Tomato Hornworm control (Manduca quinquemaculata) Tomato Hornworms cause serious damage: Tomato Hornworms are the blight of tomato growers everywhere. They can quickly defoliate tomato plants and ruin your crop. Therefore Tomato Hornworm control is key to tomato growing success. ...
Read More »Author Archives: Thomas Osborne, MD
Feed SubscriptionBest planting technique: 7 important steps
Prevent transplantation shock with this planting technique After referencing numerous sources and planting hundreds of fruit trees, I have developed an extremely effective method of planting fruit trees. This method takes a little bit of extra effort, but the ...
Read More »How to build a gopher cage
How to build a simple and effective gopher cage Background: If you live in California and you are not in a major city, you probably have gophers lurking nearby. Gophers are a serious problem and can kill a young tree ...
Read More »Grape Powdery Mildew: Diagnosis & Treatment
Grape Powdery Mildew (Uncinula necator) AKA (Erisiphe necator) If you grow grapes in coastal California, (or almost anywhere in the world for that matter), you are probably going to see a white powdery substance on the leaves. This is grape ...
Read More »How to get dragon fruit flowers
Back when this website was a blog I got a few great questions from a reader about growing dragon fruit cactus. Since these questions come up quite a bit, I am re-posting them here with additional updated information. Frank ...
Read More »Surinam Cherry (general overview and growing info)
Surinam Cherry (Eugenia uniflora) Surinam Cherry overview: The Surinam Cherry is a shrub or small tree with very interesting looking fruit. The plant grows well in Southern California but the flavor of the fruit is quite variable depending on ...
Read More »Dragon Fruit Flowers
Dragon Fruit flower (Hylocereus spp) Dragon Fruit Flower Overview: The Dragon Fruit Cactus (Hylocereus spp) is mainly cultivated for its tasty and unusual looking fruit. However, the short lived flowers are also amazingly large and beautiful. Cinderella story: The ...
Read More »Electric Snail Fence: Organic-Tec
Electric snail fence overview: In the past, I had been unsuccessfully fighting the battle against snails and slugs. However, I recently discovered a very effective and relatively cheap organic way to fend off those pesky gastropods. The solution is simply ...
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