I Know What Matters

I can't believe how big a job plant-watering has become. It's now taking something like 16 gallons per day. And for what? Lots of great peppers, okay, but also a few very sad-looking tomatoes.

Looks like the whitefly problem has been conquered. It's hard to buy imidacloprid in a formulation for tomatoes, but I checked the ingredients on the Bayer Tree and Shrub stuff, and the only active ingredient is imidacloprid, so I decided it was safe to use it. It's unbelievable how much you have to dilute it. Using recognized guidelines for per-acre active-ingredient amounts, it comes out to a few drops per plant. About .0025 grams of active ingredient per square foot. I can't believe it works at that concentration, but it looks like the whiteflies are dying. I kept rechecking the math, and I can't see any mistakes.

It makes me wonder if the dirt around the shrubs I've drenched is permanently radioactive. I'm using a cc at a time to mix tomato poison for several plants, and the shrubs take a pint at a whack. God only knows how big a dose the yard got. I used granules, and I don't know how much active ingredient they contain. I didn't put the poison right up against the fruit trees, but it may get in via migration. I am not too scared of this stuff, since they use it in flea dip for cats. But I don't want it in my fruit.

Seemed like some of the citrus was doing badly, and the common problem I noticed was exposed roots. So I buried them in extra Miracle-Gro Garden Soil and mulched over it, and they seem to be having a sudden growth spurt.

The papayas--over seven feet tall now--are blossoming. The things I thought were fruit were buds. I guess that should have been obvious. You generally have to have a flower before you get a fruit. Now I have to watch them. As soon as the papayas are big enough, I have to bag them to keep the flies from putting maggots inside them.

My fatalii peppers are finally turning brilliant orange-yellow. They are magnificent. And my PC-1s are turning red. My white habaneros must be getting ripe, because some have gone past white, directly to light yellow. I long for the day when my Jamaican hot chocolates turn glossy brown.

My seedlings are trying to damp off even though they're indoors in fresh dirt, so I'm hitting them with fungicide. Either they'll live or they won't. This must be a moldy, moldy city.

Thank God for mangoes. I don't have to do a damned thing to those.

It sort of looks like it's possible to salvage plants with yellow leaf curl virus. I cut the sick branches off of some of my plants, and some of them are growing healthy new branches. Others are growing new sick branches. Maybe the virus doesn't travel backward from the infection site to the rest of the plant. That would be a nice break.

My little Eaton compressor arrived. Og really called it this time; the box says "Eaton Compressor" on it, but other than that, it reeks of China. It has one of those diamonds on it that you always see on Chinese boxes. Am I wrong, or is that pretty much unique to China? They sent me a pretty blue one instead of the cruddy cream-colored one they advertised. Dodged a bullet there. I can't have a frumpy compressor.

Seems heavier than the advertised 75 lbs.

I just realized I have enough stuff to get it running. I have the 1/4" hose I got for the tire inflator, plus some fittings. And a box just arrived which could be my pencil grinder.

I have to go now. It is my duty to play with this thing.