Aphid Attack

My Black Seeded Simpson Leaf Lettuce has been attacked by aphids. This is my own fault for (I hate to admit it) several reasons. First I neglected earlier when the plants were at the proper stage to fully thin the lettuce. I also noticed about a week ago that my lettuce had quite a few ants. Now you might be thinking that ants isn't such a problem besides ants don't eat lettuce. Well if you thought that you would be correct ants do not eat lettuce. Ants eat a sweet nectar-like secretion from aphids and ferociously protect the aphids from their natural predators like, lady bugs. I know this and yet I still ignored the obvious clue that aphids were moving in on my lettuce. Anyhow it isn't that big of a problem since lettuce is not easily bothered by pests and aphids are easily whipped out with tobacco tea spray.

Thinning and Transplanting Kale

It rained most of the day yesterday and was quite cool. It made for a good chilli cooking day. Needless to say I didn't go outside much.

The afternoon brought clearer skies though and the rain finally subsided so I decided to get something done. I didn't mention yet that I planted a very late crop of kale and spinach in the second week of September. I usually wouldn't do this but I saw the seed at a store and thought how both spinach and kale are very cold hardy so maybe I would get a harvest from them. In fact Kale can withstand temperatures in the mid 20's before freezing out.

Anyhow yesterday after the rain I went to get my boots muddy and thin the kale. Thinning after a rain is my favorite time because the seedlings pull up with a maximum amount of roots and can be transplanted to fill gaps in my rows. I wrote a eHow article on this here: http://www.ehow.com/how_5431099_thin-transplant-seedlings-vegetable-garden.html