Hope all is well in Sacramento!!
Yes, it’s a beautiful day here in Sacramento. The edge is off of the heat, the birds are singing and life is good. — watching the hummingbirds drink out of our backyard fountain, hearing a couple of frogs croaking from my potted plants on the patio and watching the horses run the pasture.
Re the garden, can’t wait to get out and plant my tulip bulbs when it really cools off here. Getting some rain tomorrow, and so the wet season begins.
We are in a rural area of Sacramento, so we can get some nasty bugs — white flies and black widow spiders. My dogs each gotten bitten by a black widow once while sitting out in the orchard, and for one of them it was pretty serious. So, while I look for the natural choice when I can, there are limits. I do have the perimeter of my house sprayed to stop bugs from entering the house.
Usually, when I have a basic garden problem pest, I try to find a natural solution — lady bugs & the like. Second line of defense is my grandmother’s “homemade insecticide” — cooled water from boiled tobacco with a couple drops of dishwashing liquid in it, delivered from a spray bottle. It’s only when all those things have been defeated that I pull out “the big guns” — commercial insecticide. And with those white flies, I would have nuked them if I could!
Hope that all is well with you, too, on our beautiful, beloved coast!