By Kay M. Phiel, Gwinnett County Master Gardener In early May, 2011,  a friend and I took a Road Scholar/Elderhostle program to the Black Hills, Bad Lands, and Mount Rushmore in South Dakota.  We were surprised to see a Prairie Homestead out in the very desolate-looking Bad Lands area of western South Dakota.  It was raining fairly heavily that day so we didn’t explore as much as we might have.  I picked up a brochure just before we reboarded the bus and was surprised to read a portion on Iris Gardens.   We did not actually see the iris’ when we were there, as they were in another area, but I thought you might find the brochure interesting.     Iris Gardens (Retyped from a brochure about a Prairie Homestead in the Bad Lands, Philip, South Dakota) “When the first Homesteaders came to this area many of them brought iris plants from…

In 2009 the kudzu bug, also called the globular stinkbug, Megacopta cribraria, was first observed in Georgia, which appears to be when and where it was introduced to the US.  These small stinkbugs are native to Southeast Asia and feed primarily on Kudzu.  They however also feed on soybeans, one of Georgia’s agricultural crops.  I first noticed them when I looked at my fig tree in late March this year and found it literally covered in these tiny bugs.  I sent a photo to Marlene at the Extension office as I could not find them in my insect book. Over a period of a few weeks the bugs slowly left my fig tree and probably started feeding on Kudzu as it steadily greened up.  They obviously prefer legumes to figs.  But, once my string beans and soybean plants started growing the bugs were back.  They seem to favor the stems…