Gloves of garlic send ants scurrying. I recently discovered this when for some unknown reason I found ants on my kitchen bench. Having no ant bait in the house I decided to improvise. I put 3-4 gloves of garlic and spread them around the bench top. I tell you, they left in a big hurry. […]
After a sudden influx of ants on my kitchen windowsill I nearly went and bought some ant killer stuff (expensive and often not effective) when I remembered something I read many years ago. I went outside and traced the track of the ants and used a soft chalk crayon and drew a thick line across […]
PB from Christchurch asks, “How do you control fleas on pets without spending a fortune? Will diluted tea tree oil used as a spray work?”
If you or a friend have one tomato plant it is really easy to get many freebies. Use the laterals. These are the ‘unwanted’ side shoots that you are told to remove. Do remove them. As you do your gardening keep a cup of water handy, carefully pull the shoot off and put the shoot […]
To make a natural weed killer, mix 1 gallon of white vinegar, half a cup of salt, add eight drops liquid dish soap – put it all in a spray bottle to apply. Marion says it will kill weeds in two to three days.
One can grow tomatoes inside. Transplant seedlings, when need be put in a warm sunspot & you’ve got a plant growing!
Here’s a trick to remove the green from your hands when working with tomatoes. Take a tomato (preferably one leftover) and squash it in your hands and rub. The green stain will come off. We did this when I picked tomatoes commercially and it really does work.
Tomatoes require plenty of water when fruiting. The hose is useless on a hot summer’s day. Take a two litre plastic bottle, drink the contents, put a pin hole in the side down at the bottom of the bottle, then fill with water and place it in the garden by the tomato plant. Remove the […]
Don’t waste money buying garden twine. Grow a small flax bush and use pieces of the leaves. You may pay for the flax bush once, but you will have it forever.
To keep slugs and snails away from newly planted seedlings, just make a small flat container out of tin foil and put 3 or 4 slices of cucumber on it. The cucumber and tin foil together seem to give off an unnoticed smell that slugs and snails don’t like. I put a couple of little […]