Daughter and I released the living ladybugs this evening. She had fun as they ran on her arms and tickled her. There were only about 500 or 600 still living from what I could tell. Still waiting for the second shipment to arrive.

Yesterday we went to Itz Pizza. That was after the ex had taken her to Golfernoggins in the morning. So she had a good final weekend of her summer vacation. Starts school on Tue.

The last strawberry plant is dead. Nursed it for months and it was finally reaching a decent size. I had it in a pot on top of the doghouse until a couple of days ago. Then I placed the pot on the ground near the potted tomatoes so it would get more sun. Today, the dog tore the plant apart. Dug it out of the pot.

I've tolerated her crapping all over the yard, digging holes 2-3 feet deep, running over the tops of small plants. Several good size pumpkin plants have been trampled to death by her, even when bracketed by PVC stakes. Now she's tied up again and will remain so until fall. Possibly winter. As it is, I'm rethinking my attitude on dog runs.

Back to the ladybugs. Been doing the math on beneficial insects. I've read that one ladybug can eat up to 50 aphids a day. If we managed to release 1000 total, they may eat up to 50,000 aphids a day. Being optimistic that the second shipment arrives alive (translation- UPS doesn manage to kill them all), the grand total will be 10,000 released. They could eat as many as 1/2 million aphids a day!

Toss in mantises and lacewings and most of the damaging insects should be gone in a couple of weeks. Except maybe slugs and snails. May need some nematodes to control those. Nematodes are small, aggressive, carnivorous snails which attack larger snails and slugs that eat plants (like pumpkins). Though I may look up what list of pests mantises and lacewings will control.

Garden is still suffering from the weather. Not so much heat but dryness. It actually gets much hotter in Texas and things still grow much better there than here. However, central and south Texas isn't this dry. Between weather, bugs and the dog, the garden has been a near complete failure so far this year. Of course, the year and even the growing season isn't over yet.

Treated with more calcium and fertilizer this evening. Though I won't mix them together again. The mixture foamed up because of the contrast of acidity. Calcium is quite alkaline. The good part of this is that the acidity of the fertilizer probably made the calcium more available for immediate plant uptake. Hopefully. May know tomorrow.Daughter and I released the living ladybugs this evening. She had fun as they ran on her arms and tickled her. There were only about 500 or 600 still living from what I could tell. Still waiting for the second shipment to arrive.

Yesterday we went to Itz Pizza. That was after the ex had taken her to Golfernoggins in the morning. So she had a good final weekend of her summer vacation. Starts school on Tue.

The last strawberry plant is dead. Nursed it for months and it was finally reaching a decent size. I had it in a pot on top of the doghouse until a couple of days ago. Then I placed the pot on the ground near the potted tomatoes so it would get more sun. Today, the dog tore the plant apart. Dug it out of the pot.

I've tolerated her crapping all over the yard, digging holes 2-3 feet deep, running over the tops of small plants. Several good size pumpkin plants have been trampled to death by her, even when bracketed by PVC stakes. Now she's tied up again and will remain so until fall. Possibly winter. As it is, I'm rethinking my attitude on dog runs.

Back to the ladybugs. Been doing the math on beneficial insects. I've read that one ladybug can eat up to 50 aphids a day. If we managed to release 1000 total, they may eat up to 50,000 aphids a day. Being optimistic that the second shipment arrives alive (translation- UPS doesn manage to kill them all), the grand total will be 10,000 released. They could eat as many as 1/2 million aphids a day!

Toss in mantises and lacewings and most of the damaging insects should be gone in a couple of weeks. Except maybe slugs and snails. May need some nematodes to control those. Nematodes are small, aggressive, carnivorous snails which attack larger snails and slugs that eat plants (like pumpkins). Though I may look up what list of pests mantises and lacewings will control.

Garden is still suffering from the weather. Not so much heat but dryness. It actually gets much hotter in Texas and things still grow much better there than here. However, central and south Texas isn't this dry. Between weather, bugs and the dog, the garden has been a near complete failure so far this year. Of course, the year and even the growing season isn't over yet.

Treated with more calcium and fertilizer this evening. Though I won't mix them together again. The mixture foamed up because of the contrast of acidity. Calcium is quite alkaline. The good part of this is that the acidity of the fertilizer probably made the calcium more available for immediate plant uptake. Hopefully. May know tomorrow.