| Flowerfreak Posted on Friday, July 11, 2008 - 10:50 am: |   
 |
I KNEW she would find them!! lol |
I just read the reviews for Racquet Zapper at Amazon...
http://www.amazon.com/Racquet-Zapper/dp/B0006HGOOI
I'll see if your particular version is available here. Is yours just one layer of mesh? |
Here's one that uses two D batteries. Now to see how reputable this company is.
http://www.asseenontvguys.com/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWPROD&ProdID=130 |
Here's that last one at Amazon. Someone in the comments section says they get deer flies flying around their head, too. LOL.
http://www.amazon.com/review/product/B000FEO50W/ref=dp_top_cm_cr_acr_txt?%5 Fencoding=UTF8&showViewpoints=1 |
Since the asseenontvguys.com and plain old asseenontv.com companies sound really bad, I'd be inclined to order the model sold at Ace Hardware.
In case you're wondering how I came up with the first half of that statement...
I believe the bad reviews at the following site for asseenontv.com are true... but think the other reviews are fabricated lies posted by the company itself. LOL.
http://www.complaintsboard.com/complaints/shoppershaltcomasseenontvcom-c417 37/page/2.html
|
| Growit Posted on Friday, July 11, 2008 - 12:27 pm: |
|
  I should have mentioned that it might be good for deer fly/horsefly zapping. Perhaps easier than a gun LOL!! |
| Stormdancer Posted on Friday, July 11, 2008 - 12:34 pm: |
|
LOL...that zapper sounds great!! All of this talk about the zapper reminds me of the kids using tennis rackets to "pop" the boring bees...aka bumblebees...that would buzz around the front deck of our old house...they would keep the racket on the deck for just that purpose. When I was younger (in my teens) we had a Blue Tick Hound that would catch them...and crunch them near the back door...I'm sure he probably was stung for his efforts, but he did it on a daily basis the entire time we had him. Of course I also like Lisa's shooting idea...a girl after me own heart she is... |
That made much more sense to me than when I read
I couldn't see how anyone was using badminton and tennis racquets to fight off what I at first thought was meant to be "wild boars". LOL!! |
| Growit Posted on Friday, July 11, 2008 - 01:58 pm: |
|
No two. They crisscross the bat. It takes the two D batteries and as the review says only the tiny flies go through it. I hate to kill anything that I don't have to ('cept bunnies)but I do seem to have blood that insects love (including fleas!) If I let them all have a drink I would be a dehydrated bag of skin and bones by morning! |
July 9, 2008 (Wednesday)
It is 83 degrees (9:15 AM). Depending on which side of the house I look out, it is either hazy or sky blue. I'll take the blue.
My husband's project finally has more money, so he'll go back to work either later today or tomorrow.
Fat Rabbit has been eating lots of Crenshaw Melons and seedless watermelons lately. That is one spoiled rabbit.
~~~~~~~~
I think I forgot to mention that I removed the row covers from the pumpkins and melons yesterday... and found yet MORE AMBROSIA. Ugh! The wild pumpkins are vining and have flowers.
While I was outside this morning, I managed to snag a picture of the same sort of dragonfly creature that I saw yesterday. His body reminds me of milk glass.
Dragonfly
The Senior Prom Rose is far more hot pink than advertised and doesn't show any signs of lightening like my friend's has. It's not what either one of us expected and the smell is very faint, but it's a nice color anyway.
Heliotrope and Senior Prom Rose
The cabbage is still chugging right along, but all of the Pak Choi has bolted.
Pak Choi and Cabbage
I seem to have Papaver atlanticum coming up among my peas. I don't remember sowing any seeds of that in there, but I like it, although they are a little too similar in color to the Pompon Dahlias in the same bed.
Peas, Beans, and Atlas Poppies
I have my first Sweet Pea 'America' flower. No smell. Naturally. The only reason to have sweet peas is for the smell. *sigh*
'Winsome' Dahlia
~~~~~~~~
I did a little seed inventory, everything except the garden veggie/herb bag. Seed inventory is always a winter sport, but things are slow around here these days and I have been curious as to what I have in stock for next year since I didn't do the greatest job of indicating whether I had emptied a packet every time I sowed something. The pumpkin seed stash looks good for next year, so I don't need any more seeds in that department. Turns out I didn't really need to order the cucurbits I ordered the other day. Oh, well, one can never ever have too many cucurbits. The flower seed stash has been knocked way down. I know I'll be building it back up somewhat by saving some seeds this fall, but in general it won't be nearly the monster that it has been. I think that when the temps cool down this evening, I will go through the veggie/herb bag. It depends on how dull things get between now and then.
~~~~~~~~
Two more mama turkeys showed up in our yard, with five or more babies between them. They wandered through the new yard, then hopped up on the far rock wall and disappeared into the barnyard. At first, three of the babies hung around on this side of the rock wall. They were much bigger than the batch of babies I saw the other day, but they still seemed to be thinking, "Hey, you forgot about us! We are too wee to go over the wall." But then one got brave and flapped and scratched its way up the wall, then soon the others followed, but not nearly so gracefully as that.
July 10, 2008 (Thursday)
It is 76 degrees and sunny this morning (8:37 AM). It is so cool outside... the humidity has finally dropped and it feels almost like fall. It rained yesterday afternoon and again overnight. We had 0.3" of rain overall.
We had mosquitoes in the house last night. Their buzzing woke me up. I smacked at one that tried to bite my back, but I think I missed and it bit me anyway. I turned the lights on to hunt it down, but after several minutes of waiting for it to show itself, I gave up and headed for my son's room to check for more mosquitoes. I heard one and turned on the light. My son already had a bite just above his foot. I was so angry. After several attempts at trying to kill the mosquito, I finally managed to smack it into oblivion against the bedroom wall. It made an awful bloody mess.
It's amazing to me that I can hear the buzz of a mosquito above the constant ringing in my ears. Sometimes I'm not sure that the ringing is mosquitoes, though, so I had my son help listen and look for more. We found one more and I killed it. I dragged out the colorful thin fabric that I had bought to make a mosquito tent for his bed and draped it over him. I got under a blanket on the floor, then pulled part of the tent over my face, and we waited for more mosquitoes to present themselves. After 70 minutes of mosquito patrol, I wasn't satisfied that there weren't any more, so I finally moved us into the guest room for the rest of the night.
Mosquitoes make me angry, especially at this time of year. This year it has been compounded by the fact that I had been watching Boston area news a couple of days ago and the idiots reported that a mosquito had tested positive for West Nile Virus... but they didn't say where. I probably could have looked it up on the Internet, but the first WNV of the season usually shows up somewhere closer to the coast than I am, so I wasn't too worried. Anyway, the day before yesterday, some other channel ran the same story and had the brains to report where the mosquito had been found... Worcester. That's a little too close to home, so that's why I was obsessed with tracking the little freaks down last night.
~~~~~~~~
One thing has become painfully obvious about the largest front flower garden: it isn't large enough. The side viewed when coming up the driveway is a boring green wall of foliage. It can't be peered over to see what colors lie on the other side, except maybe from the elevated vantage point of a FedEx or UPS truck. I will have to enlarge the whole thing to include the 'Ivory Halo' Dogwood and fill in the whole new section with shorter flowers. *sigh* That will have to wait either until fall or until next spring. It is just too hot these days. (Well, today is nice, but I'm sure that by the time I'm in the mood to enlarge the bed, the daytime temps will have gone back to stifling.)
~~~~~~~~
It's a very nice and pretty day outside, but I don't like the way the temperature is so oddly cool and the way the sun casts an autumn light on the forest edge. I do not want fall to come early. I do not want winter to come early. This sort of weather makes me sad because it seems to be saying that summer is over, and I absolutely cannot stand winter when I have not had enough of summer.
~~~~~~~~
I weeded most of cucurbit patch #2. Some of the ones I planted are already forming buds.
Some more white Canterbury Bells have opened up. The self-seeded Tassel Flowers are forming buds. Some of the Nigella looks like it could open any day now. Best of all, I think some of my Evening Primrose is forming buds. I'd really like to know the story there. I planted that same thing last year and none of it bloomed. None of it made it through the winter, either. Then this year when I planted them, I'd grown so many in each individual plug that I just crammed them into the ground all crowded together like that and now they seem to be as happy as clams. I wonder if they will survive the winter this time?
July 11, 2008 (Friday)
It is 70 degrees and sunny (8:15 AM).
I've been having bad dreams all week, but last night had to be the worst. I kept having bad dreams all night long. Every time I woke up, I'd go back to sleep and have another bad dream. Some dreams were the same dreams I'd had long ago. Others were offshoots of dreams I've had before. I woke up from one bad dream, went back to sleep, and continued the dream where I left off. I am sooooo tired. I feel like I never even went to bed last night. I spent so much time being scared last night that this morning my stomach has such a knot in it that I feel like I've been punched in the stomach. I really just want to lie down and take a nap, but I'm too scared to try that just yet. Besides, I feel like I might barf on myself if I lie down right now.
~~~~~~~~
I have two Kniola's Purple Morning Glory blossoms today. I love those. I also have buds on my marigolds; I think they are the Harlequin ones, but I'm not sure.
I watered both cucurbit patches. Most of the water came from the rain pool. (Did I mention that I've taken the rain pool out back out of commission? It doesn't catch much rain, just mostly mosquitoes. The front one catches both, and that's part of why I used up all of that water for the cucurbits today.) On one trip back to the pool, something kept tickling my hand. I thought it was just a loose hair and I kept swishing it away, but it kept irritating me. Then I took a moment to see what it was and it was a huge biting fly of some kind sitting on my knuckle. I said something unpleasant and dropped my watering cans. At least I don't think it bit me.
~~~~~~~~
I took this photo yesterday. We've had police come to our house twice this week to deliver some important papers to my husband. Looking at this mess, no wonder the policeman that showed up yesterday looked like he wanted nothing more than to hightail it out of here. Who knows what could be hiding in that garden? Sasquatch could be in there and you wouldn't know it until it was too late.
What Lurks in the Garden?
|
| Growit Posted on Friday, July 11, 2008 - 02:11 pm: |
|
I was wondering too. I was trying desperately to believe you could shift a boar with a bat LOL! |
Thank you for the info, Moira.
Aaawwww, I won't tell Fat Rabbit that you said that. LOL.
 |
| Growit Posted on Friday, July 11, 2008 - 03:01 pm: |
|
awww, cute bunny. The fat rabbits of this world are the exceptions. I am talking the grey, breed like rabbits, things that eat everything I plant. If I could cage them all and feed then carrots I would lol! |
| Stormdancer Posted on Saturday, July 12, 2008 - 07:41 am: |
|
Hey DJ...glad I could help clear the mystery of the "wood boars"...I understood what Lisa meant...dang woman...you DO have a jungle growing all around!! Wanted to give you some info on your Dragonfly...check this link:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_Whitetail
Looks like yours is an adult male...looks like you got a skeeter patrol in this guy! |
| Stormdancer Posted on Saturday, July 12, 2008 - 01:54 pm: |
|
DJ, didn't I read somewhere in your journal that you grow Lavender and Valerian? Girlfriend...make yourself some tea with these two about an hour or so before you are ready to go to bed...sit quietly with soft music just letting your thoughts melt away...concentrate only on what makes you really happy...seeing your place exactly as you want it to look...your son's smile...when you feel your eyes begin to droop...head on off to your comfortable bed. The key is to totally get in a relaxed, happy mind space...
BTW...the Valerian acts similar to Valium...kind of a sedative, calming effect...don't drive after drinking the tea or operate machinery...make sure you have at least six to eight hours to sleep after drinking this...should help...if you have Chamomile, add some of it for the nice apple flavor...all three herbs are very good for helping soothe and calm. |
Thank you, Karen. I think I might actually have some sort of calming herbal tea in my tea drawer. I shall have to try it if I do. It has occurred to me that all of the bad dreams and lack of good sleep is due to a social event that my husband and I have to attend this week. Neither one of us enjoys social occasions and he is the center of attention at this one. We are probably feeding off of each other's anxiety. |
Oh, thanks! I just saw this post. That's definitely him. I love dragonflies. |
July 12, 2008 (Saturday)
It is 75 degrees and cloudy (8:54 AM). I forgot to check the temp when I first got up.
I have a white Nigella blossom today. Even more exciting than that, though, I found buds on the Butterfly Weed. WOOHOO! I haven't seen that since Florida. I also have a bunch of very spherical green tomatoes. I can't wait to see what they are. I do believe I threw away my handwritten garden chart during one of my cleaning sprees... before I got around to updating the version on the computer.
OH! Yesterday, when I went to check on the chickens before bedtime, I think I discovered who the mysterious garden destroyer is. I saw the (a?) woodchuck scampering away from the coop just as I approached. Bad 'chuck! That has to be what uprooted the whole corner of the Solanum and spinach bed that one day. I bet it's also what is responsible for having now munched the tops off both rows of parsley. A million things to eat around here and it goes for my parsley? Yeah, that sounds about right.
~~~~~~~~
A pale pink Oriental Lily has opened today. Mmmm, I love that smell. That batch is so short. I hope they are taller next year. A Tassel Flower has also opened.
I think it was yesterday that I finally got to figure out what grassy thing was sprouting up in the Germander: some of the descendants of 'Happy Returns' Daylily survived the winter and bloomed. Hooray! They look a little more pale than the parents, but I still like them a thousand times better than Stella de Oro. Which reminds me, one day I saw a yard in which someone had underplanted Orange Daylilies with Stella de Oro. (Did I mention that before?) They actually looked pretty nice together. Maybe I could transplant/thin some of the Orange Daylilies at the top of the driveway to the Stella de Oro patch.
July 13, 2008 (Sunday)
It is 75 degrees, breezy, and intermittently sunny (8:45 AM).
~~~~~~~~
Thanks to Karen, I now know that the milkglass dragonfly was a male Common Whitetail.
~~~~~~~~
I finally found the table legs and we have set up the table at last. It is wobbly, which is why we had quit using it in the first place, but I think it is okay for a picnic table. We are going to try a cookout today, so that'll give us our first chance to see how well the table works.
While I was looking for the table legs, I found four more "window boxes" like the two I planted the heirloom dahlias in. So, we went out to get some gasoline for my mower, some diesel for the tractor, and some manure to fill the boxes with.
~~~~~~~~
While I waited for my husband to torque up the barbie, I prepped my window boxes (during which time a mama turkey came by with her babies, a couple of which flew up into the trees, looking somewhat like flying Kiwi birds), pulled some weeds out of the chicken coop path, found my first pumpkin of the season in cucurbit patch #2, and mowed the southwest corner of the new yard. As my husband said, if you don't look too closely at it, it looks like a lawn now.
After all that work, we stood around like cavemen eating meat straight off the grill. I mentioned the table, but no one seemed interested. A little later, my son brought it up and we all agreed to finish eating the meat at the table. It was quite fun to sit under the edge of the maple trees, view the house, and survey the newly mown bit of yard.
June 3, 2008 - Before the Grass and Veggie Beds
July 13, 2008 - After the Grass and Veggie Beds
I've decided that the bed in the middle of the yard needs a stone border to keep things looking more tidy. It contains the old rhubarb, the big hollyhock patch, some herbs, the Filipendula, and some flowering weeds that I like, and is bordered by one of the new crab trees, the never-flowering Trumpet Vine, and the two Tamarack Trees. I figure that with a border, it will at least look like I planted everything there on purpose (as opposed to it having been the only sunny and convenient spot available at the time I needed to plant anything).
July 14, 2008 (Monday)
It is 72 degrees and grey (9:24 AM). I was hoping for a real downpour last night, but all we had was a light sprinkle earlier this morning.
~~~~~~~~
I need to put water dishes under the Impatiens on the porch. They wilt every time I turn my back.
July 15, 2008 (Tuesday)
It is only 10:30 AM and it is already 88 degrees outside. It is very sunny, too, and looks only slightly breezy. I thought the heat wave wasn't supposed to get here until this weekend.
~~~~~~~~
I watered the veggie beds and the container plants. I saw several more small, green, spherical tomatoes. Later I will have to water the pumpkins.
The Teasel has flowers on its cones today. How pretty. Oddly, though, its leaves seem to have developed a powdery mildew. We had rain for many days there for a while, but considering how tall the Teasel is (probably at least three feet taller than I am) and the fact that it is in one of the more open areas of the garden, I am shocked to see any sort of mildew on it, especially since it is really just a weed.
Blooming Teasel
~~~~~~~~
Whew. What began as a rock laying event turned into a weeding adventure. I think I moved a whole ten rocks or so, but pulled hundreds, maybe even thousands, of weeds. At any rate, the garden in the middle of the new yard is now beginning to look like its own separate entity, and that was really the whole point. Unfortunately, there is plenty more work where that came from. At least now I know what tomorrow will entail, if I am so inclined. On the bright side, I tidied up the old rhubarb (although probably most of the seeds are in my hair at the moment, rather than on the compost pile), and I yanked out some sort of aster that was everywhere. That last big step made a huge impact on the garden. They were a weed that I was intentionally keeping to help attract bees until the pumpkins began to flower (well, that and I actually really do like them), but I decided to be brave and yank them because when you get right down to it, they really are just weeds.
~~~~~~~~
I took my husband out to see what he thought of my progress on the new central garden. Then I took him over to see the basil. He wanted some to go in dinner. After that, he saw a rabbit hop down the hill into the lower barnyard. I didn't see it. I don't remember the last time anyone saw a rabbit around here. Anyway, he had me pick about 20 leaves of basil while he started dinner. What a delicious smell. I don't remember fresh basil smelling that way. It reminded me of men's cologne.
July 16, 2008 (Wednesday)
It is 80 degrees and sunny (10:00 AM).
~~~~~~~~
I went out to check the mail and had to make finding water dishes for the Impatiens my first priority. Didn't I just water those yesterday?
~~~~~~~~
I watered both cucurbit patches. It is HOT outside. There isn't much of a breeze, either. Time for a Popsicle.
~~~~~~~~
I decided it was time for an egg check. A Rhodie was sitting on the pile. Sometimes (maybe usually?) it's a Rock. She growled like a dinosaur every time I rummaged for more eggs. She pecked me a couple of times, but not very hard. I found 9 eggs which might be doing something and put them back under her. I tossed the rest on the compost pile. I'll mark those keeper eggs this evening. Hopefully, I'll remember to do that. I didn't want peeps because of the rooster factor, but I'll deal with that when, and if, we get there.
~~~~~~~~
To address thoughts and observations from previous entries... The white Nigella has turned purple. Also, blue ones have opened up now. Love those pretty little mood rings. Never know what they'll turn into next. |
| Flowerfreak Posted on Thursday, July 17, 2008 - 08:52 am: |
|
I had to google this one...ya learn something new everyday
lol, sounds like a good time was had, even with the work that was done
Yes, it sure is great to be able to sit back & see the progress. Great before & after shot, btw :) |
