See, the problem was in the past that… well, I live in a not rich neighborhood. How does this relate to drip irrigation?  Because according to Home Depot and Lowe’s, people who live in not rich neighborhoods don’t buy drip irrigation systems. Of course that is not how they put it.  If you ask an associate at their stores in my (apparently) ‘hood, my local stores are “urban” stores, and therefore do not carry the same products as “suburban” stores.

I don’t know about you folks, but when I think “urban”, I kind of think of, I don’t know, tall buildings, apartment buildings or lots of multi family homes, teeny, tiny 10′X30′ yards – if there are yards at all.  My neighborhood looks a lot like their supposed “suburban” neighborhoods, only the average income is several tens of thousands less and the median skin tone several shades darker. If I am living in an urban neighborhood, then I need to have a serious conversation with my local government about the overwhelming lack of crime and graffiti – not to mention trendy art galleries, theaters and coffee shops.  But I digress, as I am wont to do.

Whatever the reasoning, they don’t sell drip irrigation supplies in my “urban” area and going out to the “suburban” areas was just going to be a hassle (after all, I don’t have the latest census data that would tell me for sure that I was going to a suburban store rather than an urban store, as you can’t tell that by looks).  I had looked online at buying it – but it looked so complicated. I didn’t know what I needed or if I could use my feeble construction skills to assemble it.

Then a few weeks ago it just so happened that I was in one of those “suburban” neighborhoods to watch a movie and stopped into the hardware store nearby to pick up supplies for my other hobby.  As I was buzzing down the aisles, I spotted something on the end cap out of the corner of my eye as I was whipping past.  I came to a hard halt and put my cart in reverse.  It was a whole display of drip irrigation supplies.  It still looked complicated, but at least there were boxes marked “starter kits” and I could eyeball if this was a job I could do (great), a job the spousal unit would have to do (requires payment in steaks and sex) or something that  I would have to hire a professional for (not gonna happen).

Then, as if the gardening gods were crying out that I must have this, a strange but helpful man appeared at my side. “New to drip irrigation, eh?”  I nodded and then was immediately deluged by a massive amount of information on drip irrigation systems.  Everything I needed to know to get started and do so cheaply. BTW, he was not an employee of the store. He was just someone THAT excited by drip irrigation. While helpful to me, I do wonder what a dinner party at his house might be like.

A half hour later, with my head spinning as it tried to process all of my new found drip irrigation knowledge, I went on my merry way confident that I would have a drip irrigation system and that it would not require lots of steak and sex to get it installed.

And now I am kicking myself that I did not do this sooner. IT IS SO EASY. You know the Tinker Toys you played with as a kid? Just like that, only for water.  Too awesome!  No more powdery mildew because I had to water from overhead.  No more leaving the sprinkler on all night and flooding my garden because I forgot I turned it on.  No more forgetting that I have not watered in a week. Done. It’s all on a timer and it all goes straight to the roots of my plants.

Now, I have time for the important things that you do in an urban neighborhood, like chase deer away from your plants and mow your lawn.

Of course, have I taken this advice? Nope. I am really bad in the “do as I say and not as I do” department. Just ask my kids, who can tell you with great accuracy how often I have had ice cream after they went to bed without any and skipped breakfast after making them eat something marginally healthy in the morning.

But this year, I decided it was high time I went and got my soil tested. So I packed up my soil and headed off to see my local friendly extension office (which was in a slightly not so friendly neighborhood). In I walked with soil sample proudly in hand, ready to make wonderful changes to the soil of my vegetable and flower beds and… the lady behind the counter quickly dashed those dreams.

“We don’t do soil tests,” she stated plainly.

What! The extension office doesn’t do soil tests! What is happening to my gardening world? I have always been told that extension offices do soil tests.

Then from behind a door appeared just about the sexiest horticulturist I have ever seen, and this includes that guy that Victory Garden brought in from down under to try to save their ratings. Being a knight in shining Dockers, he informed me that while OSU extension service does not do soil tests, he could help me fill out a form to have my soil samples tested at UMass Extension Offices. I went all giggly and weak kneed and tried to pretend that the 2 children running around the lobby were escaped urban livestock that had nothing to do with me.

I put on my best doe eyed newbie while he patiently explained how I needed to have samples for my vegetable beds tested differently than my flower beds. Feigned ignorance is always a nice way to extend a nice male watching moment. But there is only so much that one can say about soil testing and after he had said it and had handed me my form and soil samples, I reclaimed my wayward children and left the little extension office in the ‘hood.

So, my local extension office does not do soil sample tests, but there are a lot of other things a local extension office is good for. Like identifying those troublesome critters that are plaguing your garden, diagnosing and recommending solutions for whatever diseases are attacking your plants and suggesting all sorts of wonderful plants to grow in your neck of the woods (or city as the case may be).

What I can’t guarantee is that you will have a sexy hot plant guy to help you out. That is something that I have all special in my extension office and I think I will be making a lot more trips there in the future… with my, ahem, gardening questions of course.

Thanks much to Jim Thompson of the Cuyahoga County Extension Office for his help this week!

I have found such a story in my garden this week. Gardeners rejoice -  a single surviving pansy was found at 10AM yesterday, the apparent sole survivor of a yearly catastrophe, commonly referred to as frost, that claims the lives of thousands of annuals .  The pansy, which is being cared for in the Hanna Plant Emergency Center appeared to be in excellent health, considering that it had successfully survived, the frost, a long, cold hard winter that had both blizzards and amazingly cold temperatures. Snowfall was recorded at up to several feet at times. Experts believe that such snowfall can insulate some hardier annuals, such as pansies, from killing cold weather and this is thought to be how the pansy survived despite being found several feet from large structures that would have protected it had it been closer.

The pansy was found growing in an abandoned flower pot in the middle of the yard. Authorities believe that the owner of the flower pot abandoned it there because she was both too lazy to clean up her garden in the fall and terribly averse to being cold.

I know we will all take a moment to smile at this little minor miracle in the aftermath of winter’s devastation and look forward to the light of a new spring ahead of us.

*While this post is tongue and cheek, there are many stories of miraculous survival and horrible destruction which happened in the recent events in Japan. If you have not already donated, I encourage you to give a little to Red Cross to help with Japan relief efforts. Any help is a great help.

I should have suspected that something was up when it was the cheapest mulch on the list.  Delivery to your home, ½ price even. Well, duh. The landscaping company wanted to get rid of it as much as my neighbors do.

I know cow manure is good for your garden, but I could have sworn composted manure did not stink.  So why does mulch with cow manure stink?  These are the mysteries I am pondering this week. That and who will replace Simon Cowell. We all know that is urgent to the functioning of the universe.

Second note to self – Do not have organic mulch delivered to your house the day before Memorial Day weekend. While organic mulch may do wonders for your flower beds and you will have 3 whole days to work on spreading it out, it does not greatly improve the taste of hamburgers and hotdogs.  The smell apparently has quite the opposite effect.

There is a tomato thief in my garden bed. I know what you are thinking. Here Hanna goes on a deer rant but, unfortunately, this time I cannot blame the long legged rats for this catastrophe. To be very frank, if it were deer, I would be missing tomato plants rather than just tomato fruit.

Nope, this thief is smaller, craftier and has thumbs. How do I know this? Because the tomatoes had been picked off the plant and the vines were undamaged. A feat that would require the perp to be able to grasp and pull the fruit. Anything remotely ripe was eaten. Anything green had a little bite taken out of it and was then thrown to the ground in apparent disgust. Oh, and the theft only occurs to a height of 3 feet.

Since we lack any monkeys, apes or gorillas roaming wild in this part of Cleveland (though often my children are mistaken for ones), I must turn my attention to the more native species of the area.

My first thought was raccoon. These shrewd critters long ago had their agents make a sweet deal with Disney that helped portray them as cute, cuddly and adorable. Fact of the matter is, the things would as soon eat Pocahontas’ face off as dance around the forest. They are not cute, they are not nice. They can be lethal on many levels.  They are wild animals, not stuffed animals. 

I promptly called animal control and was told I could have a cage to catch it with… in about 3 weeks… if I was lucky. And by lucky, they meant that it did not enter my house and make its home in the walls. For understandable reasons, people with raccoons in their home get precedent over people with them in their garden.

Understandable or no, 3 weeks is too long to wait. I have tomatoes on the line, people!!! I headed over to see my good friend Craig and in less than an hour, I had procured a live animal trap.

Then I went home to do my research. What is the best way to lure a raccoon. My first thought was to bait the trap with a tomato. After all, that is why the bugger was in my garden in the first place. And that is when I discovered a really important fact. Apparently raccoons are not so fond of tomatoes AND that damage like this is normally done by another vile critter. Opossums.

Yuck, yuck, yuck, yuck, yuck. Nasty beasties they is. I am fairly certain that ROUS’s were modeled not after actual rats but rather opossums. These freakish marsupials are immune to most snake venom and resistant to rabies. And, they have more teeth than any other land mammal. They are just scary.

So, it’s off to catch a tomato thief.

Night #1 – I baited the trap with… what else… a tomato. Yes, a store bought tomato, but I was kind of hoping that tomatoes were to opossums what chocolate is to me. “Ok, so it’s crappy chocolate, but it’s still chocolate.”

Results – Nada. Well, except for more tomatoes pulled off the plants.

Night #2 – I moved onto peanut butter. There is no force in the ‘verse greater than peanut butter.

Results – The wily, wily critter went into the cage, scooped out a handful of peanut butter and did not trigger the trap. *grrr*

And, on top of that a rather cuddly squirrel tripped the trap after I checked in the morning. It must have been in there for an hour. By the time I found it, it had bashed its nose good while trying to escape. I go out to find a bloody nosed squirrel glaring at me. I let it go. Let me tell you, I can now recite a few choice not nice words in squirrelese.

Night #3 – More peanut butter. Obviously it worked, just have to make it work better.

Results – Well, we will see. Tonight is night 3. With any luck (and not the kind that keeps raccoons out of your house), in the morning, I will have caught myself a tomato thief.

UPDATE – No kidding, just as I hit publish on this post, I heard a snap and a high shrill chripping.  I caught my tomato thief!  And it was… drumroll… a raccoon!  Apparently they are not as nearly opposed to tomatoes as the internet would lead you to believe.  In the AM,I will have my little thief relocated (not killed,even I have a heart) to a new, not tomato growing area.  I promise to post photos before he goes.