Veggie Garden Harvest & Tomato Worms

Ahhhh Saturdays.  To me Saturday means coffee in the garden, extra time to search for tomato worms, inspect strange bugs, and dote over my succulents.  Glorious.

This morning I harvested some Snap Peas that the kids started at school.  They put a paper towel in the bottom of a plastic sandwich bag, added a little water and dropped a seed in.  I was amazed at how quickly they germinated with such little sunlight.  We brought the seedlings home and planted them in the garden and they took off!  They are definitely going on my seed list for next year's garden.

I squished about eight tomato worms this morning.  Five to eight seems to be the daily average.  Since tomato worms are the same color as the leaves they can be hard to spot.  So, rather that searching for the worms, I look for their poo!

See the little black dots on that leaf?  Those are tiny tomato worm poo!  After you spot those, just look up.

Do you see him standing up on the leaf?  He knew I was looking for him so he got in his defensive stance.  When they get bigger they actually start making a clicking sound (with their teeth?).

Don't forget to shake the poo off the leaf below so you can find fresh poo the next day!

Daily Garden

Well, I failed miserably at the daily photo challenge. I'm not too broken up about it though because a new daily activity formed rather organically in April.

Will and I dream of being completely self sufficient some day. We try to implement things in our lives that either make us more self sufficient or provide an opportunity to become more self sufficient in the future.

Growing our own food is not something that is necessary right now (we can just go to the store and buy what we need for less than it takes to grow our own) but gaining the experience in doing so is invaluable.

So, this year my super awesome and amazingly talented hubby decided to test out a self-watering, raised bed garden planter.  After some research he grabbed a few ideas from some different sources and came up with his own plan for getting it done. He tweaked it a bit more and then went for it using materials that we have on hand. This is the absolutely beautiful garden that he came up with.

"Why is it so cool?", you may ask. Let me tell you!!

#1: I only have to water once a week. Yes, once a week!! I could probably go longer when the weather cools (we are hoping to use this garden year round since our winters are so mild). From what I've read, sub-irrigated planters can save up to 80% water. Love the sound of that!!

#2: No rodents snacking on my veggies. We have are big problem with squirrels and cotton tail rabbits about this time of year and I haven't seen any nibbles yet.

#3: Virtually no weeds. I pulled ONE weed (we think it came from a bird poo). We added the cover option to help with that (those criss-crossed pipes).

#4: Using the principles of Square Foot Gardening we were able to fit a lot of plants in a compact space (our garden is 4'x8').

#5: Having the planter raised makes gardening a fun task. I find myself wandering out to check on it at least a couple times a day.

I'm sure there are a bunch more reasons why sub-irrigated planters are a superior for of gardening. I just can't get enough and have begun my own small pot versions too!

I've started a Daily Garden Journal on Pinterest. If you want to see my garden grow from Day 4 (I missed day 1-3!) Click here and follow my board for daily updates.
This is what I pinned this morning: