General Chat

Nicked from a website for Tec

Earwigs in general can be considered an ally in the garden as they will eat aphids, insect larvae, snails, and other slow moving bugs. and other pests at night as they are nocturnal. One truly good function of the insect is they eat the eggs of the codling moth which is a serious problem with apple trees. When you have an over population of earwigs they can become a nuisance. Generally they will feed on your marigolds and they really go for clematis vines, dahlias, delphiniums, pansies and chrysanthemums.

I wonder if they use them here in Huntly around roses, this property has one rose bush out front other properties seem to have an abundance of roses and I walked down to the domain the other day and what a lovely lot of roses in several garden plots. We had a climbing rose back in Auckland which himself hated and I had to keep pruned. In the end it was removed for an easy care garden,, Though they will still have to prune that bougainvillea. The agent had to sweep the deck before each open home.

Hello, :-)

Pleased to see that you arrived safely at your sons Linda - at least it looks as though it may be dry for erecting the fence.
No need to get up quite so early in the morning :-D

Sue you do seem to be having a lot of rain, especially as it's summertime.

Persie - I didn't know earwigs ate aphids. They were on my list of "What's the point of them"
along with slugs and snails, wasps and mosquitos

We did get here safely thank you.

It is extremely cold once the sun goes down, but at least it isn't raining

I hope you arrived safely at your son's house - you are so busy :-0

More thunderstorms yesterday evening and more to come :-( Crazy weather. I have had to put some of my pots under shelter as they are drowning.

Good morning.

I am just looking in quickly before I repack my case and we set off to stay with my son for a few days. OH is going to build a fence across the bottom of his garden as there isn't one currently, plus they are going to put the insulation on the inside of the front and rear walls of the house.

It is still like a complete building site, but coming on, the new kitchen is in, although the electrician is coming today to do the last of the electrical work including connecting up the new oven (stove). The plumber still needs to connect the gas hob up, but at least the oven should work. Since they moved in all they have had to cook with is a microwave and a little electric hotpot which they bought.

For the last few times we have been down, we have slept on an air bed, but now things are sorted out a bit and they have rearranged the piles of boxes, they are going to assemble the spare bed in honour of my bad knee

Should one get rid of them or keep them.. they have their good side in that they eat aphids and their eggs and other nuisance insects but then they can also damage vegetation.

Yes,we have earwigs and they have been particularly bad this year for some unknown reason. I was sitting in the garden the other day when I discovered I had one of them crawling on me, I quickly brushed it off :-S They like to hide under things, I picked up a pot in the garden and to my horror there were an army of them under the little pot.

Hello and goodnight Linda <3

Goodnight Tec <3

I have never had a problem with earwigs - I don't even know if we have them in Australia. I will have to find out. The dahlia tuber was given to me by my neighbor who generally has a brown thumb but has had some success with the dahlias. I need to split them up once the season is over but normally they are left in the ground. I have some lilies about to bloom too. They are in pots.

I am safely home, only half an hour late which isn't bad given that there had been ninety minute delays earlier in the day because of overhead line damage

I looked after Esme today while Eve was at school, she was fine with me today which was a relief

I am just going straight to bed as I am tired, I will catch up in the morning

I am off to bed now, to watch tv for a while :-D

Enjoy your day Sue,

Goodnight,
Tec :-)

Yes I have used pots wherever I can which will be much easier to manage.
I am looking forward to next summer.

That dahlia sounds good, especially the colour.

I have never grown dahlias. We have to lift them every year and store the tubers dry until Spring.
Also the atract earwigs - do you have them?

Some people place upturned flowerpots fillied with straw on canes by the dahlias to trap the earwigs.

I had a neighbour who grew magnificent dahlias in an array of colours

Are you happy with your garden? I suppose it will consist of more potted plants which are easier to look after. I have repotted all of the plants that needed it and I am now putting the orchids away and bringing out the begonias. I also have a beautiful dahlia plant ready to bloom - the colour of the flowers are a rich deep purple.

Milo is a lovely old dog - he welcomes everyone who comes to the door.
Now that for the first time I'm unable to have a dog he has helped enormously in filling thegap - as do the other dogs that Sue looks after on their way to re-homing.

I don't mind my own company, which is just as well really. I can always find things to do.

You wouldn't know my garden now.Everything has been cut down, cut back, or got rid of - it looks twice as big now.

Milo sounds such a lovely dog and he is a great alternative to having your own dog. He wasn't fazed at all when we filled your back garden.

I had the house all to myself all day yesterday. I have to admit that I enjoy my own company now and then.

Maisie must go into guard dog mode :-D so she thinks she's seeing it off.

I had Milo here for a few hours today while his mother took her car to be serviced in Dolthingy.
He is staying with me for four days at the weekend while she visits her son in Edinburgh - he thinks this is his second home, and is quite happy.

Maisie barks. She wants to go outside and bark at the thunder :-)

Hello Sue,

What I really hate is losing peoples e-mail address.

Many dogs dislike thunder. We had one that could hear it coming long before we did. She was particularly nervous of it, and would land on my lap. Being a rather large labrador, it wasn't very convenient :-D

Hello :-)

My passwords are sort of funny random ones that no one would really connect with me. Unfortunately they are also easy for me to forget so I have a little booklet designed to list sites and passwords.

We have had more thunderstorms overnight - strange weather. The rain is nice but Maisie isn't enjoying the thunder :-(

It's been a lovely sunny day here, though cold.
My brother who visited today, said that most of his journey here of 65 miles was like a winter wonderland with a thick white frost covering everything.
He could hardly believe that there was no sign of fog or frost here.

We are spoilt here on the coast.

My SIL hung the curtains in my bedroom. I do have venetian blinds, but it was a bit bleak without curtains.
While she was doing that, my brother hung a picture on the wall that I had bought especially for the room.

All that is required now is the lampshade that should arrive by the weekend.

I wish I were as organised with my passwords as some here. Most are in my head, but I do get caught out occasionally :-(