Garden On, Vashon

Villains and Varmints: Such a contrast between urban and rural life. Here are two accounts that hit my Facebook wall today: both featuring drivers come face to face with something really scary.

In the urban version, here’s my boss, driving down Rainier Avenue with her daughter: they hear shots, see a guy rising from the pavement and come staggering toward them, gun in hand. Yikes!!! She gunned it, got outta there, then reached out via Facebook to get support from her community.

The rural version: a Vashon driver comes face-to-face, while driving, with a mouse on the front windshield. Driver presumably shrieks, then taps the tale into Facebook. Within the hour, five friends have commented, “Me, too!”

Apparently we have quite a problem with varmints in our cars. Mice in the window wiper wells … mice eating the electrical wiring (not uncommon cause of fires around here), mice in various compartments. Last winter I found a mouse nest in the glove box. I soon figured out they were using the tires to climb up and in. I baited a snap-trap with peanut butter, set it by the front left tire, and during the next week caught a mouse a day. 

I’ve been asking my “Do you compost?” question of any captive audience I have found myself in these last two weeks. Many of you who don’t compost have come up and told me your “rat in the compost” horror stories. It’s bad enough when driving to find a mouse staring at you. It must be heart-stopping to empty your compost pail over the pile and have a rat jump out at you.

I would be interested in hearing your horror stories or any solutions to this problem. Email me at karendale@centurytel.net. 

Starting Seeds

At the high school greenhouse, we are starting vegetables seeds for the Garden Club’s Mother’s Day Sale on May 5th. We sowed onions: red, white, green, and walla walla. And we sowed nine varieties of tomato, including several early types, ‘SunGold’ cherry tomatoes (the only place you’ll find them except from Pacific Potager), a roma, ‘Brandywines’ and even a few ‘Beefsteaks.’ I’m happy to say that the first tomato seedlings have already emerged. We plan to offer tomato plants in 4″ AND gallon pots for your growing season head-start.

True Value will be holding a Seed Starting Demo, presented by Melissa Schafer of Schafer Specialty, on Saturday, February 25th @ 11am-2:00pm. Learn the basics of starting seeds indoors. Melissa will also be giving away coupons good for 20% off Ed Hume & Territorial Seeds and all seed-starting related products, such as trays, domes, and soils.

TIME TO PRUNE RASPBERRIES

Last week I received two emails talking about pruning raspberries. It’s time, and it doesn’t take long. You want to remove those old canes that fruited last year, but leave the younger canes that may only have fruited a berry or two in the fall, if at all.

You can tell the difference by color and growth pattern. Older canes are branched, with a darker, caramel brown bark that may be peeling. Newer canes are a paler grayish-brown—they look like they’ve seen a ghost—with short thin laterals 90° to the cane, but no woody branches to speak of. 

Prune the older brown canes near the plant’s crown; the oldest canes may just snap off. You’ll probably notice leaf-tips at each joint of the new canes: they’re start to emerge next month, when you’ll want to feed the plants a 5-10-10 fertilizer. Something to do now while the weather’s still cruel.