I had a modest first harvest from my pepperoncini plants, so I selected smallish preserving jars (16 oz) that I found at Target for $4.49 for a four pack. I have no idea if that’s a good price or not? I also found a Ball Blue Canning Book, which was recommended by Shibaguyz, they seem to know what they’re doing, so I bought that too. The name of the book is rather unfortunate, but the directions in the book were better than anything I found on the internet, and it has TONS of different recipes for everything from pickling cucumbers, peppers and beets to making flavored vinegars and then some.

Here is the recipe I followed. The only change I made was to reduce the recipe because I had a smaller amount of peppers than the recipe called for. If you have never canned anything before, definitely track down a good book or website, because there are important sterilization procedures you need to do to avoid growing bacteria inside the jar (yuck!).

• 1 1/3 pounds of hot peppers
• 3 cups vinegar
• 1 cup water
• 2 garlic cloves, crushed

Combine vinegar, water and garlic is a medium sauce pot and bring to a boil; reduce heat and simmer for five minutes. Discard garlic. Pack peppers into hot jars, leaving 1/4 inch headspace. Remove air bubbles. Adjust two-piece caps. Process 10 minutes in boiling water canner.

The end result was this:

Photo by RobertGrubba.com

I think the problem is two fold. First, no matter how well you treat your container garden, plants are almost always more stressed in a container than they would be in the ground with the same level of care. Stressed out plants are like homing beacons to pests. And second, many container gardens aren’t as hospitable to aphids’ natural enemies as larger gardens, so aphids multiply without any interference from Mother Nature.

I originally titled this post “Ladybugs - A Gardeners Best Friend,” which provides a pretty good hint as to my favorite aphid treatment. Ladybugs–and especially their larva, as you can see in the photo above–love snacking on aphids. I was so excited to see a bunch lady bug larvae in my garden this weekend, because I know they are busy growing like crazy, which means they will need to eat a lot of aphids.

Attract Native Ladybugs

The best way to use ladybugs to control your aphid population is to attract the locals. And the best way to do that is to plant things ladybugs love. Usually that means plants that upward facing flower umbels, like dill and yarrow. Other ladybug favorites are golden marguerite daisies and bachelor buttons. You might also try growing sweet allysum in between all of your edible plants. They attract bees (which are great for pollinating) and flower flies (which like eating aphids).

Or Try Store Bought Varieties

If you can’t seem to attract any local ladybugs, or you want the aphids gone yesterday, you can pick up a container of ladybugs at your local garden center. They aren’t as good as the locals because they’re often native to mountain areas and are shipped several hundred miles to your nursery. In my experience, they’re more likely to fly away than the ladybugs native to my area.

To reduce this problem, put the store bought ladybugs in the fridge until late evening. This helps make them sluggish and more likely to stay the night. Sprinkle them in all the aphid infested areas. Hopefully they’ll hunker down for the night and then eat lots of aphids in the morning.

More on Aphids from Around the Gardening Blogosphere:

• Bucolic Bushwick explains what those white little flecks near an aphid infestation are.
• North Coast Gardening covers organic treatment of all sorts of rose ailments, including aphids.
• Fresh Dirt highlights a special hose nozzle for blasting the little buggers off.

What’s your favorite aphid control method?

Now, for the rest of you. You have one more chance to win an insert, but you must act right now. I am going to randomly pick one commentor on this post to receive the size insert of their choice. The comments will close at midnight tonight, so don’t wait. Click on that comments link below and leave a little note.

From top to bottom and left to right: (1) Red Herb Pots - Pier One $7.99, (2) Recycled Tire Herb Pot Set - Biome Lifestyle 24.99 British Pounds, (3) Solig Hanging Trio - Ikea $7.99, (4) Stackable/Hangable Planter - Amazon $34.95, (5) Herb Pot Trio - Amazon $39.95

Also, check out the rest of Hannah’s new blog. It’s a great collection of her ideas to run an efficient kitchen by wasting less and creatively stretching your shopping budget. As Hannah puts it, “If you want to make tasty, healthy, home-cooked meals with a minimum of time and money, CookingManager.com is for you.” Sounds good to me!

Here are some of my favorite posts so far:

• 11 Tips for Painless Kitchen Cleanup
• Cool Summer Chickpea Stew
• Microwave Myths

You know what else is poisonous? Rhubarb leaves. Small amounts are pretty harmless, but in large quantities they can cause kidney damage. Who knew? Also, don’t snack on cherry, apricot, peach, or plum tree leaves. That is unless you like the taste of cyanide.

Some plants have had their poison bred out of them, like potatoes. Only the tubers are safe though. Definitely don’t eat young green tubers, and under no circumstances should you eat the flowers, leaves, or sprouts. You guessed it, they’re poisonous.

Even the much beloved tomato has poisonous parts. The green parts cause digestive upset and can be fatal. Apparently they contain a compound called  cyanogenic glycoside. It involves sugars binding to poisons and then releasing them later. You don’t need to understand chemistry (I sure don’t) to know that cyanogenic glycosides are bad news.

Hopefully my point is clear by now. Nature is the original assasin. It’s not Colonel Mustard in the library with the candlestick. It’s Joe Gardener on the balcony with the carrot leaves. If none of your cookbooks have a recipe for a particular part of a plant, it’s probably better to hold off on concocting your own until you can do a little research.

Home Depot is carrying large black flax like the ones in the ugly strip mall pots for $24.99, and a six pack of white impatiens for $1.99. So the plants in the pot cost $26.98. I absolutely can do better!

It’s not a matter of spending a lot of money. It’s a matter of using a little creativity, which quite frankly, is missing from much of suburbia. My suggested replacements are goldenrod (1 - $4.99), purple asters (2 - $3.99), sweet potato vine (1 - $3.99), and white geraniums (2 - $2.99). Assuming I still know how to add, that tallies up to $22.94. Money left to spare!

Here’s how I’d place the plants:

Uninspired planter in Southern California

For example, this pot that I saw near the post office. How more uninspired can you get? I am sure I could do better for the same amount of money. And to prove it, I am going to research how much these plants likely cost, and post my alternative on Sunday, that uses plants that cost the same or less.

Have you seen any uninspired pots? Feel free to gossip about them in the comments. This just might be the only kind of gossip that isn’t mean or unethical.

There has been much discussion about this in the blogosphere and on Twitter today (see, for example, Garden Rant). I decided to visit a store near me to see what was going on there. For the most part the employees seemed upbeat and helpful. They were still working hard to help customers and provide “service with a smile.”

Obviously I have no idea what the problem was that caused the company’s downfall, but I have some guesses. For starters, almost everything in the store was overpriced. You can’t sell Felco pruners for more than they are selling for online. And you can’t sell relatively nondescript Ferns for $16 when local nurseries are selling the same nondescript Ferns for $9.99. If you’re going to sell overpriced stuff, then it has to be better than what is available elsewhere, and it has to be unique.

Second, while I don’t really remember Smith & Hawken before Scott’s (of Miracle Grow fame) purchased the company, I suspect that the two companies weren’t the greatest match. Smith & Hawken started off as a high-end tool company started by people in to things like macrobiotic cooking. Scott’s is about as far away from that sort of crunchy stuff as possible. They’re famous for creating a fertilizer that organic gardeners love to hate.

Anyway, that’s my two cents. What do you all think?