Day 29

Baby Sunflower sunning up the place!

Guess what I did this morning? Yep, harvested strawberries and asparagus. Also got in some quality learning time, priceless. But if pressed for a price I'd say $119.00 worth of learning.
For starters, I recommend everyone that can grow asparagus and wait a couple years for it to establish, do. I stared at one, turned around, and I swear it grew 3 inches and was already bragging to its friends before I could turn back around. They grow so fast and are so good for you, besides being delicious. You can harvest asparagus for 5-8 weeks. Plus those little guys can come back for 50 years! That's older than Madonna! (it's not but you had to think about it didn't you)  
In strawberry land I learned about runners. The plant sends out a runner, a horizontal stem that reminds me of something from the movie Alien. The runners test the land around to see where it wants to move to find more suitable growing locations for their strawberry kids.  This allows them to find better soil or areas of better sunlight. Once established, the runners will dry, shrivel, turn brown, and eventually separate leaving two independent plants: the original and the clone. We can then pot up these plants and keep them for strawberries round 2, the sequel.
However, the strawberry plant only wants to eat, grow, and reproduce. Wouldn't we all? Get back to work strawberry plant! So, the propagating energy used up in sending runners does not go into production of strawberries. Therefore, we cut them off.

One plant can grow 30-50 runners

Moving on to bugs. We saw a few ladybug larvae and they look so different then what you'd think, like a little blue and yellow crocodile. These guys are so beneficial they can feed on up to 50 aphids a day. Watch out for the hungry lady!

I'm good

Now what you've all been waiting for: I caught the mouse!!! I'll spare you the details, just know it came down to an epic battle and I won! One down!

In other news, Erica found a tick on her yesterday and swallowed a bug today. I don't know about you, but I'm nervous for her tomorrow.