Bugs, especially black flies, have been attacking the tomato plants ever since they were seedlings in my aunt's garden

For some odd reason there are large populations of black flies underneath the leaves yet these plants in my garden have been spared. What's going on?!

Giant strawberry

Lettuce seedlings

Teeny tiny strawberry

Most of the ripening strawberries in the windowsill pot are the size of my thumb

Buttercrunch patch

I'm trying my hardest to get them lined up straight but it's nearly impossibly - it's like they move when I'm not looking! I wonder how other gardeners do it.

Solving vege patch problems

Ashley just went upstairs for a nap, providing me with a good opportunity to After-bite my five itchy mosquito bites and do some much needed research.

New garden plan:
Trying out a new mix of SFG and conventional method consisting of rows of vegetables contained in tight spaces. For example, three lettuce heads in every 12'' x 24'' area and one eggplant/pepper/tomato in every 9'' x 9'' area.

Mini vege patch at my place

Tiny vege patch at my aunt's place

This may solve the flea beetle problem my eggplants are experiencing:
Eggplants and flea beetles
I'll probably start with the water-garlic spray and resort to growing dill everywhere if the former doesn't work well

Leaf lettuce seedlings aren't sprouting:
Need to pregerm them indoors rather than outdoors like the current batches because the greenhouse is way above the maximum germination temperature of 27 degrees Celsius.

Vandermeer Nursery Ltd

I have an unnatural obsession with gnomes and mushrooms. It's one of the reasons why I love Travelocity commercials so much. You can watch one of my favourites here. Anyhoo, this is the cutest collection of gnomes I've encountered so far located in Ajax, Ontario. It was a long way from home, but completely worth the drive!

Pointy hats are pointy.

The nursery was one of the biggest I've ever visited with rows after rows of lovely plants.

Along with a good looking bunch of vegetables.

There was even a water section filled with fishes. Looks pretty crowded in there!

The life and times of my buttercrunch lettuce

Look at them thrive in the outdoor mystery pot of soil

They always become container bound real fast with their ever growing long, lanky roots

Container to field buttercrunches doing quite well, which is pretty surprising because I did not expect them to survive in the clayie soil. A bit of wilting at first, but they quickly recovered overnight. I added a lot more manure and garden soil to the home of the second batch of buttercrunches, and these little guys are getting super fat fast

I got too excited and snipped this one off before it got the chance to fully develop its heart. I kind of regret it, but not really >:D the leaves were crispy and juicy just the way they were meant to be. I can't be any prouder of my babies - just look at the size of that thing!

Magnolia scale infestation

After ten years of loving care our magnolia tree has encountered its first (and probably last) problem: magnolia scale. It looks like the insects are eating our tree live.

Pennstat Pest Management
Ohio University Factsheet

Goodbye, prettiful tree

R.I.P you'll be missed

Fungi in my aunt's backyard

Someone stepped on them. Boo

RetardBugs are back

I haven't seen these dumb little june bugs in ages! Seeing this one made me reminisce the good old times when they were in abundance, making their way through the fireplace and heading straight for our lights "fizzzzzzz" and then making the entire house smell like burnt toast. Yum