Thus far my gardening education has largely been in tidbits picked up via Twitter or around the gardening blogs. I did pick up two books to read, Grow Great Grub and The Gardener’s A to Z Guide to Growing Organic Food. Another Twitter friend also recommended The Garden Primer, which I may turn to next. So I’ve gleaned little bits about companion planting, like that basil and tomatoes grow well together — so I stuck a basil plant next to my cherry tomatoes. And that marigolds help repel pests — so we threw a couple of those in as well.
And, I’ve heard before about how helpful ladybugs can be, so when Tiffany mentioned that she found some at our local garden center, we rushed over to pick some up this past weekend.
I’m pretty sure that all the ladybugs quickly fled for cooler climates (in typical DC fashion we went from frost advisory to 90s and humid in the span of about a week), but it was a fun experience for the boy. He bonded quickly with the little critters, even giving one a kiss… (above right).
They did seem to set in quickly on whatever was eating my basil, so hopefully a few of them will linger around for a while!
And now, 5 links for Friday:
1. FoodieTots around the web: our “Local Potluck Tuesday” was mentioned on the Washington Post; and our kitchen garden experiment was mentioned in “Mom’s Guide to Gardening with Toddlers and Preschoolers” at SheKnows.com.
2. Let’s Move! Some of my favorite chefs (and foodie moms) participated in today’s “Chefs Move to Schools” launch at the White House; read about it in Jane Black’s article at the Post.
3. Farm-to-School: While chefs talk at the White House, DC’s Farm-to-School Network hosted a city-wide “Stawberries and Salad Greens” event in DC’s public and charter schools this week. Erin of Sustainable in the City made my strawberry agua fresca for 160 elementary school kids!
4. Back in the garden, check out this beautiful post on “Here’s What Could Happen if You Grow Tomatoes” over at Raising Foodies. (I’ll settle for the boy *eating* a tomato from our garden, asking for it for dessert would be icing on the cake!)
5. And be sure to visit goodLife{eats} for this week’s Grow Cook Eat round-up, featuring a call for chard recipes. Our CSA starts next week, so we’ll be looking for new chard recipes, too!
10 responses so far ↓
1 Tweets that mention FoodieTots.com » Blog Archive » In the Garden: Fighting Pests with Bugs and Flowers -- Topsy.com // Jun 4, 2010 at 3:27 pm
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2 Katie @ goodLife {eats} // Jun 4, 2010 at 10:08 pm
I just ordered some lady bugs online because aphids set in on a few of my plants this week. YUCK! Can’t wait till they get here and clean things up for me!
.-= Katie @ goodLife {eats}´s last blog post ..GrowCookEat: Swiss Chard Recipes =-.
3 Rose Silver // Jun 24, 2010 at 3:57 pm
Ladybugs do wonders for your plants. I never thought of these before and often disregard their presence in my garden. Until my tomatoes was dying from aphids that I searched for help. Found out about ladybugs and bought some. It did worked and the aphids were controlled.
4 Letter Tray : // Oct 29, 2010 at 12:49 pm
the best thing about organic foods is that they are free from hazardous chemicals that are present in non-organic foods-;-
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