Bugs and Bounty

This time of year, I am always out enjoying the bounty of the yard, which makes it hard to want to be inside on the computer.  Since I blog about gardening, it is almost always hard to blog when I have something I want to talk about.  However, since the pouring rain just drove me away from my mowing, it's a great time to blog.

I just finished work a week ago, and am really enjoying my summer. The girls are off visiting my youngest sister's family and my parents, so Mike and I have a ton of time. We've seen shows, attended the Jazz festival, gone out for meals, had picknicks and friends over, but mostly we've been in the yard. Right now every vegetable is blooming and we are eating lots of zucchini, strawberries, greens and herbs.  I am making strawberry rhubarb crisp, salads, soups and dozens of other goodies.

All that time in the yard also gives me two other things: beautiful bouquets and bugs.  Given the amount of rain you'd think I mean mosquitoes (I have never seen them so bad in the city) but I actually mean  variety of cawlies that  haunt the organic gardner.  So far the nets are keeping my brassicas (kohlrabi and cauliflower) safe from the cabbage moths that have haunted them, but my moneywart, potatoes and my roses have unwanted guests. The caterpillars on the moneywart are small but very hungry, in the tradition of the picture book. You can see the size of them on Mike's hand and in the picture above.  Since I have many feet of moneywart, I also have many, many feet of caterpillars.

For most gardeners, all these bugs would be devastating. I must admit the sawflies in particular have me a bit down, but Mike is so delighted and dedicated to nabbing them (more on film than in person) that they have a real upside.

Picture this conversation:

Mike: Wendy, come quickly.  I have found a great beetle.  Do you know what it is?

Me: (glancing over from weeding the strawberries) That's a potato bug.  Kill it.

Mike: It sure is great.  Look at the stripes.

Me: It isn't great.  Kill it or it will strip the leaves off of the potatoes.

Mike: Are you sure? It looks so cool. We don't want to eradicate it if its a good bug.

At this point Mike goes inside.  I weed the rest of the berries, the garlic (whose scapes I picked this week - delicious), and the beans. Mike comes back out carrying a lot of camera equipment.

Mike: Well, it is either the Colorado Potato Beetle or the false Beetle.  I'll investigate.

I weed the onions and start cutting the comfrey to place around the plants as compost. 10 minutes later, Mike pipes up again.

Mike: It's the Potato Beetle.  I've found eggs on this leaf.

Me: Have you killed it yet?  There are probably others.

 Mike: Wait till you see the close up of the eggs - they're orange. 

In all fairness to Mike, he did eventually do the deed, despite his vegetarian love of all animals and insects (minus mosquitoes - even he can't take it that far).  And his diagnosis and dedication to bug picking did save the rose bush.  He's spent a few minutes each day helping me squish or drowned caterpillars, too. 

But while I am marvelling over the fresh Saskatoons on the bush, he is so busy editing bug pictures that he forgets to taste them as he eats them.  I guess that it is a match made in heaven, in that I don't have to compete for the food and he doesn't have to compete for the insects.  Now if only he loved to kill weeds.