Based on past experience I planned on keeping my starter peas in their flats longer this year, hoping to reduce sow bug predation.
As a result, even though I’ve repotted about 75 of them, they have become so leggy that I had to transplant them yesterday and, given our rainy weather, I am keeping my fingers crossed that the peas won’t get eaten again. For added insurance I sprayed the soil with Jerry Baker’s Bug and Thug Spray. (Recipe added below.) A local farmer told me that sprinklings of lime deter the bugs, but I’ll give the spray time to see if it works first.
I’m sowing a second batch of peas outside now, planning to fill up the bed with all the peas destined for the garden since it’s getting late in the season. Before I transplanted the pea bed I first dug the weeds under and let them rot, then applied compost and Solomon’s organic fertilizer and sprinkled the lot with Baker’s Bug and Thug spray. I left the bed for a week, then hoed under any further weeds before transplanting the 75 seedlings from the flats. I wanted to wait until it stopped raining but decided I might not live that long, so I just dug a trench along the trellis with a hoe and endured the deluge. At least the soil is sandy and easy to dig.
I plan on laying a length of soaker hose along the bed for when and if this wet weather finally changes. Since I sow the first batch of peas in flats indoors, I don’t bother pre-sprouting them, but the next batches should be pre-sprouted so the ones that fail to germinate don’t take up valuable garden space. In order to do that, I take a damp cloth or paper towel, lay out the peas intended for the garden, roll them up and put them into a plastic bag labelled with the date and what they are. I put the bag into a warm place for about a week, opening up the bag every day to allow fresh air to reach the peas. Once they’ve sprouted they can be sown into the garden.
Here’s Jerry Baker’s Bug and Thug Spray:
3 T. baking soda
2 T. Murphy’s oil soap
2 T. canola oil
2 T. vinegar
2 gal. warm water
Mix all ingredients together and sprinkle where needed or spray on plants until they are dripping wet. Apply in early spring when bugs and thugs are waking up. Good luck!
Please contact mary_lowther@yahoo.ca with questions and suggestions since I need all the help I can get.
