Let us know if you want to participate.

We are happy to have grapes, string beans, corn, and a few ripening tomatoes. On Saturday the 20th, we ate sweet corn straight from two corn patches to Suzanne’s husking and deworming table to Jan’s stove, then back to us under the trees.

Farmer’s Market in Historic Tomé Thursdays 4-7 pm

at the Tome Dominguez Community Center

on the north side of Hwy 47 directly across from Valencia Community Gardens

Vendors welcome at a cost of $3.00 per table/spot

Contact Andrea for more information at 865-3394 July 21, 2016-September 15, 2016. Be sure to check out TTLG’s corn patch on the premises.

Life Cycle
Adults overwinter and seek shelter under dead leaves, vines, rocks and other garden debris. As temperatures begin to warm in the spring (late May and early June), squash bugs emerge and fly into gardens where they feed and mate. Egg laying soon begins and continues until midsummer with females depositing small brown eggs usually on the undersides of leaves. Eggs hatch in one to two weeks and the young nymphs disperse quickly to feed. Nymphs pass through 5 instars requiring up to 6 weeks to develop into adults. There is typically one generation per year.
Note: Because of the long egg laying period, all stages of this garden pest occur throughout the summer.
Squash Bug Control
• Plant resistant varieties when available.
• If only a few plants are affected, handpick all stages from the undersides of leaves.
• Place boards or shingles on the ground near host plants. Used as a nighttime shelter, they make excellent traps for morning collecting.
• Floating row covers are extremely effective when placed on seedlings and left in place until plants are old enough to tolerate damage.
• Diatomaceous earth, a natural pesticide made from the fossilized shells of one-celled organisms called diatoms, is abrasive to many insects and can be dusted over plants to reduce numbers.
• If pest levels become intolerable, spot treat with an organic insecticide.
• Roto-till or dispose of infested crop remnants shortly after harvest to reduce overwintering adults.

Molly concludes:  Adults do manage to overwinter in our garden.  Sounds like hand picking the eggs is a good strategy if we do it every garden day because the eggs need 1-2 weeks to hatch.

http://www.stltoday.com/business/local/article_a7ffbe9a-5848-5826-aa28-6b75b3c947d2.html

You’ll find links in this article to the new GMO study by the National Academies of Sciences and claims of conflict of interest by Food and Water Watch. Read and see what you think. Note that the question of the effect of herbicides on GMOs is still open.

Wednesday before Cinco de May Outdoors on a beautiful day

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New Studies Prove Organic and Grass-Fed Are Worth the Price

Feb. 29, 2016

It always bothers me when I hear people say organic food is too expensive. To me it’s a question of whether you value your health and whether you’re willing to cook at home limiting meat and stocking up on organic bulk foods, not to mention growing your own veggies and raising your own eggs organically if not your own cows.

http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2016/02/29/organic-food-grass-fed-meat-milk.aspx

Thanks, Joyce, for posting this now vindicated study that was discredited by forged evidence.

http://globaljusticeecology.org/scientist-who-discovered-that-gmos-cause-tumors-wins-lawsuit/

See more here:  http://www.gmoseralini.org/en/

The Secret Life of Roots at the U.S. Botanic Garden in Washington this weekend.

Thanks to Suzanne Taylor for posting this photo on Facebook. Roots can break up nearly impenetrable soil so water and nutrients can percolate.  That’s one reason we plant cover crops in our community garden.  Soil stores carbon. Cover crops reduce need for fertilizer if you’re a conventional farmer (which we aren’t).  We use manure and mulch as well as cover crops.  Then we can drill down to plant seed, leaving the cover to prevent evaporation.

This place has almost 100 varieties of cover crop seed for sale, and they take PayPal.

https://smartstore.greencoverseed.com/

Perhaps you recall that in 2013 Whole Foods announced they would label GMOs by 2018.  Well, apparently intentions have changed.  I don’t know if USDA is forcing or Whole Foods, Organic Valley, and Stonyfield Farm are choosing to accept Monsanto’s GMOs. You decide if in allowing GMO alfalfa, these groups are opening the door to other GMOs.  Whole Foods’ email says, “The policy set for GE alfalfa will most likely guide policies for other GE crops as well  True coexistence is a must.”

http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/265-34/34968-usda-forces-whole-foods-to-accept-monsanto

and http://www.counterpunch.org/2011/01/28/the-organic-elite-surrenders-to-monsanto/

Now we need to grow organic more than ever and support GMO labeling.

http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2016/02/02/how-roundup-damages-mitochondria.aspx?e_cid=20160202Z1_DNL_art_1&utm_source=dnl&utm_medium=email&utm_content=art1&utm_campaign=20160202Z1&et_cid=DM96871&et_rid=1340637461

I hate the expression “perfect storm,” but here is one: The mosquito engineered to wipe out dengue fever, by being released where tetracycline is present in animal feed, breeds without the self-destruct function, thereby facilitating the spread of Zika virus. Or maybe the tetracycline–inserted into genes as a marker–is itself part of the genetic engineering process (though the article doesn’t say so).http://theantimedia.org/zika-outbreak-epicenter-in-same-area-where-gm-mosquitoes-were-released-in-2015/