Undeveloped Lakes: A Thing of Beauty

This year for our annual family trip, my parents, sister, brother-in-law, husband and I went down to Southern Indiana to see Patoka Lake. This almost-9,000 acre lake is beautiful. One of the reasons it's so beautiful is that people can't build on it. I'm sure if they could, they would, as all beautiful things it seems must be ruined by development.

We rented a pontoon and spent 9 hours cruising around the lake. Yes, there were lots of other boaters out there, but even that didn't take away from the pristine beauty of this beautifully clean lake.

Nowadays, when people talk about going to the lake it seems they're always speaking of a lake that has multi-million dollar cottages built on it and an overwhelming amount of people. To each their own, but to me, that's not relaxing AT ALL. I enjoy nature for what it is, not for what people want to abuse it for.

Basil -- The Powerhouse of Companion Planting

I didn't do very much companion planting this year in our first garden, but I'm pretty sure what we did do has paid off. Companion planting, if you're unfamiliar, is planting plants that benefit each other together. This isn't just for vegetable gardening, either, but this post is about the veggie garden.

For our first veggie garden at our home, we decided to plant basil and tomatoes together. Basil is a powerhouse in the garden, especially for tomatoes. It not only improves the growth and flavor, but also repels several pests of tomatoes (and other fruits and vegetables). Basil repels white fly, tomato hornworms, aphids, flies and mosquitoes.

Pruning Basics

Most of us have a basic understanding of what pruning is, but few of us know how to do it correctly. It's not simply shaping the plant to give you what you think is the best look; it's actually for helping to maintain the health of your shrubs and trees (which, coincidentally, adds to the aesthetics). Pruning correctly also stimulates new, fresh growth and the production of buds -- keeping your shrub looking new and young for many years.

Before you go shearing your shrubs into an unrecognizable box, get in tune with your plant and figure out a few things about it before you've actually damaged it.

What You'll Need to Know: 

1. Does your shrub bloom on previous or current year's growth? This refers to when your shrub sets its buds. A general (and by general, I mean most of the time, not all of the time) rule of thumb is that summer-flowering shrubs bloom on current year's growth and spring-flowering shrubs on previous year's growth
2. How thick are the branches I'll be cutting and which tools will I need?
3. Is any of it dead, diseased or injured?
4. Should I really prune it back to a different height or width or should it be moved to an area where it can grow as it should?

Fertilizer?

Fertilizer is often a term tossed around by gardeners and other people, but what is it? Why do you need it? Do you need it? Ah, the questions that arise when planning and planting a garden. Fertilizer supplements the needed nutrients that your soil may be lacking. It comes in various forms: Granules and liquids; man-made and organic; etc ...

When you look at a bag of fertilizer, you'll notice 3 numbers on the bag or box. These 3 numbers represent NITROGEN, PHOSPHOROUS and POTASSIUM, in that order. These 3 macronutrients are the ones more likely to be needed in your soil. The numbers represent what percentage of each is in the fertilizer you're getting. But what exactly do these nutrients do?

Spiders: Why I Love Them

It seems even some of the more environmentally minded people are still squeamish around spiders. Although I'm not, I have to admit they can be somewhat intimidating with eight legs and the ability to snare  their prey with high-quality death traps of sticky silk; well, some of them anyway.

I know even the most arachnophobic people out there have heard either "They're more scared of you than you are of them" or "Oh, but they're soooo beneficial." And most of those arachnophobic people, no matter how severe the fear, believe it deep down in their heart but just can't seem to appreciate these eight-legged predators.

Few creatures have had to endure the horrible reputations caused by stories and tall-tales like spiders; wolves and snakes may be the only other two that are in the same category. Horror stories of massive spiders in toilets, faint-causing photographs of bites and of course the Hollywood machine have all put images in our heads of spiders with fangs the size of steak knives readily hunting us as their next meal.