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Pests & Diseases

What’s the Deal with Flies Eating Plants?

I love gardening. I also sometimes hate gardening. Well, hate might be a strong word. But we all have those immensely frustrating moments when it seems like everything goes wrong. Roots rotting. Leaves withering. Flies eating plants. Deer eating tomatoes.

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Pests & Diseases

How to Deter Slugs and Grubs in a Vegetable Garden

In the 1939 movie, The Wizard of Oz, the protagonist, Dorothy, and her friends, the Tin Man and Scarecrow, walk through a dark forest, fearing that they may get eaten by “lions and tigers and bears, oh my!” I’m pretty sure slugs and grubs aren’t on their minds at all.  If you haven’t seen the movie, […]

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Pests & Diseases

The Best Organic DIY Insecticide for Indoor and Hydroponic Food Gardens

I love my indoor garden for several reasons, but mostly because I don’t love outdoor garden pests. Well, maybe except for those cute rabbits that I always plant a little extra for in my outdoor garden. I also don’t love using harsh chemicals on my vegetables. It’s beyond me how they can kill insects yet be perfectly benign otherwise. Granted, I’m not a chemist, and maybe I’ve watched a few too many episodes of X-Files, but I prefer the DIY insecticide approach. 

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Pests & Diseases

How to Make Eco-Friendly Slug Repellent at Home

How could something so helpless like a slug cause so much damage in your garden? You might not always know you have a slug problem right away because slugs only come around at night and when it’s cloudy and rainy. But you’ll definitely notice their damage. You’ll see holes and jagged edges on your vegetable leaves and stems. You can tell if the slug damage is fresh by how rough the edges of the holes or bite marks look.

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Pests & Diseases

10 Helpful Plants for Bug Control in Your Kitchen Garden

The joy of growing a kitchen garden in your yard is imagining the delicious recipes and meals you’ll create using your home-grown herbs and vegetables. Do you know what gets in the way of that joy? Bugs. Gross, invasive, plant-eating, vegetable-killing bugs! I’m looking at you, Tomato Hornworm! I’ll never forget the first time I grew a large crop of tomatoes. I would pop outside to check on my kitchen garden and see that some of my tomatoes had been chewed, and others were missing leaves or stems were completely bare.

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Pests & Diseases

How to Keep Deer From Eating Plants Naturally

I love deer. They’re such graceful, beautiful creatures, and I love looking out of my window and seeing them stroll through the yard. However, I also love my garden and I’m always looking for new ways to keep deer from eating plants, herbs, and fruits.  Deer are resourceful and persistent when it comes to eating […]

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Pests & Diseases

Embracing the insect invasion in the garden

By the time fall rolls around, the hostas and the roses, the kale and beets and tomatoes all show substantial insect/pest damage. They aren’t the only things in the garden that have been under attack. All summer long the slugs, beetles, aphids and other creeping crawling things have been at work. And it shows. It […]

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Pests & Diseases

How to Treat & Prevent 5 Common Vegetable Diseases

As gardeners, there’s no shortage of disappointments out there waiting to swoop in and ruin the enjoyment of your garden. Rabbits may eat your strawberries, seeds may never germinate, and your nosy neighbor might tell you all the ways he thinks you’re planting your cucumbers wrong. But vegetable diseases are on another level. 

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Pests & Diseases

The Best Garden Decoys That Actually Work to Deter Pests

I love a garden gnome as much as the next person. They’re a fun way to add some personality around the peas or some cool kitsch to the cucumbers. But when it comes to garden decoys that deter pests, they aren’t all that effective. As a matter of fact, I’m pretty sure the rabbits around my house have been taking selfies with the gnomes.

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Pests & Diseases

How to Get Rid of Wireworms in Potatoes

If you find small, dry, round holes in your tubers, look more closely, and you may discover wireworms in potatoes. Wireworms can cause significant damage in a garden, but they especially seem drawn to potatoes, carrots, and corn.  How can you tell that you have wireworms? And what should you do if you find them? […]

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