Monday, May 23, 2011

It's All Spider-y Under There...

In one of my favorite episodes of The Andy Griffith Show, Barney and Gomer are working to rebuild a bandstand and Gomer doesn't want to go up under it because he is afraid of spiders...He says something like, "But Barney, it's all spidery under there."  To which of course Barney replies "Gomer, get down there with them spiders and start workin'!"
Well now I know exactly how Gomer feels and it's happening in my garden!  Last year when I raked all of the mulch up in the Fall, I placed it on a tarp in the yard for re-use.  We I've finally gotten all of it back out on the garden and it's FULL of spiders!  I mean thousands upon thousands of spiders.  From little tiny jumping spiders to giant ones as big as my hand (no lie, I've killed two that size so far.)  I beat the living crap out of them with my shoe.  I've put a question into my local extension service about getting rid of them.  I'm not for using tons of chemicals in the garden but they are stringing webs EVERYWHERE and just plain old freaking me out!  (I have identified the giant spiders as Wolf Spiders and they both were carrying egg sacs-I have NOT posted a picture because honestly they just flat out scare me!)

In other garden news-the tomatoes and peppers are coming along nicely and I think I will have enough for most of the neighbors.  
Something is continuing to decimate my eggplants, not really anything else just my 4 eggplants-see?
The green beans have started training up the lines from last year and I only have to help them out a little bit.  I did thin them again this weekend, it gets harder and harder to pull up plants the bigger they get!
The pink eyed peas are doing ok, some of the leaves are a little "shriveled" up, they seem to be growing this way.  This is my first year for these so I am not sure if this is normal or not.
And finally, the squash plants are growing nicely and it is almost time to start "attaching them" to the cages.  I think I will use some fabric strips instead of string.  I have a sack of (way too small) clothes going to the thrift store and I may just cut some of them up for tying purposes.
I was out of town for a week and very nervous about the garden-so I'm happy to update that everything (well except the spiders) is going good!

2 comments:

  1. ackkkkkkkkk! I hate spiders too. Your garden is looking good :)

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  2. ooh! spiders are icky. i can't remember the name of the spider, but apparently there are some where the baby spiders crawl into the mom's back (so you can't see them). I killed one of those with a hammer once, and the little baby spiders flew out everywhere. I almost threw up! Bleh!

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