Colorado Potato Beetle

Hmmm ... so my most successful seedlings this spring were my eggplants. I had so many that I gave away many in 2s and 3s to friends. I was late getting mine in the ground due to all the rain we had in June and they have struggled/been eaten/looked fairly pathetic since plating out.
Recently they have staged a comeback and have begun to look hearty, robust and flourishing. I was giving them a little TLC and weeding at the weekend when I happened to notice insect eggs under one of the leaves. Then I saw a beetle on a leaf that looked like an unshelled sunflower seed. Looked it up on bugguide.net and found out that it's a Colorado Potato beetle and the eggs were likely it's eggs. They favor plants in the nightshade family - potato, eggplant etc, lay eggs under the leaves which then hatch and devour the plant. Yikes!
I killed the beetle and eggs and went and did another check this morning to check for any more. So far so good.

Does this count as garden? Hmmm?

Before









After

We have started on renovating the screened in porch using a fab product called Screentite. Of course we have to sand, TSP, prime, paint and THEN we get to install the ScreenTite track but it is childs play compared to stapling and all that malarkey.

Eyed Click Beetle

While gardening this weekend, a large beetle landed at my feet. It was one of those beetles that you look at and think "my god, I bet that could devour my house and all of my plants". It was about 2" long, slim (rather than a fat stocky beetle) black with white speckles and two large white rings on it's front end.
I took a photo, trapped it under a flower pot, finished my gardening and went inside to try and ID it. I had it under the flower pot on the front step when I thought "if this beetle is just might eat my house maybe I should put him and the flowerpot at the end of the driveway" at least that way he'd have to walk a long way to get to my house.

This was a perfect example of the power of the internet: I googled "black beetle white circles" and found a reference to "Eyed beetle". Then I googled that and got to a great bug ID site: (http://bugguide.net/node/view/15740) and ID'd it as an Eyed Click Beetle. Then I did a little more poking around and found http://www.organicgardening.com/feature/0,7518,s1-2-9-1296,00.html. They said the following:

"But the larvae of eyed click beetles tend to leave gardens and lawns alone, preferring instead to prey on the larvae of wood borers (pests that you definitely don't want in your yard). So the next time you see one of these guys, rest assured that it won't harm you or your plants, and let it go along on its merry way."

So I went back outside and released it. I did find one other beetle in the garden this weekend with an orange rear proboscis/willy thing! which I still need to ID. This guy:

The raised bed

I also planted the raised bed. This is something, as a somewhat neophyte gardener, that I am especially proud of. I designed and built the raised bed after the original plan (4' x 1'H fire pit ring from Tractor Supply) was not available, I grew the plants that I have put in it from seed (salvia farinacea/salvia gruppenblau, achillea millefolium/yarrow colorado and gomphrea globosa/globe amaranth) and I filled the bed with leaf mould from our leaves, compost from the pile and top soil left over from digging for the temporary patio. Of course right now it looks like I am growing a harvest of popsicle sticks (my plant labels).

Moving day ...

As I looked at the asiatic lilies, that I bought thinking they were day lilies back when I knew less, towering in the front! of my border, I knew that this weekend could be only for one thing: moving day.
And so it went. I dug up and moved the asiatic lilies whilst in full bloom. Most likely not recommended at this time of the year but they were (beautiful) but annoying the hell out of me. I was careful not to snap the stems and they moved very easily into the back garden.
The front border immediately looked better for it's loss but today I planted the Speedwell (Sunny Blue Border) and the white Salvia (Snowhill) that I scored at Hollandia - 10 perennials for $30 plus 20 off this w/e. The BBG class has really helped restrain my impulse plant buying but I'm afraid we could not resist a Lace Bluecap Hydrangea. I was actually looking for a few hydrangeas for some winter structure in the borders.
I also moved some smaller asiatic lilies to in front of the a/c unit.
I moved some sedum and artemesia to make a space for the hydrangea - at the end of the driveway border. Fingers crossed that the deer do not snack on it, at least until I get some cuttings from it.
I planted out the remaining lupine seedlings so that I will have a mass of them in the front border - they and the lupine really got clobbered by the month of wet that we just had.

This weekend has been two days of gorgeous sunshine - 70s-80s temps - and the garden has to be loving it after all of June's rains.
Once some of the coneflowers in the front (echinacea purpurea? etc) have died off I need to move them 3-4ft further back in the front bed. They are towering 3-4ft high now. Moving them back will make way for some continuation of something else I have out there (most likely salvia or coreopsis).