Slug Solution?

 I prepared my baskets two different ways.  Some of them I put cuttings in.  The cuttings lived, but the baskets look pretty sad.  

 This basket shows the second way I prepared the baskets.  I just broke off the stems and kept the roots.  I put the roots in a new liner with new soil.  These look better than the others right now.  I don't know which I'll like better further on in the season.

 The cuttings I took did ok in the greenhouse, but they look awful so far in the flower boxes.  Larry said they always look awful at first.  We'll see if they even survive, much less look good.

 I put the ones I prepared with the roots in front.

 This picture shows the shelves I'm painting for the porch.  I want to keep my gourds on the porch.  The next step on the shelves is clear varnish.  I used exterior paint, and I'll use high-gloss exterior varnish when I'm sure the shelves are dry.

 This is the frame and bottom two shelves.  

This picture shows a slug and lots of diatomaceous earth.  The diatomaceous earth is supposed to prevent slugs.  I've decided it really just lets them show up against it.  I found a link that said slugs don't like caffeine and strong, dripped coffee is an organic method of fending against slugs.  So far the best thing seems to be finding them, picking them off, smearing them with my shoe.  Yuck!