Reducing Pesticides For the Love of Birds

I'm a reluctant gardener. It isn't that I don't enjoy being outdoors in the sunshine, because that's one of my favorite things in the world. Maybe THE favorite thing. But I'd much rather be taking a nice, long walk or sitting quietly by a lake watching birds than pulling weeds.

However, as you may recall if you've been following my columns, I made a New Year's Resolution to plant some bird and wildlife-friendly plants, so I've been trying to stick to that promise. And because our yard is certified by the National Wildlife Federation as a backyard wildlife habitat, that means I need to follow-through on my commitment to eliminate pesticides from my yard. It's easy in January to make those sorts of commitments, but it's much harder in June when bugs are making salads out of my plants.

It started with my rose. It's a lovely thing, called Reine des Violettes, an antique hybrid. I planted it last Mother's Day, which was the first Mother's Day following the death of my mother in July of 2000. The blossoms are lavender-pink, and it has a nice fragrance. So I was understandably distressed when, in May, the rosebuds looked ugly and frayed. I took a digital picture and e-mailed it to a friend of mine who I know to be a successful gardener. She wrote back saying it looked like I had aphid damage, but not to worry, because aphid season here in the Pacific Northwest is fairly short. She counseled me to use a good stream of water from a garden hose to wash the aphids off of the buds, and hope for the best. I did, and my Reine des Violettes made a swift recovery. A few blooms had damage around the edges, but most were spectacular.

Now it's slugs and snails. I e-mailed other birdwatcher/gardener types who I know are also trying to limit pesticides in order to protect the birds in their yards, and the advice I got was to buy something called diatomaceous earth. Apparently it's made up of the shells of diatoms, and it's just abrasive enough that slugs and snails won't slither across it. If you sprinkle it on the ground around your plants, they'll stay slug and snail free, and you don't have to use poison.

The last problem I've encountered is something chewing on the butterfly bushes I planted this spring. These are my New Year's Resolution plants, so it's important to me that I keep them healthy. I did some research and combined a couple of recipes for a good, strong insecticidal soap which will, supposedly, get rid of those creepy-crawlies without injuring the "good" bugs, like ladybugs or bees, which we definitely want to keep around. Here's the recipe:

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