_source=taxpayers

Someone has to pay for this and its not the ones that have caused this debt.

1The right not to be deprived of life except in accordance with fundamental justice (Section 8)

2The right not to be subjected to torture or to cruel, degrading, or disproportionately severe treatment or punishment (Section 9)

Image by Eszter Miller from Pixabay

Food, Gardening

Your Plants’ Natural Immunity (Wally Richards)

October 7, 2022 Pam Vernon Leave a comment

Plants, just like ourselves, have built in protection against diseases though their immunity systems.

We build up our immunity naturally over the years by surviving disease attacks and by having a healthy nutritionally rich diet.

That is not to say that we are immune to disease attacks but under normal situations we can fend off most health problems when we have very good health.

If we get into stress then our metabolism does not have the same stamina and we catch a cold or worse.

It is said the leading cause of heart disease and cancer is stress. I think its the stress that is the straw that breaks the camels back, after unhealthy living and insufficient nutrient rich food.

The same applies to plants, place them into stress and they will more likely catch a disease.

I have written a lot in the past on how to build the health of plants by building the health of the soil; having soil that is rich in humus, minerals, earth worms and soil life.

Even when we have the best soil on earth, plants can still catch a cold when they are placed into stress and our current spring weather is very stressful to our plants and to us keen gardeners.

Chilly winds, too wet, too dry, only the occasional nice day does not make for great gardening and our plants don’t do so well either.

We can however increase the immune systems of plants by a few monthly sprays of Perkfection Supa for roses and other plants.

The active ingredient of Perkfection is ‘Phosphite ion’ or Phosphonic Acid. (Potassium ions are also present).

Perkfection is very safe to handle and spray and when used on food crops there is no withholding period other than your normal washing of produce before eating.

Perkfection is used extensively by commercial growers of produce and fruit as its safe, effective, in prevention and control while not restrictive on exports of produce.

We have suggested Perkfection Supa for Roses and Other Plants as an alternative to more toxic sprays, for the assistance in recovery from/or prevention of, the following problems:

Black spot, Downy Mildew, Phytophthora Root rot, botrytis, Canker, heart rot, damping off, crown rot, leaf blight, silver leaf, late blight, collar rot, pink rot, brown rot, Armillaria, and gummy stem rot.

Now that’s a big list of common plant diseases which means that many of your disease related problems can be overcome with applications of this product.

Besides using Perkfection over your roses for the likes of Black spot and Downy mildew you can also use it as a spray over all your fruiting plants and trees including your strawberries.

It can be used also over your potatoes, tomatoes, lettuce, beans, cubits (cucumbers etc) lawns, onions, passion fruit, Cauliflowers, cybidium orchids and ornamental plants and vines.. In fact there is no where you cannot use Perkfection to advantage.

Being ‘Synthetic Organic Phosphates’ what you are doing, is placing this valuable material, onto the foliage of your plants, where it is very readily absorbed and transferred through the whole of the plant.

This fortifies the plant’s cells, increases the plant’s immune system and makes your plants less susceptible to invading pathogens.

There is however a down side, as with any good thing, you can use too much and the recommendation is to use Perkfection at 4 ml per litre of spray once a month for about 6 times in a season.

(Note a season is the normal period of time for that crop or plant. Roses are from Spring till Autumn. Most annuals 5-6 months.)

The reason is that, you can over load your plant with organic phosphates causing a clogging of the cells and halting growth until the system clears.

If a plant has a problem spray the first month with Perkfection at 7 mls per litre.

For plants you wish to fortify use at 4ml per litre for 2 to 3 months.

Prevention is better than cure and by spraying your plants in the spring you give the greatest protection to leaves and fruit, autumn spray will give greatest protection to roots and tubers.

I have suggested that on the 1st of the month to spray your roses and other preferred plants with Perkfection, MBL (Magic Botanic Liquid) and Mycorrcin. Then 14 days later (15th) spray with Mycorrcin and MBL.

What we are doing is boosting the plant’s immune system, supplying a large range of minerals and elements, feeding the beneficial microbes to increase their populations which also work to eliminate diseases.

If insects problems occur then include Wallys Super Pyrethrum as it is a quick knock down control.

1The right not to be deprived of life except in accordance with fundamental justice (Section 8)

2The right not to be subjected to torture or to cruel, degrading, or disproportionately severe treatment or punishment (Section 9)

Gardening

More tips on beating those pests in your garden (Wally Richards)

September 30, 2022 Pam Vernon Leave a comment

It is a new gardening season and once it warms up the pest populations will quickly grow.

So far the temperatures have been below what would be normal for this time of the year and considering we are only a few weeks away from Labour Weekend it is most strange.

Temperatures have a great bearing on insect pest activity and population growth.

An ideal spring is an early one with 2-3 weeks of nice warm temperatures which attract the pests out of hiding to get on with their lives. Then a sudden cold snap for a week will bowl most of them out of our gardens and then delay the problems they cause till after the new year.

As the weather/temperatures are not great yet it means they are marking time for better days.

If we place controls in now and over the next few weeks we will be able to stop, confuse and eliminate a lot of the pests before their populations start to build.

This can be achieved by quick elimination of the pests that are lurking about on our plants by the use of the quick knock down spray; Wallys Super Pyrethrum.

For General use at 1ml to 2 litres of water (5ml to 10 litres of water) It is very concentrated and very cost effective.

Best used just prior to sunset when bee activity has ceased.

The spray will stay active through the night affecting any pest insects that come into contact with the residue.

Next day it will become inactive within 2 hours of direct sunlight.

You can also use Wallys Super Pyrethrum at 2.5ml per litre for a spray under eaves for spider or indoors for flies etc.

Contains: 28g/litre pyrethrins in the form of an oil in water emulsion

A 1ml pipet is supplied in addition to the measure which is on the side of the Bottle.

Note the container has 100mils which makes up 200 litres of normal garden spray strength.

If not all the made up spray is used, then place the sprayer in a dark cupboard to keep it ready for future use.

The next step in pest control is to hide your plants so the pests dont know that they are there.

Of course you cant lift the plants and hide them some where but seeing many pests find their host plants by the smell of them, then we can disguise the plant’s smell by an over riding stronger smell.

Wallys Neem Tree Granules are perfect for this and even I have been surprised by the many comments from Landscapers and gardeners about how their pest problems have reduced by simply scattering Wallys Neem Tree Granules over the soil near plants, shrubs and even trees.

Ideal in a glasshouse to stop whitefly from smelling your tomato plants.

Placed under your citrus trees and Rhododendrons it will not only disguise the smell of the plants but also clean up any pests in the canopy. Repeat another application 3 months later.

On fruit trees that maybe attacked by either Codlin Moth or Guava Moth I suggest to also make some little bags out of old curtain netting, fill with the Neem Granules and hang in the tree at the four cardinal points about your height, high.

Moths flying around at night will not be able to smell the fruit so easily and so fly on by not knowing there is a ideal place to lay their eggs.

Another excellent control is a lure and trap which can be a from a color or a smell.

Wallys Sticky Yellow White Fly traps are ideal for both inside a glasshouse and outside hanging by plants such as tomatoes.

It always amazes me how many small adult pests are caught on these yellow sticky pads.

That in its self stops hundreds of eggs being laid and the resulting damage to your plants.

Then there is also another way to control moth problem by which you set up a moth lure to attract them and kill them.

Take one litre of hot water add a 100 grams of sugar, one teaspoon of marmite, half a tablespoon of

Cloudy Ammonia and half a tablespoon of Vanilla:

Mix well and divide the mix between two plastic milk or soft drink bottles. (500 mils approx each)

Punch or drill some holes (big enough to allow a moth in) in the side of the bottles just above the level

of the mix. Place on a stand about a couple of metres away from the tree. At about waist height like on a small folding table.

When a number of moths are caught dispose of them and make up a new solution.

Ideal for both codlin and guava moths.

Then we can have control of the psyllid pest which effects and destroys our tomatoes, potatoes and tamarillos and to a lessor extent, capsicums, chilies, peppino and okra.

If you had psyllid problems on your tomatoes last season this is what you do.

When you plant your tomato seedling water it in with a solution of Wallys Silicon and Boron Soil Drench, used at 10ml per litre of water apply about a 150mls of the solution into the soil to water the seedling in. You will repeat this again two weeks later.

This gets the silicon into the plant through the roots and the plant takes it up readily because of the boron.

You then mix Wally Silicon Cell Strengthener Spray used at 5ml per litre of non-chlorinated water and

Mixed with Wallys Silicon Super Spreader used at just 1mil per 5 litres of non chlorinated water.

(Comes a 100ml bottle makes 500 litres of spray, use the 1ml Transfer Pipet supplied to measure)

Mix these two products into a one litre Trigger sprayer which will be 5mils of Wally Silicon Cell

Strengthener Spray with quarter a mil of Silicon Super Spreader which drives the spray into the tomato plant. Spray the young plants each week till about a metre tall.

The spray keeps ok so just place out of direct sunlight to use again next time, after giving the contents a shake.

Once a metre tall spray 2 weekly and then when you reach the stage when there is a good fruit set spray once a month for any new growth.

Done correctly you will wipe out all the psyllids in your back yard or glasshouse and be free of the pests next season until they find their way back from the neighborhood.

Remember that a lot of pests are brought home on plants obtained from elsewhere including places you purchased from.

Root mealy bug is a curse insect as is root nematodes both suck goodness out of the roots of plants they are feeding on. On container plants and out doors they can be treated with Wallys Neem Tree Powder sprinkle a little on to the potting mix then cover with a little more potting mix

On lawns you can do the same but in gardens where the pests are just use Wallys Neem Tree Granules. Often gardeners are surprised at how good the treated plants are after a few weeks of application.

Thats because they dont have the pests sucking out their goodness anymore.

Here is to a reduced pest problem this season.

Phone 0800 466464
Garden Pages and News at www.gardenews.co.nz
Shar Pei pages at www.sharpei.co.nz
Mail Order products at www.0800466464.co.nz

New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990. Part II of the Act covers a broad range of Civil and Political Rights. As part of the right to life and the security of the person, the Act guarantees everyone:

1The right not to be deprived of life except in accordance with fundamental justice (Section 8)

2The right not to be subjected to torture or to cruel, degrading, or disproportionately severe treatment or punishment (Section 9)

Gardening, News

COMING UP ROSES (Wally Richards)

September 19, 2022 Pam Vernon Leave a comment

A gardener this week phoned me asking about roses and what should he be doing this time of the year?

He suggested that I should write an article about roses so here is a copy of a past article I wrote over 5 years ago and revised now:

There is something special about roses that gardeners like.

It could be the shape and form of the flowers; it maybe the exotic perfumes some varieties have; or it could be something in our genes, because roses must be the oldest cultivated ornamental plant in the history of the world.

In Nature things such as leaf diseases (black spot, rust etc) and insect pest attacks on plants is part of life but when it comes to the rose enthusiast these natural occurrences are like the end of the world.

Woe betide a blemish to the foliage or an aphid feeding on the newly forming flower buds in spring.

It is war and every chemical of mass destruction will be mixed and used to control and eradicate.

The goal is the perfect bloom (with a tear drop of dew on a petal) framed by perfect foliage of a dark rich green. Picture perfect and hopefully with a divine scent to boot.

For those that show their roses at their annual local rose show or in the national rose shows the perfect specimen is the ultimate challenge.

I remember in days gone by when chemicals; that have since been banned because of the damage they did to the environment and to our health, such as Shield for Roses.

These would be used religiously by gardeners on their beloved roses biweekly.

Alternating with Super Shield and applications of Rose Fertiliser and Nitrophoska Blue.

If the rose sprays did not do what was expected there were other lethal chemicals to use, Captan, Bravo, Orthene, Target and Maldison. (All banned now as far as I am aware)

To say that the health of the roses was compromised would be an understatement and every season instead of the perfect rose the plants would be a very sore sight.

Years ago I recognised the problem that the chemicals were doing to the soil life and the immune systems of the roses and wrote articles on the matter.

I remember a Garden Centre owner in the Taranaki region telling me how she read my articles on roses and followed the advise. Within a couple of seasons she had turned the sickly roses in her home garden into lovely roses.

The local rose society members visited the gardens and were amazed at how healthy her roses were and wanted to know what chemicals she was using to have them looking so great.

Her reply was no chemicals which the members had problems believing because they had been indoctrinated into Shield, Nitrophoska etc as the ultimate tools of rose perfection.

The products made the companies that sold them a lot of money but did nothing for the health of the roses or the health of the users.

Here is a little logic I remember as a boy visiting my uncles farm in Taranaki where my auntie had a few rose bushes between a paddock and the gravel driveway.

Besides the dust on the plants in a dry summer and the occasional cow or possum nibbling the foliage they were very healthy.

They had some horse or cow manure thrown at them from time to time and cut back in the winter along with a bit of a tidy up.

Another aspect was that being in the country the plants were not suffering from chemicals in the water such as Chlorine. Just rain water from the sky or the tank.

I remember another rose enthusiast who also told me that his parents were great collectors of roses and had over the years several hundred specimens on their farm property which he was also involved in their care.

He told me how over the years of growing up how wonderful and healthy the plants had been.

As ‘new’ things were introduced to assist with the rose care, the health of the roses deteriorated so more stronger chemicals were used to no avail.

His parents passed and it was then his sole responsibility to care for the sick inheritance.

No matter what he used, how much he sprayed the roses only got worse and one winter after another poor health season he was seriously considering plowing all the roses into the ground as they were hopelessly sick and some had already died.

He told me he read an article I wrote about rose health and a program to follow and decided to give it a go for one last attempt.

What happened was that season there was a marked improvement in the roses, not up to their former glory but certainly heading in the right direction.

Then in the following season most of the roses turned to their full health state and a phone call to thank me was made. He said that my advise was the best gift to his deceased parents ever.

It is just common sense really, work with Nature not against it.

Chemicals are designed to kill and control; they can kill both the good as well as the bad plus adverse side effects as we commonly see with our own human pharmaceutical concoctions.

Chlorine in water is bad news for soil life so if you have this poison in your tap water then see about removing it with a 10 micron carbon bonded housing and filter. Email me for more info if interested.

Next stick to natural things to feed your roses (and other plants) this includes all animal manures including sheep manure pellets, blood & bone, compost that is not made from green waste.

(I know people that have lost their roses to compost containing herbicides from green waste)

The compost is used to cover over the blood & bone etc.

For extra minerals use Wallys Unlocking your Soil twice a year and Ocean Solids once a year.

Apply a little Fruit and Flower Power once a month during flowering season.

Spray your roses 2 weekly with Magic Botanical Liquid (MBL) This will do more for your roses health than anything that I know of.

Once a month spray them with Perkfection starting in Spring when there is a good show of leaves. Perkfection can be added to every second spray of MBL.

Any sign of aphids spray just before sunset with Wallys Super Pyrethrum, it is a quick knock down control.

During season any sign of leaf diseases spray with potassium permanganate at a quarter teaspoon per litre of water.

Here is something that you may find interesting; a Peer reviewed study about climate change that was released recently

see https://www.aei.org/carpe-diem/there-is-no-climate-emergency-say-500-experts-in-letter-to-the-united-nations/

It confirms my thoughts that adverse weather events have been happening every since weather was recorded.

The difference is the Media coverage now compared to say 50 years ago when you only found out about floods and droughts in the news paper.

Pushing the Fear Button for control and to make us poor.

1The right not to be deprived of life except in accordance with fundamental justice (Section 8)

2The right not to be subjected to torture or to cruel, degrading, or disproportionately severe treatment or punishment (Section 9)

agenda 21/30, Gardening

USDA is tracking community gardens! Red flag

September 14, 2022 Pam Vernon 8 Comments

This is from Doug and Stacey. We’ve posted their videos just twice so far on the topic of living off grid.

Here we have a topic rearing its head again … one that is of concern to all of us world wide as the global plans tighten up further, global food supplies manipulated and controlled (see the Ice Age Farmer for more info on that) and the promise from the globalists we’ll ‘own nothing and be happy’. We had hints of future control in NZ back with the Food Bill, threatening we could not share or our produce over the back fence. Nice try! Watch Kiwis!. So here it’s pointed out that the registering of your community garden with government is a red flag and about more than meets the eye … watch and listen to the video.

OFF GRID with DOUG & STACY

Subscribe to OFF GRID with DOUG & STACY: http://bit.ly/2nrYf24

Gardening

September gardening in NZ (Wally Richards)

September 13, 2022 Pam Vernon Leave a comment

There are plenty of chores to attend to at this time of the year as the day light hours increase and plants emerging from their winter rest.

Hardy plants will be showing very good growth now including the plants you do not want commonly referred to as weeds.

Unwanted plants are very valuable if you make use of them and treat them as a fodder crop.

Smaller unwanted plants should be cut off just below soil level with a sharp carving knife or sharp Dutch Hoe.

This removes the root system from the foliage leaving the roots to rot off in the soil providing a rich source of food for the soil life.

The foliage falls onto the bare soil where it is quickly broken down by the soil life providing them with more substance to nurture your preferred plants.

Taller weeds can be cut down with a weed eater such as using the Pivotrim Pro attachment which are available from Mitre10 Mega stores.

(This are far superior to using the roll of weed eater plastic tape which I always found a problem using.)

After cutting down the weeds with the above you can leave the stubble unless you want to clear the ground which means cutting off the weeds below soil level with a sharp carving knife.

Real tough root systems I have used a box cutter on which makes the job a breeze as long as you are careful not to cut yourself.

These methods of weeding enhances your soil or growing medium where chemical herbicides greatly harm the soil life and your plants suffer.

If you have waste areas or cobbles/cracks where weeds flourish then sprinkle salt over the area and lightly water. The weeds are killed and stay weed free for a time.

Another safe to use is mixing Ammonium sulphamate at 200 grams per litre of water and spraying on a sunny day when the soil is on the dry side. Give those conditions weeds are likely to be dead within an hour or two.

Spring temperatures and moisture brings out diseases to attack your plants so sprays of potassium permanganate (Condys Crystals at a quarter teaspoon to a litre of water)

with Raingard added sprayed onto the soil and plants controls a wide range of diseases and fungi nicely.

Note it will stain things like your house & fences if you are not careful, but will wash off over time.

An interesting bit of information you can purify drinking water of harmful bacteria by placing 3 or 4 grains into a litre of water, agitate to make water a light pink and leave for 24 hours before drinking.

Using this method means a large quantity of water can be treated saving the need to boil.

Spray the above potassium permanganate adding Wallys Liquid Copper for protection of curly leaf on stone fruit about every week till disease time is past.

Spray also your roses and other deciduous trees and plants to protect the new spring growth from diseases.

Sprinkle Wallys Neem Tree Granules under your apple trees, roses and citrus trees to reduce pest insect problems.

Use the Cell Strengthening products we wrote about a few weeks ago to strengthen your tomato plants, potatoes and tamarillo so the dreaded psyllid nymphs cant feed and ruin your crops.

If you have concerns about build up of diseases in your soil where you grow tomatoes year after year such as it your glasshouse then treat the soil with Terracin and 3 weeks later with Mycorrcin.

Ensure you store the unused bottle contents in a cool situation out of sunlight as it has live beneficial bacteria which would die if exposed to too much heat such as in a hot shed.

If you do not have any plants in your glasshouse so far, then you can burn sulphur powder inside the house to fumigate it of insect pests that maybe hiding away.

Wet times allows slimes to grow on paths which can be dangerous to walk on causing one to slip and fall. Spray with Wallys Moss & Liverwort Control to kill the slime.

Also ideal to use for moss in lawns and liverwort growing all over the place. To obtain best results adjust the nozzle of the sprayer so it is a bit of a jet which forces the product into the target area.

Does not harm plants if they are sprayed at the same time.

Start spraying strawberry plants 2 weekly with Mycorrcin which will increase your harvests by 200 to 400 %. They will fruit earlier, more fruit, larger berries and a longer cropping season.

Dont forget to also use Wallys Secret Strawberry Food for bigger strawberries.

When planting seedlings place a little Wallys Unlocking Your Soil into the planting along with a little Neem Powder to give your seedlings a good start and some protection from pests.

I favor crop cover (also so sold as Bug Mesh), which is 4 metres wide. By using wire or piping to form hoops place the cover over the hoops to give protection to the young plants or seeds from weather, pests, cats and birds.

Great stuff and reusable season after season.

If you want great gardens this season then use only natural products that will not harm the soil life and earth worms.

This includes putting a 10 micron carbon bonded filter/housing onto your water tap if you have chlorine in your water supply.

I have received many reports from gardeners about how their gardens have greatly improved in health after removing the chlorine from the water they use on the gardens.

It is just common sense, a chemical poison that is added to water to kill microbes is going to do the same to the beneficial microbes in your soil and effect the valuable earth worms.

I even wonder what harm it does to our gut bacteria when people drink chlorinated tap water.

If anyone has any data on this I would be interested.

1The right not to be deprived of life except in accordance with fundamental justice (Section 8)

2The right not to be subjected to torture or to cruel, degrading, or disproportionately severe treatment or punishment (Section 9)

In response to Wally’s question on chlorine, search ‘chlorine’ in the search box for our articles here on topic. It is a carcinogen for starters. EWR

Gardening

Alternative ways to defeat those weeds (Wally Richards)

September 10, 2022 Pam Vernon Leave a comment

Chemical herbicides aren’t the only option available. There are a number of other products which are handy weedkillers but which don’t do as much damage as do the chemical herbicide products.

Oils added to water and sprayed over the foliage of plants in certain conditions will dehydrate or bleach the foliage, destroying everything growing above the ground.

Thus any cheap cooking oil mixed with water adding the same amount of dish washing liquid as oil then sprayed over weeds on a hot sunny day when the soil is on the dry side, the foliage of the sprayed plants will begin wilting very quickly – within minutes even.

If it is applied in cooler weather, or when the soil is moist, the killing action will take longer, and might not even work at all.

Ratio to use will depend on several factors; you could start off with say 100 mils of used cooking oil with 100mils of dish washing liquid into a litre of water.

That may dehydrate some weeds and other weeds may need a stronger solution. Of course you can spray it undiluted for maximum effect.

Plants are at their most vulnerable in sunlight on hot sunny days when moisture levels in the soil are low.

It is then that the roots of the plants will be gathering moisture as fast as possible to send upwards to replace the moisture lost through leaf transpiration.

When water is being lost from the leaves faster than it can be replaced, plants will be seen to wilt or droop.

This is most noticeable on hot sunny days, when leaves wilt during the day but come right as the sun goes down and the moisture level of the plant’s cells is replaced.

Foliage that remains starved of moisture for too long will dry out and is unlikely to recover.

You might notice that only parts of a leaf will be affected, perhaps only the tip or the edges. When oil is applied to the foliage in these conditions, all the leaves and stems are likely to wither and die, effectively killing the plant’s foliage.

If the plant is an annual, this will deprive the root system of energy, and it too will wither and die.

If the plant is a perennial, it will have the ability to send up new foliage from it roots, tuber or bulb, and it may well survive.

But if we keep spraying new foliage as it appears, doing the work in ideal hot sunny conditions, the roots or the bulb will eventually run out of energy and fail completely, causing the plant to finally die.

By adopting this method, we’re simply applying the basic principle that no plant can survive indefinitely without foliage as it loses its ability to gather energy from the sun.

If we simply keep cutting the foliage at ground level (as soon after it appears as possible), the plant will eventually die. The well-known Dutch Hoe, with its sharp edges, was designed for just this purpose.

Used against weed seedlings, the hoe would be placed just under the surface of the soil and then pushed forwards so that its sharp edges sliced off the weeds just under the surface, killing annual weeds and knocking back perennial weeds.

The fallen foliage is left on the soil to be re-absorbed back into the soil.

The latter may need a further treatment or two using the same method to finally finish them off.

If the hoe is used when the weeds are very young, it will successfully kill both annual and perennial weeds which have grown from seed. The older and more established the perennials, the more treatments will be required to get rid of them.

There are several common household products which can be used for non-selective weed killing, including any salad or cooking oils, vinegar and salt plus bleaches and acids.

(I spoke to a old farmer recently who told me they used to use sulfuric acid to remove the potato crop foliage prior to harvesting the tubers. Said it worked very quickly but could not remember the strength of the solution)

You need only to experiment a little with various dilution rates to see what works best for you.

Good old common table salt, purchased in bulk or in kilo bags, is probably the cheapest natural weedkiller available to everyone.

Use it at the rate of 240 grams (about 12 heaped tablespoons) to a litre of warm or hot water to dissolve it, and then spray it on the foliage of the weeds, again in sunny dry conditions.

Then stand back and watch the plants shrivel over time. Annuals will be seen going off quite fast, with perennials probably needing further salt treatments.

If you are finding that you are not getting the kill coverage you want, then increase the amount of salt to about 500 grams to a litre of water.

You will find that a little trial and error will indicate the level of salt needed to do the job well, without using too much. Applying extra amounts of salt over an extended period of time will eventually harm the soil.

If you are spraying only the foliage, and at the above rates, there will be, little residual damage done to the soil.

To make absolutely sure, give the area a good watering after the weeds have died. Adding Raingard to the salty water at a rate of 1ml per litre of water should also help the salt adhere to the surface of the foliage.

Salt can also be applied dry on cobbles to kill weeds in joints or cracks.

Another home product which is useful is white vinegar. It is made from ascetic acid which, in its undiluted state, can be quite dangerous to play with if you don’t know what you are doing.

Only small amounts of ascetic acid, probably about 100ml to 1 litre of water, are needed to make a strong white vinegar.

If I remember correctly, it becomes a good weedkiller if diluted to the rate of about 15-20% acid. Salt is certainly much safer to use, and can be purchased cheaply in bulk.

Many years ago, and probably still today in some places, many people did their own oil changes on their vehicles, primarily to save on the cost of having a garage do it.

The old oil from the sump would then be poured over areas where gardeners didn’t want plants to grow – it was often applied to grassy areas of parks to mark out the lines for football fields and the like.

The strip over which the oil was poured would be bare of grasses for a long period of time. Diesel, at about $2.50 plus a litre, (price varies) is a very good weed killer,

used either as a spray to knock out weeds with a short-term residue growing in waste areas, or as a drench for longer term control.

Likewise, salt applied directly to the soil in reasonable quantities will also give a long-term control, depending on the amount applied to an area.

Simply apply the salt and leave it to get all those unwanted plants out of our cobbles or pathways – it’s a cheap and easy solution.

Sulphate of ammonia (which is another type of salt with nitrogen), was once another very popular weedkiller for spot control. It was also relatively inexpensive if purchased in 25kg bags from stock and station agents.

All that’s required is about a tablespoon of sulphate of ammonia powder placed onto the crown or centre of a weed. Left alone, the dry salts will burn out the crown of the weed, killing it outright.

As it is nitrogen, the control residue level lasts only for a short time. Some gardeners use this product on flat weeds in lawns – and indeed it can be a reasonably successful lawn weedkiller if mixed in with sand to get an even spread over the lawn.

This is called Lawn Sand, and here’s how to make your own.

Take 5kg of sharp sand (plasters sand preferably – don’t use river or beach sand as it can contain weeds of its own), together with 700 grams of sulphate of ammonia, and 300 grams of sulphate of iron.

The iron aids in making the area more acidic, and helps to burn mosses. Mix this all well together, and apply at a rate of 30 grams per square metre.

Do it ideally in dry weather conditions when rain is unlikely – if it does rain soon after application, the Lawn Sand will be less effective. Grasses which come into contact with the Lawn Sand will turn brown, but should bounce back after a week or two.

Another compound called Ammonium sulphamate mixed at 200 grams per litre of water and sprayed over weeds is also a very effective way of getting rid of them as they quickly compost down.

Watered over the foliage of oxalis into the soil it will compost the bulbs and help you get rid of this pest weed.

Sold as a Compost Accelerator or Super Stump Rotter and as Ammonium sulphamate in 2kg jars.

1The right not to be deprived of life except in accordance with fundamental justice (Section 8)

2The right not to be subjected to torture or to cruel, degrading, or disproportionately severe treatment or punishment (Section 9)

Gardening

GERMINATING SEEDS (Wally Richards)

September 2, 2022 Pam Vernon Leave a comment

There are two basic places to germinate seeds, one is where they will ultimately grow and mature the other is in suitable containers to germinate and then to transplant out into open ground or larger containers latter on.

Firstly it is always best to plant any seed in the spot where it will grow and mature.

The reason for this is because when a seed germinates it will send down a tap root and if in open ground in a friable soil that root can be very long.

If on the other hand we germinate in a container or seedling tray that root will be limited in the depth of the tray and growing medium.

It is not practical to grow every thing at the maturity site, especially when we are getting an early start or growing out of season.

There are some seed types which should only be grown in their maturity site and only planted when conditions are favorable.

I often see seedlings for sale in punnets of plants which should never be offered this way because novice gardeners, that know no better, may purchase and have poor results..

The worst example of this is root crops such as carrots and parsnips which should only be direct sown as in any other form they will not produce a normal root.

An exception to this is a carrot that is round in shape and does not produce a long edible root.

Beetroot and onions are seedlings that will transplant but are better to direct sow. (Direct sow means planting seed where they will mature) Spring onion is an exception.

Corn, beans and peas should all be direct sown and you will get far better crops if you do so.

Larger seeds are easy to handle and can be placed where you want them to grow without having to thin out later on. Silverbeet is another one that would be best direct sown.

If you want to start off seeds early in open ground try this method.

Make a trench about 100mm deep and the same wide, mow your lawn and collect the clippings which you then pack fresh into the bottom of your trench.

(Note if the grasses are in seed in the lawn it maybe best not to use the clippings to prevent moving grass weeds to your garden)

Pack firmly to about 80mm then sprinkle a little compost over the clippings to cover.

Next sprinkle Wallys Calcium and Health or garden lime and Wallys Unlocking Your Soil along the trench along with foods such as chook manure, sheep manure pellets, blood & bone, Bio Boost and Neem Tree Powder.

Once again cover lightly with weed free compost (Purchased)

Next sow your seeds such as peas, beans, sweet corn etc. (Peas are hardy but others will depend where you are in NZ to when you start)

Once the seeds are spaced out along the row then spray them with Magic Botanic Liquid (MBL) at 20 mls per litre. This really speeds up germination.

Then cover the seeds with more compost and water down using a fine rose watering can with MBL added.

For those that have problems with either cats, birds or late frosts then make some hoops out of No8 wire and place them along the row with a clearance of about 200mm in the middle of the row.

Place crop cover over the hoops and on one side cover with soil and on the other side with lengths of old timber or similar.

That allows you to easily take off to tend to the plants if needed. The heat from the grass clippings will warm the soil which greatly helps germination.

Once well developed then you can remove the hoops and cover and store for future use.

Now lets look at doing similar but in seedling trays or by using cell packs or punnets.

If you keep the punnets and cell packs that you have purchased in the past then these are good value to use.

Wash them out in hot water so they are nice and clean.

To fill I use only purchased compost of high quality such as from Daltons or Oderings.

I have found that seed raising mixes are a gimmick and most of the ones I have looked at are too expensive and do not work as well as a good quality compost for most seed germination projects.

Think about this; outside in Nature we find all sorts of soils types even straight gravel or sand where seeds do not appear to have much trouble germinating, without any special mixes from mankind.

One important aspect to consider when germinating in seedling trays is to have heat from a heat pad.

Some garden shops, pet supplies and brew shops have heat pads which can be used for germination.

I place a sheet of polystyrene block on a bench to direct the heat upwards then sit the seed trays on the heat pad.

If you go to wholesale fish outlets or fish departments of supermarkets you will likely find used polystyrene trays free or for a few dollars.

You can sit your heat pad in the tray and being white it will provide lots of good reflected light.

If the pad you buy is a higher temperature than you require then cover the pad with sand and keep the sand moist. Sit your seedling trays on the sand.

Fill your seedling tray or cell packs to about two thirds full with purchased compost as above.

Carefully sprinkle a few seeds over the compost keeping them apart so they each have their own space.

Spray then seeds with MBL and Mycorrcin mixed together in a trigger sprayer with non chlorinated water.

Once the compost and seeds are wet then cover seeds with more compost (You can sieve it if you like) and wet down with your spray.

Now you spray the tray at least twice a day to keep the compost moist using the same trigger mix.

Once a few seeds have germinated and before they start stretching for light get them out into natural light from overhead such as on a bench in a glasshouse.

If you do not have a suitable place then place your polystyrene box outside with a sheet of glass over it.

The seedlings will need spraying still but off the heat pad a lot less. Make sure the seedlings are in good light but not strong sun light to burn them.

If you are worried about them at night you can bring the polystyrene box inside or onto a porch.

When the seedling are big enough to handle prick them out and pot them into small pots once again using the compost or plant out in your garden.

If you spray the seedlings a couple of days before planting out then you do not need to harden them off.

1 The right not to be deprived of life except in accordance with fundamental justice (Section 8)

2 The right not to be subjected to torture or to cruel, degrading, or disproportionately severe treatment or punishment (Section 9)

3 The right not to be subjected to medical or scientific experimentation without consent (Section 10)

4 The right to refuse to undergo any medical treatment (Section 11)

Furthermore, the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990 guarantees everyone: Freedom of Thought, Conscience, and Religion.
This includes the right to freedom of thought, conscience, religion, and belief,
INCLUDING THE RIGHT TO ADOPT AND HOLD OPINIONS WITHOUT INTERFERENCE (Section 1)

Image by StockSnap from Pixabay

Food, Gardening

Tomato Time (Wally Richards)

August 28, 2022 Pam Vernon Leave a comment

If you are like me, your fingers are itching to get the new seasons tomato plants under way.

The earlier you start the sooner you will have ripe tomatoes to eat.

I think most garden centres will have a few early varieties already to buy and grow on.

This last week after the cold spell the weather has been fairly warm in most areas.

This is likely because of the rain brought down from the tropics which caused so much damage also brought with it, warm air.

As I write this in Marton at 10am on Saturday the temperature outside is 18 degrees and starting to feel a bit more like some spring weather.

If you have a glasshouse or similar then no problem in getting your first tomato plants started either in the ground or in containers.

If you do not have a glasshouse there is no reason not to plant one or more tomato plants into 20cm containers to grow on for planting out into your garden later on as a well established plant.

You just need to have the containers in a sunny sheltered spot and if the weather turns to custard or looks like a frost then bring them inside (porch, carport, shed, kitchen) they will be ok then till weather improves and back to their spot outside so they get ample sun light.

Firstly lets look at planting your purchased tomato plants, whether in the ground or into a container: make a hole that will be deep enough to bury the plant up to the first leaves.

The reason for this is that the plant will produce roots all the up the trunk making a bigger root system compared planted shallow where the original roots are.

More roots, bigger plant and better results.

Place about half a teaspoon of Wallys Secret Tomato Food with Neem Powder at the base of the hole and just cover with a little of the growing medium.

Also sprinkle Wallys Secret Tomato Food onto the growing medium surface but not against the trunk of the plant.

Not only are you giving your tomato a great food but also the Neem Powder helps prevent insect problems.

In a glasshouse also sprinkle Wallys Neem Tree Granules as the smell of the granules will further disguise the smell of your tomato plants so whitefly will not know they are there.

Hang Wallys White Fly Sticky Traps in the glasshouse near the door and vets as well as above your tomato plants.

These will catch any adult insects pests that find there way into the glasshouse.

The biggest problem that many gardeners had over the last season or longer is the dreaded psyllid.

These little pests lay their eggs on to tomato plants, potatoes, Tamarrilo (these three are the worst affected) but they will also attack chili, capsicum okra and pippino.

The nymphs when they hatch out are very small and you need a magnifying glass to see them.

They are sucking the goodness out of your tomato plant and even worse injecting a toxin into the plant.

The results seen are the plants lower leaves may turn yellow prematurely, be distorted, fruit will become progressively smaller and the end result will be a fungus mold up and down the trunk before the plant dies.

Eggs hatch 3-9 days after being laid and nymphs pass through five scale-like stages in 12-21 days, depending on temperature.

In greenhouses, tomato-potato psyllid development proceeds rapidly between 15-32 C, and the lower temperature threshold for development is about 7 C.

It is the mid range temperatures that are best for the psyllids and for breeding.

Lower and very high temperatures reduce their activity and that is why very early and late in the season, while temperatures are mild they are not much of a problem in open air gardens.

Late self sown tomato plants will do well till winter knocks them out.

From personal experience I found that once you have a psyllid population in your back yard that each season it will be far worse than previous up until growing of tomatoes, potatoes and Tamarrilo is a waste of money and time.

For instance Opiki (between Palmerston North and Levin) was a great commercial potato growing area a few years ago. Now there are none grown as the chemicals needed to control had to be applied so frequently and the costs too high to be economical.

Sprays such as Neem Oil or chemical ones will help control a bit but the populations become so great that they just don’t control sufficiently to be any thing than a waste of money.

Confidor (the bee killer) would be the best to work as a chemical spray but of course now no longer available to the home gardener as it is a bee killer which we do not want that.

About two years ago the psyllid problem in my big glasshouse had got so bad that I went out looking for a safe means of control.

I found the answer in silicon which if used to treat the tomato plants from seedlings to maturity not

only prevented psyllid damage but actually got rid of them completely from my glasshouse and gardens.

So for other gardeners I bottled 3 products the first is Wallys Silicon and Boron Soil Drench which is watered into the soil where your tomato plant is to grow either before planting or after planting.

Another drench is applied 2 weeks later.

Then you mix Wallys Cell Strengthening Spray and Wallys Silicon Super Spreader together.

The Super Spreader forces the Cell Strengthening spray into the plants.

This spray can be started once your tomato plant has foliage and repeated every week as it grows.

Once it gets to flowering and about a metre tall then spray every two weeks.

Once you start harvesting fruit spray once a month.

Add Magic Botanic Liquid (MBL) to the cell strengthening spray.

I make up the spray into a one litre Trigger sprayer and leave by the plants out of direct sunlight to used again till all contents finished as it keeps ok. Just shake the bottle in case of settling.

You will not only have lots of tomatoes as it used to be but also the fruit will be bigger and tastier as the leaves of the plant will love the silicon spray and grow to about double their normal size.

The plant will get more energy from the sun having larger leaves and the plants will be the best tomatoes you have ever grown using the Wallys Secret Tomato Food and the Silicon cell strengthening products. Even if you do not think you have a psyllid problem it is worthwhile to use the cell strengthening products as you will have better tomatoes as a result.

These products also work well on preventing or reducing the damage to garlic from the garlic rust problem.

You could try the cell strengthening spray with MBL added on your favorite plants such as roses and see what happens.

Problems ring me at 0800 466464
Email wallyjr@gardenews.co.nz
Web site www.gardenews.co.nz

1 The right not to be deprived of life except in accordance with fundamental justice (Section 8)

2 The right not to be subjected to torture or to cruel, degrading, or disproportionately severe treatment or punishment (Section 9)

3 The right not to be subjected to medical or scientific experimentation without consent (Section 10)

4 The right to refuse to undergo any medical treatment (Section 11)

Furthermore, the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990 guarantees everyone: Freedom of Thought, Conscience, and Religion.
This includes the right to freedom of thought, conscience, religion, and belief,
INCLUDING THE RIGHT TO ADOPT AND HOLD OPINIONS WITHOUT INTERFERENCE (Section 1)

Photo: pixabay.com

Gardening

Using Neem in your garden & elsewhere (Wally Richards)

August 27, 2022 Pam Vernon Leave a comment

Azadirachta indica, commonly known as Neem, nimtree or Indian lilac, is a tree in the mahogany family Meliaceae.

It is one of two species in the genus Azadirachta, and is native to the Indian subcontinent and most of the countries in Africa. It is typically grown in tropical and semi-tropical regions.

Each year the tree flowers and produces fruit or kernels which are the seeds of the tree.

These are harvested and cold pressed to extract the Neem Oil which is used for many things including as an insecticide and for medical uses.

If the kernels are press only once then the Neem Cake will be dark in colour and have a good Neem smell.

If they are cold pressed more than once to extract more oil then they will be light brown in colour and not have much smell which means they will not any where near effective as the dark Neem Granules/Powder;.

The crushed residue is called Neem Cake in India which my company Garden Enterprises import in container loads into NZ for gardeners to use.

Before it is shipped the Neem cake is dried then screened to obtain to particle sizes which we call Wallys Neem Tree Powder being uniform particles 1-3mm in size.

Then there are the larger particles we call Wallys Neem Tree Granules which vary from 1mm to about 50mm in size.

Both are the same thing it is just the size of the particles that determine what we call them.

Likewise either can be used to do most gardening tasks that Neem Cake can be used for but each has its special tasks for applications.

Firstly lets talk about Neem Tree Powder, lovely to work with, easy to handle and far better to use for some applications than the Neem Tree Granules.

For instance when planting seeds or seedlings a little of the powder can be sprinkled with the seeds or put into a seedling’s planting hole.

It is a must to prevent carrot fly damage; you sprinkle the powder along the furrow with the seeds at sowing time.

Later when the carrots have germinated and have tops of foliage about 3-4cm tall you then side dress the row with the powder.

By doing this most gardeners have found little or no damage to the carrots at harvest time.

The Neem Tree Powder is ideal for treating grass grubs in lawns if used when the grubs are near the soil surface. For most that would be in the autumn after the autumn rains have moistened up the soil.

By cutting out squares of turf and examining the clods will let you see if there are grubs near the surface, if so then treat those areas where there are several grubs per square foot.

Sprinkle the Neem Tree Powder over a freshly mowed lawn and water in to settle the powder onto the soil.

If you have a roller then roll to press the powder into the moist soil.

If not then either lift the height of your rotary mower by a notch or two before you mow again or leave the catcher off so that powder picked up while mowing will be put back onto the lawn. Only applicable for two or three mowings after application of the Neem Powder.

Where you apply the powder on the lawn you may notice after a couple of weeks that those areas are looking better than where it was not used.

This is a good indication that you have root nematodes in the roots of your grasses and they are sucking the vigor out of your lawn. So if this is the case then you know to treat the rest of your lawn.

Neem Tree Powder is also ideal to place a small sprinkling on top of the growing medium of your container plants to eradicate root mealy bugs in the roots. Out side containers it does not matter so much as the powder will get molds when it breaks down which is normal; but indoors it will look unsightly so cover the powder with a little more growing medium.

Wallys Neem Tree Granules being bigger in size means they will last much longer slowly breaking down.

This makes them great to use on the soil of more established plants such as trees, shrubs and roses.

I have had a few gardeners tell me they used them in the root zone of their roses and significantly reduced problems of pests and diseases.

We have found them magic placed on the soil under citrus trees from the trunk to the drip line..

Within a period of about 6-8 weeks all insect pests on or in the tree are gone including whitefly, scale borer and mealy bugs.

At the beginning of the season when you plant up your glasshouse with tomatoes and other plants put some Neem Tree Powder in the planting holes and Neem Tree Granules on top of the growing medium (soil or containers) Many reports have said that in its self has solved most of their problems with whitefly in the glasshouse.

The reason I believe is that the smell of the granules disguises the smell of the plants and hence insects pests flying by don’t know that there are host plants nearby.

Disguising the smell of plants so that insects do not know that they are there is a great easy control.

It is the first line of defense against codlin and guava moth damage. You hide the tree when its fruiting.

The time to use the granules is after the fruit has formed on the tree and is about halfway to maturity.

Sprinkle the Neem Tree Granules under the tree from trunk to drip line.

Next make up some small bags using old curtain netting which you will place some granules in and the hang in the tree about your height. Hang around the tree 4 to 6 bags.

When the moths are flying at night looking for where to lay their eggs from the smell of the fruit they will fly on by as can not smell the fruit because of the Neem Granule’s smell that overrides the fruit smell.

Simple and very effective in greatly reducing the damage to your crop.

In regards to using Neem Tree Granules on the soil under plants you are likely to find they work better on some types if plants than on others.

I found on brassica such as cabbage that powder in the planting hole and granules on the soil meant that caterpillars never got established or caused much damage.

A few months ago a lady gardener from India told me that she soaks Neem Tree Granules in a bucket of water (about a cup full) for a couple of weeks stirring occasionally.

Then she takes the water and sprays or pours over her roses late in the afternoon.

According to her it keeps the pests and diseases under control.

Wallys Neem Tree Powder and Granules are great gardening aids and available in sizes in 1 kilo, 3 kilo and 20 kilo bags.

Problems ring me at 0800 466464
Email wallyjr@gardenews.co.nz
Web site www.gardenews.co.nz

1The right not to be deprived of life except in accordance with fundamental justice (Section 8)

2The right not to be subjected to torture or to cruel, degrading, or disproportionately severe treatment or punishment (Section 9)

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Gardening

Tips for Planting plants (Wally Richards)

August 10, 2022 Pam Vernon 3 Comments

Gardeners are buying and planting plants now for the coming season.

This may range from seedlings of vegetables, annual flowering plants, fruiting plants and ornamental shrubs and trees.

There are a number of traps and tips which if known will make for a more successful growing season and thus more pleasure for yourself.

Lets start off with seedlings which will likely come in cell packs (each plant has its own little growth space with normally 6 cells to a pack.)

Then there is the punnets where a number of seedlings share the same growing area.

The first thing to do when looking for vegetable seedlings to grow is to see how old the plants are?

If they are on the large size in their cell/punnet then give them a miss as more than likely they have been stressed and may go to seed a couple of months after you plant them. A total waste of time and garden space.

This does not apply to flowering/fruiting vegetables such as tomato, capsicum etc as the bigger they are the further advanced they are to maturity the better.

It applies to brassicas, lettuce and such like.

Also don’t be silly enough to buy root crops in punnets such as beetroot, onions, carrots, parsnips, spring onions as they will never be any where near as good as the ones you grow from seed, planted where they will mature.

Big seeds such as beans, pumpkin should also only be grown directly from seed.

The results will be ten times better than transplants which for crops such as carrots are laughable as they will never become a nice specimen if they were grown from transplants.

The secret to seed growing in an area that they will mature in; is that they get their initial tap root or roots out and those roots do not get disturbed by transplanting.

With the likes of carrots either buy the seed that is on a seed tape or later on thin out the crop which gives you some baby carrots for salads.

I look for the younger smaller plants that are likely the freshest ones from the growers nursery.

These will likely have been kept moist in their growing medium and hence stress free.

Even if they are a bit too small to transplant that is ok; you can grow them on outside in a sheltered, sunny spot. While they are getting bigger you do not want to over water them or let them dry out.

Over watering makes them soft, under watering can lead to stress.

If you can pick the time and day that you plant out, best time is before rain or later in the day when the sun is going down.

If you are really smart you spray any plants you are going to transplant a few days before disturbing them with a spray of Vaporgard and Magic Botanic Liquid combined. (Spray for total coverage)

How many of you have planted out seedlings to see them lay down for several days on the soil till they pick them selves up and start to show growth? We have all experienced that I am sure.

Well the few days before transplanting spray of Vaporgard means that moisture loss through the foliage at transplant time is minimal and the seedlings sit up like little soldiers and start growing immediately.

This is very important: Before you try to remove the seedlings from their punnet or cell pack you plunge it into a bucket of water and watch them bubble.

This removes all air from the growing medium and also gives the seedlings a nice drink.

You then carefully tap out the seedlings without damaging the foliage.

They should, being so wet, slide out nicely.

Next we inspect the foliage for any pest insects or eggs.

In some cases you may have several seedlings in a cell pack or punnet that have their roots intertwined with each other.

You have two options you can plant the plug with more than one seedling and in a couple of weeks time cut the smaller ones off at soil level allowing the best fellow to grow to maturity.

Or in your bucket of water you can carefully separate the seedlings and have a lot more to plant out.

Down in; under water, they will tease out and separate nicely with minimal root disturbance.

But now maybe you have more seedlings than you need for one crop and one harvest.

No problem you put all the extra seedlings to]gether in a clump and and plant them it the garden.

Being in a clump they will not grow much but will hold so that in say a couple of weeks you can lift, divide under water and plant a second crop. (An old trick which I have held surplus for several weeks in that manner)

Soil preparation is important unless you do what I do.

Clear the area of weeds and then sprinkle what goodies you like to use over the area such as animal manures, sheep pellets, blood & bone, Ocean Solids, Wallys Unlocking your Soil, BioPhos and Wallys Calcium and Health.

Now spread a layer of purchased compost over the area to the depth of 3-4 cm.

I prefer Daltons compost as it is herbicide free and nice to work with.

Into this layer you can plant your seeds or seedlings.

Spacing is important so you do not have over crowding.

Keep moist with daily light waterings and spray the plants with Magic Botanic Liquid (MBL) each week.

Lets upscale to plants such as shrubs, vines and trees which once again you are either buying in a pot or plastic bag.

Follow the advise as for the seedlings but when you remove the plant from its grow container have a good look at the root system.

If the plant has been in the container for a while the roots will have filled the container and spiraled around the base of it.

If left like that and placed into a planting hole you may wonder months or even years later why has that plant not grown?

Simple the roots can not get out from the clump they formed in the container.

Some gardeners try to tease the roots out and that can help a little but really a waste of effort.

You take your secateurs and at the four cardinal points you cut the root spiral the depth of your blade.

Roots are like branches, you cut the end off a branch and that branch will create new branches back to the trunk.

You cut the roots and the plant makes a lot of new roots and that is what you want for growth.

It is a busy time ahead so get cracking with small plantings now followed by more each month.

Thank you for the many ‘Get Well’ emails I received in regards my virus/cold, getting better now but it does take a while. I saw on the TV channel, Al Jazeera TV News Channel that there is now good evidence that America released the initial Corona virus and have also done the same with the Monkey Pox virus.

Problems ring me at 0800 466464
Email wallyjr@gardenews.co.nz
Web site www.gardenews.co.nz

1The right not to be deprived of life except in accordance with fundamental justice (Section 8)

2The right not to be subjected to torture or to cruel, degrading, or disproportionately severe treatment or punishment (Section 9)

Gardening, News

GARDENING: THE IMPORTANCE OF CALCIUM IN YOUR SOIL (Wally Richards)

July 31, 2022 Pam Vernon Leave a comment

Calcium (garden lime) is a very basic mineral that is often overlooked by gardeners.

Kiwi gardeners in the past would dig over their vegetable garden at the beginning of winter after the last crops had been harvested.

The soil would be turned to the depth of one and a half to two spade depths, bringing the subsoil to the surface and then left in unbroken as mounds for frosts to work on.

Over these clods of soil a good coating of garden lime would be applied making it look like it had snowed after application.

The idea was to bring up from the subsoil minerals to the surface. Weeds would be buried underneath to compost down and the soil would be exposed to the elements as the lime would be washed in.

In spring these clods would break up with a light touch of the hoe turning the garden into a lovely fine tilth of healthy soil. Potatoes, brassicas and other vegetables would be

planted to not only feed the family as they were harvested but also to store and preserve surpluses for the coming winter.

Life was hard but very rewarding; it was a different world.

The principals of liming our vegetable gardens has not changed even if this practice is too often neglected these days.

I was talking to a keen gardener on the phone this week who explained to me that he was gardening naturally (without the use of chemicals) and he had felt that the results were not as good as he would have liked.

So last season he gave the garden a good dose of gypsum (calcium & sulphur) and the improvement of the crops was really noticeable. Even his dad (an old, very experienced gardener) remarked that he had finally got things right.

Getting things right can be as simple as giving your gardens a good dose of a fast acting lime.

I say fast acting because not all limes are equal in the time frame that they can be of benefit to the soil.

Some garden limes come from lime stone that can take up to 10 years to become soluble and useful in the soil.

That is like putting your money in the bank and having to wait 10 years to get any interest.

On the other hand soft limes start working for you immediately on application.

Lime sweetens the soil as we say which means it lifts the pH to be more alkaline.

NZ soils over time become more and more acidic because of our rain fall, these days likely even quicker because of pollution.

All our beneficial friends in the soil require calcium to thrive, as one source explained it; calcium is like the coal that feeds the furnace, calcium feeds the soil life making for great gardening.

Acidic soil becomes anaerobic and breeds the microbes you do not want, called pathogens or diseases.

The soil has the same principals as our own bodies, if we become acidic inside we can become sick and diseases such as cancers can thrive. If we keep our internal body alkaline then we will be much better off.

Soil pathogens can be suppressed by using Terracin followed by applications of Mycorrcin.

There maybe minerals in the soil that plants need but cant take up because of the lack of calcium.

In plants calcium is part of cell walls and membranes; it controls movement in and out of cells, reacts with waste products and neutralizes toxic materials.

Calcium activates many enzyme systems, it improves microbial activity and it enhances uptake of other nutrients.

It is essential for cell division as well as increasing cell density, and improves texture (crunch) of crops.

Calcium is critical for balancing excess nitrogen as well as disease suppression.

Having the correct amount of calcium in the soil will require less nitrogen.

The calcium will loosen the soil and make more nitrogen available.

Lack of sufficient calcium will result in the following plant disorders;

Necrosis at the tips and margins of young leaves, bulb and fruit abnormalities, (such as blossom end rot in tomatoes), deformation of affected leaves, highly branched, short, brown root systems, severe, stunted growth, and general chlorosis.

It must be remembered that these problems are caused by an inadequate supply of calcium to the affected tissues.

These deficiencies can even occur when the soil appears to have an adequate presence of calcium.

A gardening product is now available called Wallys Calcium And Health which comprises of a fast acting calcium along with important elements for your health and the health of your plants.

Calcium & Health contains fast attacking lime, magnesium, selenium, boron, sulphur, potash and phosphate in a balanced ratio for your gardens.

Using this new product on your food crops is going to help ensure you obtain these essential elements in your diet.

A number of gardeners are concerned about their bodies not obtaining elements such as selenium from the vegetables and fruit they grow.

By applying Calcium & Health to your gardens will help increase the goodness and nutritional values of your home grown diet.

Used at 60 grams per square M (scoop provided is 60 grams) or as I like to do is place a small amount into the planting hole of seedlings.

Avoid using the 60 grams around acid loving plants as it does increase the pH but about 20 grams will be of benefit without interfering with the pH to affect the plants.

I also recommend you using gypsum and dolomite in your gardens as well; these later two can be used around acid loving plants as they are pH neutral.

The important aspect to remember is that calcium is vitally important to the health of your plants and soil.

Every plant needs calcium to grow. Once fixed, calcium is not mobile in the plant.

It is an important constituent of cell walls and can only be supplied in the xylem sap.

Therefore, if the plant runs out of a supply of calcium, it cannot re-mobilize calcium from older tissues.

If transpiration is reduced for any reason, the calcium supply to growing tissues will rapidly become inadequate.

Without adequate amounts of calcium, plants experience a variety of problems as our gardening friend found out at the beginning of this article.

Phone 0800 466464
Garden Pages and News at www.gardenews.co.nz
Shar Pei pages at www.sharpei.co.nz
Mail Order products at www.0800466464.co.nz

Photo: Goumbik @ pixabay.com

Food, Gardening

Dealing with ‘wet feet’ in your garden (Wally Richards)

July 26, 2022 Pam Vernon Leave a comment

Recently I have been asked why some plants (and in particular citrus trees) are loosing leaves and look like dying?

The problem is root roots and any plants, shrubs or trees that can not have their roots wet for any length of time will likely die unless some remedial action is taken during wet times..

In a few cases I have been told that a citrus tree has been happy where it is for several years and now suddenly it is suffering.

The reason is likely a change in the flow of rain water which has made the root zone much wetter than in the past.

Maybe a shed was build nearby, maybe a concrete path or drive was laid which has changed the course of water and made an area wetter that in the past.

We will talk about citrus though there are a number of other plants which are not happy with wet feet.

Citrus need to be planted on very free draining soil and one way to ensure this is to make a mound of soil about 30cm tall and plant into the mound.

One of the locations I used to live at was so wet in winter that it was a lake a foot deep .

Initially I planted in the back yard some specimens that would take up the excessive water one of which was a twisted willow.

To grow my citrus trees I cut 200 litre plastic drums in half and made some large drainage holes in the base and on the sides near the base.

I then partly buried the container into the soil.

This was to help stabilize the tree in wind so they did not blow over.

Well what happened is the roots found their way out through the holes in the bottom/sides and the citrus really took off.

In winter they were sitting in a lake of water happy as Larry with a good part of their root system above the water.

This could be a method you could use if you have a very wet section.

There is another advantage to this and that is if you move house you can with a bit of effort dig the drums out of the soil cut the extended roots and take them with you to the next location.

I have citrus than have now lived in three different locations.

With the amount of rain in many locations there could be a chance your citrus are suffering so best to check.

Yellow leaves and leaf drop are a good indication it might be wet under foot.

There is an easy way to help over come the wet and allow the soil to dry out quicker.

Take a spade and just beyond the drip line and dig a trench about one and a half spades deep.

This allows the water to flow into the ditch and quickly evaporate with sun and wind.

A big problem this time of the year is mulches over gardens and around plants.

Mulches are for keeping moisture trapped in the dry times.

In wet times they are deadly.

So if you have bark gardens, weedmat or other covers over the soil for moisture retention you need to keep an eye on the plants growing there.

If they are starting to look poorly then you may be best to remove the mulch and let the soil breathe.

You can help speed up the recovery of any plants suffering from wet feet by spraying the foliage with Perkfection at the 7 mil rate.

A month later at the 5 mil rate this will help the plant generate new roots and overcome root rots.

Winter time is also a hard time for indoor plants and losses can occur if the growing medium is too wet.

House plants do not need much water at this time and if they are sitting in a saucer that is full of water you may have a problem.

There is a simple test you can use to determine how wet or dry a container plant is.

Lift the container and if it feels very light then it needs a small drink.

If heavy forget it and check a week later.

There can be a problem also where the mix has become so dry that when you water it does not wet the mix but flows out the drainage holes.

The plant gets only a little drink but not enough.

To overcome this add some dish washing liquid to a container of warm water and water the soapy mix over the growing medium.

This breaks the surface tension and allows the soapy water to penetrate.

Next time you water the water will stay there and not run out.

Another way of doing this in summer (not now) is to plunge the container into a tub of water and watch it bubble.

When it stops bubbling it is soaked thoroughly and you lift to drain.

Watering is an art which takes a lot of thought to get it right all the time.

EARLY BIRD LAST DAYS

Problems ring me at 0800 466464
Email wallyjr@gardenews.co.nz
Web site www.gardenews.co.nz

Phone 0800 466464
Garden Pages and News at www.gardenews.co.nz
Shar Pei pages at www.sharpei.co.nz
Mail Order products at www.0800466464.co.nz

Food, Gardening

7 Edible Plants for the Bog: Good Eats That Grow in Wet Soil

July 24, 2022 Pam Vernon Leave a comment

Cranberries, taro, day lilies, mint, duck potato and more ….

From onegreenplanet.org

A bog, technically, is a wetland created from freshwater and an abundance of organic matter. Bogs are soft and spongy, characteristically found in cooler climates, with the largest bog being in Siberia. They can be formed in poorly draining basins, from lakes overrun with dense plant growth, or along the flattest floodplains of streams. They can take hundreds of years to form. It’s not these bogs we’ll be growing food in, though they could work.

The bog we are referring to here is that space in a suburban lawn or rural plot where the water tends to stand after rain, the patch that never seems to completely dry out. These spots might seem horrible places for putting in gardens, but with the right plants, it’s possible to make “bogs” productive, beautiful settings. Rather than filling them in, we can take advantage of the moisture and grow some special, and especially delicious, plants.

READ AT THE LINK

ahttps://www.onegreenplanet.org/lifestyle/7-edible-plants-for-the-bog-good-eats-that-grow-in-wet-soil/?utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.page&utm_campaign=postfity&utm_content=postfityd34f1

Environmental Health Watch NZ

Category Archives: Gardening

Pollination in your garden (Wally Richards)

Surprising facts (and cover up) about copper (Wally Richards)

Iron or Copper Equipment in Farming In the 1930s

PLANTS AND YOUR HEALTH (Wally Richards)

TIME TO PLANT FOR WINTER (Wally Richards)

Time to deal to those garden pests (Special offers – Wally Richards)

How to grow potatoes in buckets for beginners

A Christmas message from Wally Richards

POLLINATING FLOWERS OF FRUITING PLANTS (Wally Richards)

GROWING WOES IN THE GARDEN (Wally Richards

December Gardening (Wally Richards)

ENCOURAGING CHILDREN TO GARDEN

No dig garden using cardboard (Wally Richards)

Dealing with pests in your lawn (Wally Richards)

Some useful gardening tips (Wally Richards)

Psyllids in your garden and how to deal with them (Wally Richards)

Phosphorous for your garden (Wally Richards)

Spring in the garden: things we might miss or forget (Wally Richards)

Your Plants’ Natural Immunity (Wally Richards)

More tips on beating those pests in your garden (Wally Richards)

COMING UP ROSES (Wally Richards)

USDA is tracking community gardens! Red flag

September gardening in NZ (Wally Richards)

Alternative ways to defeat those weeds (Wally Richards)

GERMINATING SEEDS (Wally Richards)

Tomato Time (Wally Richards)

Using Neem in your garden & elsewhere (Wally Richards)

Tips for Planting plants (Wally Richards)

GARDENING: THE IMPORTANCE OF CALCIUM IN YOUR SOIL (Wally Richards)

Dealing with ‘wet feet’ in your garden (Wally Richards)

7 Edible Plants for the Bog: Good Eats That Grow in Wet Soil

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Watching our environment … our health … and corporations … exposing lies and corruption