Yes, I’ve seen them in person at my community garden and thought the same thing - attractive! Easy to use! But really only cover 1, MAYBE 2 small plants at a time so not only would having a few be expensive but would probably look odd!
I’ve chicken wired before at this garden (the bed is 4 x 10) but there there are rules about how low/high it can be and to be honest, it’s hard to get to all the plants when it’s installed.
Any advice for older Day Lily plants?
I have a few large areas where they’ve expanded over the decades (and maybe were thinned back when Mom gardened our yard). They provide lots of green, no watering needed …. well until they turn brown later in summer. But few actual flowers. Looking quickly, it seems that late summer is the season to thin them?
I thought this was a fascinating article. So interesting for the vegetable growers. Since the worst part of any garden is the weeding. No weed, organic vegetable garden.
I generally use a heavy straw mulch for my vegetables, a la Ruth Stout. If I had access to more compost, I might give this a try.
Coincidentally I got help on my crowded, non-blooming day lily plants yesterday via NextDoor. Somebody offered lilies that had sprouted in a gifted flower pot. I asked about when/how for day lily dividing. Outcome was a gardener coming over to my yard todemo the method and then dig some up for herself. Win/Win. She also gave some hints about moving some to a sunnier locations.
Got a whole lot of potted tulips from Trader Joe’s that were gifted to me which stopped blooming. The plant info stake said that they could be replanted outside after they’ve finished blooming. Research online seems to state that potted tulips rarely rebloom if planted outside, but I thought it was worth a try. Anyone with tulip knowledge to share?
There has been a lot of controversy over tilling dirt. As the article mentions it can disturb the good stuff like works in the soil.
The use of cardboard or even newspaper has been around for awhile - the biggest problem may be having enough good compost to be above the cardboard. Or depending on your garden, enough cardboard to cover your space!
I use leaf mulch around my plants once planted and taking off - that helps a lot with weeding and keeping moisture in. I just have a raised bed for vegetables so no tilling.
I live in AZ and our dirt here has, like, ZERO organic matter in it. When we moved into our house, the ‘soil’ was like cement. This hard pan stuff that’s like a rock. When I started planting trees in the backyard, I needed a jack hammer.
I’m in this Facebook gardening group and people were talking about putting down wood chips that they get for free from Chip Drop. I started doing that. The first winter, I laid down wood chips through the entire backyard about 12" deep. By 3 months later, it was 6" deep and worms showed up. I put another 6" of mulch down 6 months later. Then again about once a year in late Nov/early Dec.
After about 4 years, there’s now a small narrow layer of dark black soil that’s on top of the hard pan clay stuff. And I hardly ever have to weed anything.
In fact, the spots where I get the most weeds are where there’s gravel.
I think that this method can totally work, but it can also take a long time for it to happen with layer upon layer of mulch, compost, etc. So in the meantime, I attempt to grow vegetables in raised beds. 
Visiting friends in southern CA and they have a massive loquat tree in their front yard. Ate this entire bowl for breakfast! So juicy and amazing!
Should finish picking out my radishes the next few days. Picked my first ever bunch of arugula last night which I enjoyed on my home made egg mcmuffin this morning! It has been very mild and very dry here - very little rain the last couple of weeks.
I never had much luck growing radishes here in my neck of the woods… daikon- yes. Grew a ton of that, but radishes all go to seed very quickly. I gave up. It is tomatoes and cucumbers and squash and eggplant from now on.
I always throw some seed in an April - they take only about a month so they seed, they grow, I pick, and then can plant something in their place - and if they don’t work, no harm done!
I also ate the radish greens last night! Very yummy. Sauté a little garlic in olive oil for a minute, add cleaned greens, cook for 2 minutes till wilted. Salt, pepper, a little red pepper flakes and a squeeze of lemon and done!
Nice!
I tried to do this… no matter what I’ve done, they all are going to seed before developing a root that can be eaten. I gave up! 
Those look great. Have you tried radish and butter sandwiches?
I have not! Just baked some bread - might have to try it for lunch! Like bread, butter, sliced radish and a little salt?
We had an unusually long, tough winter here. (Somebody on NextDoor commented that some plant growth is 21 days behind a typical year?) My tulips were uninspired, and the few that were out got trashed by hail. Twice. Many of my iris didn’t bloom… perhaps they were early variety.
But all around town we are having a wonderful show of iris this week! Here is a sampling from my front yard.
Yesterday we were visiting a favorite local winery, and I saw a stunning purple/white variety. It’s tempting to get new iris bulbs. But I’m sticking to the original plan of getting only new tulips and daffodil bulbs. Iris were favorites of my mom (and my grandfather), so I will just be dividing iris she planted years ago. That way any iris I see in the yard is linked to Mom’s bulbs. Silly, I know.
Not silly!
My husband is in charge of the gardens.
He has a plan. To plant flowers that bring him joy! They are a mishmash of colors, he tries to put them in a way where the smaller plants are in front and the larger in back. But it’s definitely not a curated collection 
Other than one type of day lily around the deck that is. That he sprays once a week with deer and rabbit repellent because apparently day lily must be delicious!
I can confirm that deer will decimate day lilies. That reminds me, I need to relocate mine to closer to the house for that very reason.
Thoughts about this tool? Just saw it in my feed as I take a break after about 2 hours on my hands and knees pulling weeds, raking the top soil of a large bed….
