Friday, December 01, 2006

Cat-astrophic Plant Pathogen?



Catchy title aside, let's look at this catagory of plant pests. Today's Problems and Solutions question: Is a capering cat a catalyst for plant room cataclysm? Or is this calm kitten only considering catching up on a much needed catnap?

What do you do to keep pets away from plant room shelves and show plants? Do your pets cause you any problems? How do you remove pet hair from the delicate leaves of your plants? -No catty comments now... (Many thanks to our most handsome volunteer, Hoover, whose photo was submitted by S.J.)

Does anyone have any interesting links to sites relating to violets and gesneriads that they would like to share? Send us an email with the link information and we'll post it for everyone to take a look at.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Fortunately my cats don't seem too interested in my plants but I've used crumpled up aluminum foil by things I want my cats to avoid. They aren't too fond of stepping on it. Has anyone tried growing some aromatic herbs like rosemary or basil by your other plants on the light stand? Animals aren't always interested in things with a scent.

Anonymous said...

Parakeets and cockatiels love just about any plant. If they're flying around, be sure your plants are behind closed doors. Our rabbit considered the AV's a smorgasborad. He sampled each one within reach. In his case, chicken wire around the plant stand to the height he could not jump.

In gardening catalogs I have seen a type of plastic "grass" that cats won't walk on.

Anonymous said...

Fortunately the only plant my cat liked was a Spider Plant! She never bothered my violets. I was lucky!