Lawns on cars!
They can’t be serious!
Check out the video:
Scarecrow Post Coming Soon!
Blog posts detailing the use of the motion activated scarecrow will be added soon!
Check out this video:
Aerogarden Stories Coming Soon!
Do not forget to bookmark the OCDGardener.com website! There will soon be blog posts detailing the experience of using the AeroGarden for indoor seed starting and growing herbs.
Check out the video below:
Introducing OCDG Minion
Every obsessive compulsive gardener should have a minion or two for watering assistance, heavy lifting, etc.
For those unfamiliar with the term “minion”, Wikipedia defines “minion” as:
A minion is a follower devoted to serving his master relentlessly.
Pests
Pests:
Anything which gets in the way of a successful harvest or bloom.
*As an OCD gardener, you view deer as “prairie rats” and “mortal enemies.” Your yard has become just a deer buffet.
*Drive 600 miles to stand in front of a renowned nursery’s “Deer Resistant” plants table, only to say “Are they kidding?” “Nope.” “Really?” “No way!” You question your sanity, and wonder if your deer are genetic mutations. You know, not your average deer, but zombie deer. You argue these plants aren’t “deer resistant” at all and walk away in disgust. You still spend $200.
*You have run into the yard barely clothed to brandish kitchen utensils at invaders.
I have tried many preparations, with varying results.
Plantskydd
Bobbex-R Repellent
Herb sprinkle
Irish Spring
Woodpeckers:
The hairy woodpecker is a true villain. That laugh of Woody’s? Demonic. Truly, this bird is the devil. If you catch a woodpecker and confront him, he merely hops around to the opposite side of the branch. Failing to evade you, he simply hops to the next highest branch. Throwing the handy pinecones doesn’t work; their trajectory rarely results in a direct hit. More laughing from the woodpecker.
Perhaps a flamethrower? Grenade launcher? My biggest pine tree is riddled with holes! If this pine tree dies due to the swiss-cheesing it receives from that blasted woodpecker, 80 years of tree goes down the drain. Not to mention, that will leave an incredible hole in my landscape. Since all woodpeckers are protected by the Migratory Bird Act, I can’t kill it. Besides, I’m a pacifist. So let the games begin.
Irritape – as of day 3, it seems to work. Unfortunately, the 30 mile per hour winds just stripped it from the tree. When I retrieve it, we will start the clock over.
Owl with swivel head – This is cool, and I’ve actually scared myself a couple of times noticing it out of the corner of my eye perched on the deck rail. However, the only thing it seems to have done is keep the woodpecker from pecking the deck rail on which it is perched. Two months in….
Grasshoppers: The scourge of the plains! I usually start with NoLo Bait. This is a biological control, nosema locustae, which infects grasshoppers and turns them into cannibals. Importantly, this is not harmful to the bluebirds who frequent my yard.
Seeds
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- Aerogarden tomato seeds, day 1
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- Aerogarden salad mix, day 7
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- Aerogarden-started tomatoes versus seed flat started annuals
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- Jiffy seed starting mix versus Miracle-gro seed mix
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- Miracle-gro versus Jiffy seed starting flats
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- side by side Jiffy versus Miracle-gro seed starting flats after one month
Seeds:
The OCD gardener can’t stand bare spots. In our zeal to bend the earth to our will, we go to great lengths to coax more from our gardens. In years past, faced with a surplus of annual or perennial seeds, I have actually attempted the “throw-it-down-and-see-what-grows” approach. Seeds are cheaper than bedding plants, but prove dicey in terms of quality of yield. I love getting various seed catalogs in the mail. Those colorful booklets make January less daunting. I go completely crazy marking my wish list; think the little kid with the Sears catalog circling potential presents. I want one of everything. It always looks so good on the page!
For annuals this year, I tried to buy as cheaply as possible. I spent considerable time analyzing the Proven Winners website, and I downloaded their Idea Books. You can’t buy Proven Winners seeds. You can only get those as actual plants at licensed retailers, which would cost me an arm and a leg. So I decided to try seeds to see how close I could get to the real things.
Amazon sells lots of seeds, but the selection is fairly narrow. For instance, they market an amazing bunch of petunia seeds which are all the kinds my grandma grew. I want the double varieties, the unusual hues, the “super-tunia” kinds, which are only available from more exclusive retailers. From Park Seed Co., I ordered snapdragons, pansies, osteospermum, diascia, bacopa and verbena varieties. I tried to stick to stuff which survives despite my best efforts to kill it.
I purchased my vegetable seeds from Territorial Seed Company. They have a lot of heirloom varieties, which I have found taste far better than the average hybrids. Call me picky, but if I go to Herculean efforts to grow this stuff, I better love it.
Oddly, I found myself woefully unprepared for the quantity description. Thinking I’d start with a small quantity of some interesting varieties, I was surprised. I’m used to just grabbing a packet of seeds from the hardware store or WalMart. I had no idea what a gram or a quarter gram or eighth gram looks like. Turns out, 1/8 of a gram of tomato seeds is about ten seeds, depending on the size of the fruit. Yikes. Small quantities of petunia seeds, which look like dust, are “pelleted.” This means they are bound up in some plantable medium to make them easier to see and sow. So the 5000 seed packet of Bacopa was quite a contrast to the 15 seeds of osteospermum.
Seed Starting:
This year I decided to try a more scientific approach to seed starting. I kept track of where, what kinds, quantity and cost of all seeds and equipment. I also made this a kind of science fair project.
March 6: I set out two identical plastic seed trays. Both had 5 Jiffy Peat Pots (the ten-cell kind). One I filled with Jiffy Soilless Seed Starting Mix, the other I filled with Miracle-Gro Seed Starting mix.
Everybody was covered with plastic and placed on a 20 by 20 seedling heat mat in my basement. My basement usually hovers between 57 and 63 degrees, with an east and south window. Sadly, the sun can’t do it all. I dampened the mix and planted the annuals in identical rows, marked with popsicle stick halves.