The Great Bug Release!!

The bugs arrived on Thursday just before sun set. I had to release most of them right away, so i had to race to the greenhouse to get them released before sun down.

The tomato plants and a few of the flats of beans have a white fly infestation. I released Delphastus pusillus to help curb the problem. Today i only found two white flies so they seem to be doing their job. Please excuse the funky top of this tomato plant, i accidentally bent it with my 'chest' area last week. 

This is another shot of the tube. The beetles are the black dots on the strips of paper. 

You can't see anything here but i released Stratiolaelaps scimitus which are little tiny predatory mites that eat the fungus gnat larva. My fungus gnat infestation is the worst of the three infestations i have, it's pretty intense. They're really tiny flies when they're adults and i breath them in a lot while i'm working, not fun, very gross. They're also eating the roots of my beans which is really pissing me off. I've lost two and a half flats to these little bastards. 

This is the tube they came in, you can't see the bugs so i figured i would show you this. 

I have a slight aphid problem, my ladybugs are still kickin but not in the numbers i would like them to be in. When the bugs arrived these little guys hadn't hatched yet. They started hatching yesterday and i've been doing a slow release with them. Yesterday was about 50 and today was around 100 flies. These little guys don't like fans very much so i only have the ones on the ceiling going with is causing the fungus gnats to explode in population. I also have to keep the humidity high for these flies and the mites, which is also not helping with the fungus gnat issue. 

When the beetles came out of shock they all ran to the tops of the bamboo stakes that the tomatoes are tied too. Weird little bugs. 

I still have to order in a few more bugs for the fungus gnat issue so i'll be doing this again soon. 

A side note: since all the snow melted today i went out to check the garden. I still have 3 heads of cabbage kickin and 3 kohl rabi's, if the sun comes out i'll be able to harvest them in a few days. 

My experiment in growing during the winter in Northern Ontario.

Well all things considered it's actually going fairly well, in fact I've been eating fresh yellow beans straight off the plant for a few days now. However, there are a few problems.

Regulating the temperature has been a challenge. I finally had my humidity controls installed the other day so the humidity levels have finally started to drop. Unfortunately the damage has already been done; as I now have a fairly large fungus gnat problem. The fungus gnat larva has started too eat the roots of various plants so I've been holding off replanting until this weekend. I also have a white fly and aphid problem. I've ordered about 6000 various predator bugs to help with the infestation and they should be here on Friday.

Water has been another issue. Trucking watering cans to and from the house got a little old so we filled a 45 gallon drum and put a pump in it so i'm able to water a little faster. Unfortunately filling the drum back up requires a warm day to run a hose to the greenhouse.

The doors of the greenhouse are being replaced in two weeks to help with the humidity and the over all heat loss problem.

I'm not supplementing any light right now, i'm just using what the sun gives me. So far stretching hasn't become a huge issue. For the most part everything is growing pretty nicely.

I know that i haven't been blogging as regularly as i would like,  I've taken a fairly large amount of projects on right now and i'm trying my best to manage my time accordingly so my blog has had to take a back seat. Also i haven't really had much to report.