One of those moments
gardenchat@hort.net
  • Subject: One of those moments
  • From: &* C* D* C* U* A* 9* C* <c*@edwards.af.mil>
  • Date: Tue, 24 May 2011 11:12:26 -0700
Did you ever struggle with a problem and then when the solution came to
you, it was so obvious you felt like an idiot? I had one of those
epiphanies last week. I used to think I had a brain... 
I have the occasional critter problem in my vegetable garden, plus
unsettled weather in spring. I protect my row crops like corn, beans,
and lettuce with floating row cover; I pull 15 feet or so off the roll
each year and anchor it over the beds for about a month until the frost
quits, the winds die down and the plants are big enough not to get
munched. 
For tomatoes I slide those plastic protectors, the "wall o'water"
things, over the tomato cage. It's too annoying to actually fill them
with water - it's always windy, the tubes collapse and I end up soaking
wet and covered with mud. But just sliding them over the cages works
like a charm.  
Squash, melons, and cucumber I hadn't figured out. Sometimes I protected
the seeds with those little strawberry baskets, but I had to have some
on hand. Sometimes I made a little chicken-wire enclosure. I thought
about cloches, but it gets too hot under one even in spring. Didn't want
to make cages to support wall o'waters, and I really hate using them
with the water. So every year I futzed around with something.  
Last week while I was rolling up the cover over the lettuce it came to
me. Just cut the row cover into an appropriate size square and anchor it
over where I plant the seed. How easy is that? How dumb not to think of
it sometime in the last 10 years? DOH!

Cyndi  

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