Fava bean takedown

I am so over the triffids. So two days ago I put on my big hominid pants and got to work.

Despite me not watering for a few days (to ease removal) and despite spraying all the time- the vines were just black with aphids still.

Gross gross gross gross gross.

I harvested the few broad beans I got a while back- everything I pulled was destined for the compost bin.

But what about the ladybugs?

Well of course I saved them!

Some had interesting spot patterns.

Now they live on my really nice tomatoes!

So it took a while (and I had to stomp down in the green can to get it all in) but after all that work:

Silly bee eater for scale.

The worst part of this is: because of how screwed up the fava beans got I’m probably not going to be able to save the soil. The whole initial point of growing the fava beans as cover crop was to fix nitrogen to the soil for next season’s plants- and I’m not even going to get that!

And what few beans I got don’t look too great- and this was a variety meant as cover crop not for eating so they’ll probably taste not great.

*sigh*

At least the bed is freed up for other plants now- and the aphid breeding apparatus is gone.

The worst thing was having the spray down the compost bin because the aphids were trying to escape the bin. No pictures because I don’t want to be responsible for vomit covered keyboards or phones.

I need to buy more neem oil. I also need several long showers.

You win some- you lose some. True of life- true of gardening.

Lesson learned.