coming at you in HD from the backyard garden, and today we've got another exciting episode
for you. This is not a fun one, and this one's having to do with pests. Pests in your garden,
and one particular kind of pest you may be having, and I know I am. Now this stumped
for a couple days and I was like, 'what the heck is going on?' You know, and what happened
was this.
I simply came outside and these are my beautiful purple perennial tree collards
that under extreme conditions like the nice hot heat they do flower and go to bulbs and
seed, but that's alright. You can cut these guys off and they'll continue to grow and
I have let these gone to full term and flower, seed, and then produce the seeds and then
cut them back and then the pant continues to grow and this is simply amazing. So, this
year what happened was they went to seed and this year I came out and all the seed pods
are getting jacked up like, 'okay, John, what's going on? Usually at the end of the season
when the seeds are finally done and dry, the seed pods will bust open and fall and then
I'll have tree collards coming up my wazoo, but in this case the seed pods are looking
all green and they're all messed up and damaged,' and I'm like, 'man, what's going on here?'
And I couldn't figure it out until I was walking outside just the other day. So, actually let
me show you guys actually what I saw when I was walking outside.
So, now I'm about to
go outside and show you guys what those little spur dudes are going in my thing. Alright,
I got the zoom there. See that little sucker? Look at what that little sucker's doing. There's
a little bird, eating my tree collard seeds, little scumbag.
Look at that. He's snacking
out, man. That's a nice fat source for him. Totally eating it.
So, we're going to have
to prevent him from eating my tree collard seeds anymore. So, here's the damage to the
tree collard seeds. The birds basically peck these open like little pods. They eat all
the little beans out.
These're not even developed seeds yet, 'cause they haven't been out long
enough, but they're a high source of fat to the birds, and yes we can actually also eat
them. Wouldn't give us a lot of food. I'd rather save these for the seeds themselves,
and, you know, they're really tearing these guys up. I don't know if I'm even going to
have a good yield of seeds this year 'cause they really picked the majority of these guys
up, and, you know, now because it was highly damaged, I might not have any tree collard
seeds.
So, this is what nature does. So, we're going to have to be proactive and take some
steps that they cannot do this in the future. So, come back at you in a second. So, man,
isn't that incredible? You guys say the little bugger, man.
The little dude was eating my
seeds. I mean, it's all good. I'm glad I could feed nature, but, you know, he needs to be
eating something else, not my rare perennial tree collard seeds that rarely go to seed,
and these seed are quite valuable 'cause I. Want to save the genetic diversity to spread
those to other people so that they can also grow these cool plants.
So, I had to figure
out a solution so that the birds can't get in here to eat but also make in convenient
for me to still harvest my tree collards when I want to eat them. So, you know, I could
go out and buy bird netting, but that would be an expensive having to buy more stuff or
I could get hang some CDs, some compact discs, on string and that would kind of spin around
and that could kind of scare the birds because that would be good or you could take some
like milar film like milar balloon, that material, but it up into little strips and then tie
them onto places and that may blow in the wind and scare the bids and keep them away,
and while those methods may work, it doesn't really protect your junk in the trunk. I like
protecting my junk, especially if I'm playing sporting events, but anyways, we're going
to protect my tree collard seeds because they are important and they haven't even yet developed.
They're still babies and they're getting eaten. It makes me so sad.
So, let me next show you
guys how I'm going to protect my tree collard seeds with a cool item that actually I just
happened to save. So, now I'm going to show you guys how I'm going to protect my tree
collard seeds from getting eaten from the birds. I've got these bags here. So, what
these bags are.
They're poly bag and actually I get coconuts in these. I buy coconuts in
bulk in the husk, and I guess these bags are very similar to the bags you might bet a big
bag of potatoes or a big bag of onions, you know, or a big bag of oranges sometimes, but
this is like the super huge gigantic size. Usually the ones for potatoes or onions are
bit smaller, and I don't know where else you'd get these but I have these laying around because
I really don't like throwing anything out and that could be a thing, you know, if you're
gardening and you're single like I am, but it could be a bad thing if you're married,
so good thing I got a good big garage and maybe I'll even build a shed here to store
some extra junk, but hey, one mans junk is another mans treasure, and this today is a
treasure because it's going to allow me to save my perennial tree collard seeds form
getting eating by the birds, and maybe another solution would be to get a good cat. Anyways,
so, all we're going to do is take this big bag here, and as you can see there's the opening,
and this bag is so huge, it'll fit on me.
Stick 'em up I want all your vegetables. So,
we're going to take this bag and put all these stalks here that have the seeds growing, if
they have the leaves I'm not going to keep them in the bag 'cause I want to be able to
harvest those guys, and luckily most of the guys that have the seeds are to be segregated
out and I think they're right here. So, we're going o take these guys on plant and we're
going to bag it on up and to help inside this little bag here I've got a bamboo stick to
keep this straight. Hopefully that's going to allow me to put this on a little bit easier
so it doesn't collapse on me, and we're just going to go ahead and stick this all the way
in, just like putting a bag over your junk when you're going to use it.
So, the last
thing is we're going to go ahead and grab some string here. We've just got some twine.
Just going to go ahead and roll off a bunch, just break it off, and we're going to go ahead
and tie off the bottom. This is very important so that the wind doesn't blow this off and
the bids won't be able to actually get inside and then get up in there and have free reign.
So, we're just going to go ahead and pull this pretty taut. That's a cool word, taut.
I was taught a lot of stuff in school, but I'm also able to pull this taut and tie it
off.
Bet you didn't know I was an English major. Actually I wasn't an English major,
so don't learn English form me, just learn gardening. Alright, so we've got this taut
here. Just going to go ahead and put our string around and tie this guy off.
Alright, we're
all tied off and check it out, this is now my protected tree collard seeds. A couple
are sticking out here. They might be able to get to 'em, but that's alright. The majority
of them are going to be safe form the bids and I will be able to harvest them for my
uses instead of the birds eating them.
Another thing I was considering for, you know, mother
nature and for the bids, because it's really sad in this day and age that the birds have
to come to my garden to eat my perennial tree collards, I mean they are mineral dense mineral
rich with trace minerals, probably taste better than anything else they could find in this
big city, 'cause there's not a lot of nature that could feed the birds anymore, so I did
consider, you know, maybe getting a bird bath and actually a bird feeder to feed them and
supply them with food but then I don't want necessarily to encourage birds to come into
my place because when that runs out hey might come to my garden and eat and know that this
is a valuable food source for them. So, I. Don't really want to encourage them to come
so I decided to just wrap this up and let them find some place else to go. Another thing
that may happen that has happened to me before is that in the heat of the summer when I have
nice juicy plump red tomatoes, the birds are going to come and peck at the tomatoes.
Now,
they're not necessarily pecking to eat the tomatoes. They're pecking for the water. Tomatoes
are full of water, and that's why they're good for us, besides that they're rich in
other things like lipopine and other nutrients. So, you know, at that point I may just have
a bird bath to see if I could divert them, you know, to go to the bird bath instead of
pucking my tomatoes for the water, or I might just se these bags once again to cover my
tomato plant if they're small so that I can eat my tomatoes and not the birds.
So, you
know, the last thing I want to mention today is that there will always be creatures, pests,
whatever you want to call them, whether they're birds, alligators, lizards, moles, boles,
cats, dogs, rabbits, raccoons, anything, they're going to be coming at you to you're garden
to eat your stuff because you're providing them food, you're providing them gourmet food
that they can't get anywhere else. Some of the best stuff, especially if you're using
some of my growing practices including a lot of organic matter, the compost and some of
the trace minerals. Man, the foods really going light them up like it lights you up
when you're eating it. So, but there's always a way to keep them out.
Just be persistent.
Just use your brain and think of creative ways you can use to, you know, keep them out.
I wouldn't normally have to go buy some, you now, bird cloth or whatever, and that costs
some money, but I had these guys laying around and I always love to find reuses for something's
that I have saved previously. So, hopefully you guys have enjoyed this episode, you're
a little bit more motivated now to, you know, deter pests however you can. Once again, my
name is John Kohler with growingyourgreens.Com. We'll see you next time, and remember, keep
on growing..
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