Day: June 9, 2002

Sunday, Jun. 09, 2002 – 10:38 p.m.

2002-06-09 10:38

Search Continues

My search for the Neem Oil concentrate has so far been unsuccessful. I have tried two Lowes, two Walmarts, three Ace Hardwares, two Targets, Home Depot, and three different garden supply places. I may have to order it over the Internet. I did call the manufacturer and spoke to a nice lady (it was she who suggested checking Target, Lowes and Ace Hardware). I have found other products by Green Light in all of these places but they just don’t seem to carry what I am looking for. I have sent an email to several of the RRS folk seeing if they know of a place to get the stuff as well as sending an email to the manufacturer to see if they can give me an idea of who might carry around here. When I talked with the nice lady, she suggested that if I didn’t find it in the different places, an email could be sent to the local sales rep to see if he had any customers for the products in the area. I am still waiting to see.

I did find a different product called Fruit Tree Spray by Bonide. It contains a different mix of several pesticides including Captan (the fungicide I tried to use several weeks ago) and Carbaryl (Sevin… good against Japanese Beetles but also kills good bugs like bees.) I used this new stuff to spray on Saturday morning and it seem to work pretty well. I now know that I need to mix up about 1.5 gallons when I use it. I initially mixed up 1 gallon in the sprayer and got through about 3/4 of the garden so I ended up having to mix an additional 1/2 gallon to finish off the spray program. This should be effective against the mildew on the Rosa Mundi as well as the blackspot.

Busy Saturday

Yesterday was a busy day! I got up early so I could get the spraying done and then I went off to help Corwyn & Katherine move. We got the truck loaded and over to the new house. It would have been easier if the house 4 doors down the street (but on the other side) had not been having an auction. That made finding parking a pain. Rick & Marnie’s new house is so…. 70’s. You should see the wallpaper in the bathrooms! The house is a nice size (4 bedroom 3 bath) a nice size living room and den plus a formal dining room, small workshop room, and a garage. The lot is a nice size but would not be good for roses without a LOT of work (not enough sun). The back yard is mostly overgrown with small trees but there is a nice patio.

We got the truck all unloaded and the other folk heading back to the old house for a second load but I had to leave so I could go home, shower, and head for Zita’s house for a surprise 25th anniversary party for Steafan and Louisa.

Well, I would have been on time… if I had not gotten as far as Holly Springs only to realize that I didn’t have the directions. Since I had never been there before, I REALLY needed the directions. So there I was, 45 minutes late, at Zita’s. It was a nice party. We sat around and ate, blew bubbles, and played bocce until dark. Then more sitting around and blowing bubbles and talking. I left about 10:30pm.

Sunday

Today, I had some very specific things that I wanted to accomplish…. and I did pretty well. First things first… I went and checked the roses for the beetles and I found them on two roses: JFK and Voodo. Yes, they found the JFK [sigh] but only 5 were on the blossoms there and I was able crush them. Voodoo had quite a number on its blooms but the were all dead! Next, I have been needing to repot a number of the small roses I had gotten recently (the order from Bridges Roses (see The Roses in an earlier entry)). I am a little upset because two of the roses that were in small pots seem to have just dried up. One of these is the rose from Richland GA. I am pretty sure that I did not underwater them… I repotted tha Richland GA rose to see if I can revive it. I ended up using almost all the potting soil I had to repot about 6 roses (2 Kitty Hawks, an Acey-Ducey, Black Jade, Gentlemans’ Agreement, and a generic grocery store red miniature). The other 5 plants were another Kitty Hawk, the three “The Fairy” plugs and another nice size miniature that I don’t remember the name of. All the post I had were about the same size as the existing pots for the two larger miniature. So, I planted one (the one who’s name I can’t remember) in Bed 4 between the Rembrant and Glowing Peace. This was kind of a blank spot anyway. The Fairy plugs went into blank spaces in Bed 3 and a spot in wildflower bed. We will see how they do in those spaces. As for the Kitty Hawk, I will get a nice blue ceramic pot for that one the next time I am at the store.

While trying decide which to plant where, I noticed that there were a number of grass sprouts in the beds. So it was time to pull weeds. When I starded, I figured I would clean up an area to plant the roses. About 1.5 hours later, I had successfully weeded beds 4, 3 and 1. It would have been nice to bring the radio out while I did this but I had originally planned to just go plant those roses which should have only taken 15 minutes or so.

After lunch, my task (before heading for the Baronial Meeting) was to check the cabin tent to make sure it had not rotted. It was fine so the next thing is to figure out how to rig a fly over it (for rain and shade). That is going to take some planning….

I also measure the inside and if I take the queen camp bed/futon, it will fill most of the tent so I am going to have to figure something else. Looks like I am making myself a bed before Pennsic!

Ok… it is again late so I am going to leave it here for tonight…