© Copyright 2007 Gammy's House
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Gammy's Online Home- A place that shares fantastic free products, links, inspirational videos and encouragement
The Garden
"When you open your eyes and your heart for nature's beauty around you, there is so much to enjoy and love.  I see each day as a gift with a possibility to discover something new."
Go organic...
Find your local...
Beneficial insects...
Edible flowers...
coming soon
Doghouse...
Playhouse...
Birdhouse...
Greenhouse...
This month in the garden...
My patio pals...
June
This is a pregnant female.
She likes the peanuts.
Click on the map to find your Plant Hardiness Zone
TRUE LOVE!
The blue jays love the corn
Have you found a secret room yet? Email me at GammysHouse@gmail.com and let me know which room you found
OR
enter you discoveries in my "Detectives Log Book" located in The Library.
Check you standings here
Last Updated 06/09
Plant hardiness zones...
Zone ratings are intended to indicate excellent adaptability of the plants. Many plants may survive in warmer or colder zones. Usually, mere survival does not represent satisfactory performance.  [more]
This is a great site to find answers to all your garden questions.

Do you have a beautiful garden and want to share pictures?  I'd love to ooooh & ahhh over them.  Upload them to
Gammy's Garden Friends
Drop Box
Welcome to my Garden
Marjolein Bastin
Click on the butterflies to dance in my Butterfly Field
Garden  tips & recipes...
As a north Texas resident, I feel compelled to provide information to assist and encourage local folks that would like to become environmentally conscience or would just like to learn more about gardening in Texas.  So... here are some great links and useful information just for you.  Enjoy!
Gardening in North Texas...
It Really Works!
Deter Flies With Bags of Water

A housefly bases its sense of direction on the direction sunlight comes from. Some entomologists believe that when these complex eyes experience refracted light, the insect becomes confused and flies away. 
I ate at a restaurant the other day that had ziplock bags filled with water to which one penny was added (to keep the water looking clean).  They  tied off the top and hung them with strong string from rafters on their outside patio. 
I had just eaten at this restaurant a few weeks prior and fought off flies the entire time.  On this visit, not one fly came around.  It worked so well, I made some water bags to hang outside my back door.  While find their way inside my home, I don't have the big problem with them that I did before.  Check out a picture here
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More Fantastic Garden Links
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~Be sure to water your melon patch well as fruits develop.
~Set out tomato transplants all month.
~Start sowing cantaloupe, eggplant and pumpkin
~When vegetable plants set fruit, side-dress with fertilizer.
~Plant warm-season grasses
~Add summer-blooming annuals such as, marigold, zinnia, periwinkle, and cosmos.
~Sow pepper seeds throughout the month.
~Keep pinching back chrysanthemums.
~Harvest potatoes when tubers reach 2 to 3 inches in diameter
~ Spider mites often flourish in hot dry conditions. Use organic mulch to increase the humidity near plants and release predatory mites, lacewings and ladybugs to help control these pests.
~Pick tomatoes when the fruit is firm and just beginning to turn red. Let them finish ripening indoors.  This way you get them before the birds do.
~When climbing roses finish blooming, prune them. Thin out the oldest wood then trim the remaining canes back by about a third.
~Keep up with weeding; pull or hoe the weeds before they mature and set seed.
~Keep plants mulched to prevent drying out and deter weeds.

~It's the rainy season.  Roses that have wet feet(roots) for 6 hours or more can get "black spot".  Pinch off the sick leaves and treat with baking soda spray.
~Add compost throughout the landscape beds and the vegetable garden.
~Mulch beds with compost or other organic material to help conserve moisture and curb weed growth.
~Encourage birds by putting out a couple of feeders with different types of food, by adding a pond or birdbath and by giving them shelter with birdhouses or trees and shrubs. Birds eat many insects that feed on plants. Check out Gammy's Birdhouse in the Garden to find out how to create a wildlife habitat in your own backyard.
Tammy's Squirrel Cafe'
Garden "To Do" list for
Garden designs...
Me feeding pet squirrel
Do ya mind?  I'm eating here!
I've enjoyed my many different garden designs over the years from moonlight gardens to xeriscapes and I've always had...
Check out Tim Beckman's square foot gardens

Tim is an Advanced Master Gardener in Indianapolis, Indiana. To cold for me, I'll stick with Texas, thank you,  but he provides fantastic information on his site.

Thanks for sharing Tim.
 
Like my friend Mark, I'll be moving to a new home this year and plan to share pictures of the development with you...but for now... here are some of my favorite resources for free design ideas and plans.
FREE GARDEN DESIGNS & PLANS
Note: Better Homes and Gardens asks that you to sign up for their online newsletter in order to download their fantastic garden plans. I've been receiving their eZines for many years now and love them. My only complaint are the adds that pop up from time to time, but accessing all the great information on their website is well worth tolerating the adds. Best of all ...It's FREE.
Monarch Map Sightings
Watch a LIVE Butterfly EMERGE!
Nature at it's best...
Monarch Migration
Unlike most other insects in temperate climates, Monarch butterflies cannot survive a long cold winter. Instead, they spend the winter in roosting spots.

Monarchs west of the Rocky Mountains travel to small groves of trees along the California coast. Those east of the Rocky Mountains fly farther south to the forests high in the mountains of Mexico.

The monarch's migration is driven by seasonal changes. Day length and temperature changes influence the movement of the Monarch.

In all the world, no butterflies migrate like the Monarchs of North America. They travel much farther than all other tropical butterflies, up to three thousand miles. They are the only butterflies to make such a long, two way migration every year.

Amazingly, they fly in masses to the same winter roosts, often to the exact same trees. Their migration is more the type we expect from birds or whales. However, unlike birds and whales, individuals only make the round-trip once. It is their children's grandchildren that return south the following fall.

When the late summer and early fall Monarchs emerge from their pupae, or chrysalides, they are biologically and behaviorally different from those emerging in the summer.


The shorter days and cooler air of late summer trigger changes. Even though these butterflies look like summer adults, they won't mate or lay eggs until the following spring. Instead, their small bodies prepare for a strenuous flight. Because they are cold-blooded, they are unable to fly in cold weather.

Fat, stored in the abdomen, is a critical element of their survival for the winter. This fat not only fuels their flight of one to three thousand miles, but must last until the next spring when they begin the flight back north.


As they migrate southwards, Monarchs stop to nectar, and they actually gain weight during the trip!

An unsolved mystery, is how Monarchs find the overwintering sites each year. Somehow they know their way, even though the butterflies returning to Mexico or California each fall are the great-great-grandchildren of the butterflies that left the previous spring. No one knows exactly how their homing system works.

Source: Monarch Watch
Journey North Monarch Migration Update
Interested in the Monarch migration.  Check out this animated map on Journey North for the latest sightings in your area.
YOU GOTTA SEE THIS!!!
Check out my latest garden project.
Cobblestone Patio
Jenny's Website
Free Garden Projects
Fun Interactive Site