All the plants are suffering severely from BLACK spot. Reminds me of Pirates of the Caribbean and makes me want to spit and trun around just saying it. The 19 inches of rain we had was nice. Lots of blooms but all balled up and rotting. Every rose bush has it, new growth included. Pulled all the mulch off and used the tiller on it to try and cut the mold and muck to the air.

Ordered 9,000 Ladybugs to try and clean it all up and they took 5 days to get here. Put the 1st hand full out today. Also checked the pH and it is 7.2-7.5! Yiks 90 times!

So much for buying expensive dirt. We shall see it I can correct it. I think I had that problem last year and used Cotton seed mill to fix the old veggie garden. Also put manure in there and they spruced up nicely. I will check at the Fertile garden if I can this next week and see what options I have this year.

The praying mathus eggs that cost a BUCK last year never hatched. I’m a bit nervous about the Japanese beetles and and listening carefully every night. Last year they stripped every plant I had before I figured them out. Last year I was using A LOT of Nitrogen based Bayer. This year I am rotating every 2-3 weeks with Liquid Ironite, Scotts and Bayer so the Nitrogen is lower. I don’t know if this will keep them and the spidermites down but we shall see.

Note to self, 7 dust can cause Clementus to go into dormency. I had 30 blooms and now it isn’t dying but it is not growing. This has never happened before and that is the only thing I did different!