Pest Problem....

This is my Gardenia. I had some pretty flowers on here this year.... but then I got aphids. I have plants with other problems also...

Above the Gardenia you will see my Grapefruit tree. It has leaf miners.... I love Gardenias, and I love my grapefruit tree, because the Gardenia has beautiful flowers and the grapefruit tree is the off spring of the tree I grew from a seed in NY, and Daddy brought down to me when I bought the house in Winter Springs.... That was my baby, and I recently discovered that the girl who bought my house, cut down my tree. This tree is almost my legacy... I will not have any children, and now it is gone, so all I have left are these 3 babies that I again grew from a seed from the fruit of the tree that I grew from a seed. I have to save these... period end of subject.

I tried cutting the affected leaves out, but they grew more leaves and the leaf miners went after them. I got my Rodale's Organic Gardening book out, and it said that they come from the dirt. They also said that a Nicotine tea will kill them, and the aphids, so with the assistance of my girl friend who smokes, by her donation of a pack of cigarettes, I made 1/2 gallon of Nicotine tea this weekend. The way I did this was to soak 1/2 cup of tobacco in 1/2 gallon of water, with 1/4 tsp of pure soap. I soaked the tobacco in the water, in the hot Florida sun for a few hours, then I strained it through cheese cloth, and sprayed it on the leaves, and then even put some of the tea on the dirt the plants are growing in.

So, this is what they look like now, in a few days I will cut them back, and hope for the best.... I will follow up with some pictures of the demise or the celebration.

Keep your fingers crossed for me.... These Grapefruit trees are very dear to my heart. I kid you not, the parent tree was once a seed on a plate 35 years ago, in Farmingdale NY. My mother was on a grapefruit diet, and I was cleaning the breakfast table off, and saw that one of the seeds starting to germinate, so I carefully assisted it along. Before you knew it, my Dad and I were planting the tree outside in May, and bringing it in, in November. We did that for about 10 years, and when I moved to Florida in 1985, and bought my first house in 1987, the first trip my Mom and Dad made down by automobile, was with my Dads van, and in the back was my grapefruit tree. Boy I had a great Dad....

Then when we had a freeze in 1988 or 1989, when my Dad was here, and he wrapped the tree in a heavy drop cloth, and put a 75 watt flood at the base to keep it warm. Then he woke up all that night in regular intervals to check on the tree. The following January, I had my first buds, and the following December, I had my first fruit. And it was good fruit....

Well anyway.... do what ever it is you do... keep your fingers crossed, say a prayer, wish real hard... what ever works... and then check back.... :)