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Look Who's Coming to DinnerRead the article this discussion is about
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» CarolWallace - Chives I plant garlic chives with my David Austin roses and have rarely had an aphid problem. Of course also plant nasturtiums, which are an absolute aphid magnet - so perhaps they were deflected before they got near the chives and roses.But in the area where most of my roses are, it's a good blast of water, just as you say. It has worked fine for me for years. Of course I also have Japanese beetles. But my roving band of chickens have been keeping the beetle grubs under control, so even THAT is not much of a problem these days. -- posted by CarolWallace » Adriela_Sakamoto - Chives And they are so absolutely lovely, with the purple heads and the vertical lines. I envy you your chickens. I have roving bands of slugs.-- posted by Adriela_Sakamoto » CarolWallace - Chickens by accident I'm lucky I livce in an area that is zoned rural. Neither my husband or I ever thought about owning chickens. I was visiting a gardening friend who has a farm - and we heard this screaming sound when we neared her barn - a tiny baby chick, barely escaping being trampled by a goat. My friend picked him up and we tried to search for the mother (it was SO egg-shaped you knew it had JUST been hatched!) but it was still screaming so loud we couldn't. I asked what would ahppen to it absent a mother and my friend said it would probably die. So I took it home. It lived in my pocket for the first two weeks because it needed warmth. It truly thought I was mom and my husband was dad.Unfortunately, as it grew we realized two things. First - unfortunately, it was a rooster. Second, it hadn't a clue as how to act like a chicken. So we got him a hen. Instinct took over; they had babies - but the poor rooster never got over the idea that we were his parents and he had to protect us. No one could even attempt to approach our house. He and the hen had babies - but he was still more protective of us than the family. Finally, and most reluctantly, we decided he needed a new home. A friend of ours who had a real farm volunteered to take him, although he was a bit concerned about how his existing rooster would take to this newcomer - ours was only a Bantam insteadof a full-sized rooster. But apparently they tangled, and our boy won! Meanwhile, we had the kids - none of whom think we are mom and dad, and one of whom is also a rooster. They just had babies. Mom teaches the babies daily how to dance in the mulch. It's a lot like having a crew of mulch-mixers and grub eaters. And walking fertilizers. I'm thinking about it a lot this week, because the friend who took our hand-raised rooster was one of the 19 people killed in the Pennsylvania plane crash last week. -- posted by CarolWallace » Adriela_Sakamoto - Chicks and Chives I was delighted to read of your chickens. I've heard of bantam's, and my mother used to have to eggs from a particularly vicious hen, but I have never had any. One day.. one day.I'm so sorry to hear of the loss of your friends, Carol. I don't know what to say, but that.. Adri -- posted by Adriela_Sakamoto » CarolWallace - Vicious hens My mom grew up on a farm but seems to have been totally unsuited to it - among my memories was her daily battle with a henhouse full of vicious hens - and then there was the time she killed a cow. .Actually, our current batch aren't at all vicious. They run when they see us coming. It's an adjustment after all that time when we had a rooster who used to like to perch on my husband's shoulder or sit in our laps to be petted. BUT, as I said - they are great to have for garden pest control. -- posted by CarolWallace » Adriela_Sakamoto - ?? The hen killed a cow? No.. your mom. Isn't that what they do on farms?Adri -- posted by Adriela_Sakamoto » CarolWallace - Not on dairy farms She threw a rock at it and hit it on the head and killed it because apparently it balked at being milked just then.-- posted by CarolWallace
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