Several interested earwigs on oil jar edges and a few already in oil! Yay!
Less yay: more earwigs eating the Peruvian ground cherry (which is farthest from the oil).
More yay: big beautiful toad patrolling the backyard prairie.
Earwig battle
A poem on current events, by Paula
Nibbling on my plants
Damned earwigs took my carrots
Let us go to war
No more diatomaceous earth, now for oil traps
I talked with a nice county extension agent today who said anything soft-bodied could be hurt by diatomaceous earth (DE) including toads, though being large and hopping they’ll be less so than a slug or earwig. But, I love my toads, so no more DE.
She did however suggest oil traps to reduce their population while I work to make the habitat less absurdly full of rotting wood (thanks past Claire for all the mulch).
They survived their first earwig night
Just a few nibbles! Maybe the diatomaceous earth is helping.
Testing summer plants in the land of earwigs
I set out some of the tomato cages today. In the raised bed with the worst earwig depredations, I put one each of poblano pepper, Rio Grande verde tomatillo, Tommy Toe tomato, and Peruvian ground cherry.
I put out these four plants to see if the earwigs attack them and if so I’ll try petroleum jelly around the stem. I have other plants of all these so if any get completely consumed it won’t be the end of the world.
There have been fewer earwigs out in that bed since I’ve started putting out diatomaceous earth. However, in the adjacent bed, they have now moved onto a lettuce that was less dusted. So, maybe it’s helping?
Baby basil and mature greens
Lettuce, spinach, and corn salad greens for salad. Thinned the window basil and used that on pizza.
Last year’s sugar snap peas and coriander
Wow, flowers the first spring!!
Super delighted and surprised to see flowers on the native currant this morning.
Plants doing cool stuff
Neat article about corn making an innovation that humans want!
Earwig prevention attempt again
I saw that the new bok choy and mizuna seeds are coming up so I tried all this diatomaceous earth again. I also put vaseline around stems of one each mizuna and bok choy as I read that can keep them from climbing too, though the seedlings are only barely 1/2″ tall so we’ll see.
