Rebecca Branham

Trapping the rodent was my first experience with a mole; it's different than the pocket gophers I trapped as a kid in MN.  The boards of the raised beds make the effort so difficult, because of the way the jaws have to be positioned to work.
Steve Solomon started Territorial Seed Co. over by Eugene.  He states the PNW soil, because of our pattern of heavy winter rainfall, is deficient in everything but potassium.  In the book, he has a recipe for building a supplement.  I don't have any outbuilding to store the materials = I've ordered some from a company that still formulates it.  
After reading the book, I'm pretty sure my problems are due to use of grass hay in building the compost piles---and even using grass clippings for mulch on the beds.  I wasmaking high potassium levels even higher for the plants.
I wondered if there was a way to trap the potassium and remove it, thus lowering numbers., But it's probably a better approach to make a concerted effort to raise everything else up.  And no more grass.

I'm 74.  I've gardened for many years---in many soil and climate types.  This current situation has me baffled.
This is my 5th summer at this location.  I moved from Coastal Oregon with it's sand.  My "garden" was 4 and 5 gallon buckets and some 4'x4' raised beds.  I had a lot of wonderful help moving and was able to bring much of it with me.  Everything that first summer of re-establishing the beds looked normal.  The next year, plants struggled.  I put it down to the damage done by a mole---air pruning with it's tunnels.  It took me a month to trap it.  The next year, I dug around to collapse the tunnels.  Plants still struggled.
I have 4 cubic-yard compost bins.  One is always being emptied, another being filled and two decomposing.  I had two tiered worm farms, but the moles kept invading to eat the worms. I now have a worm box.
I have a composting toilet.  3-4 5 gallon bucket contents go into each bin.  I thought the urine might be causing a salt build up---even with 40" of rain a winter....  So I quit adding it, although it hasn't caused any problems with other gardens that I know of..
There are many oak trees here and I wondered if the leaves weren't great for the bins because of tannin.  The grass growing under the trees is not lush.I  switched to local grass hay for my carbon source.
I don't have a car and order many things online.  The cardboard goes into the bins.
I first read the Solomon book when I moved to OR many years ago, but didn't register the K info.  I rented from a lady with goats and I remember she bought alfalfa from the eastern part of the state, because it was necessary for milk production---vs buying local grass hay.  So, I knew about the deficiencies of the hay, but didn't consider it could impact my gardening.  She also supplemented with Selenium.
I don't believe in the usefulness of soil teats; they say nothing about availability of plant nutrients.  My neighbor's tomatoes don't have cat faces. So Ca is fine....
Having dealt with symphylans in the past, I've developed the practice of starting seedlings off in 4x4 pots with good soil.  It hasn't been enough to produce the results you would expect after transplanting.
I've ordered some liquid fertilizer that is 5-5-1.  My next experiment.

I'm reading Steve Solomon's book "Growing Vegetables West of the Cascades".  I'm in the southern end of the Willamette Valley.
He says our soils are unbalanced---with too much potassium.  Apparently, I've been making my situation even worse by using the native grass hay in my compost.  And adding comfrey---a bioaccumulator for potassium..
Would it work to plant lots more comfrey and totally remove the biomass from the system?
Any other ideas?

My carrot problems here in the PNW has been slugs eating the young plants.  I've found seeding carrots during time periods of lesser slug activity helps.  And adding bonemeal helps solve the not filing out problem.  I can have lovely greens that don't have much underground.

At a former garden, I had everbearing strawberry plants that were called a "crown" variety.  They were entirely runnerless (unless stressed---then there would sometimes be some runners.)   To reproduce, they made another plant(s) right along side the original = every 3-4 years you had to dig up the clump that was now 50+ plants.  The original and older center plants had deteriorated, thus forming the ring/crown of younger plants.
This past spring, I wanted to establish a strawberry bed.  I spent hours on the Internet and couldn't find anything but alpine strawberries that were runnerless.  I've raised red and yellow alpine strawberries from seed before---totally different from what i was looking for.
Does anyone recognize what I've described?

YouTube has a couple of videos about manual hay balers.

Revitalized old post.  Writing to comment on the stinky compost.  It smells because it is too wet; it is anaerobic.  Anaerobic bacteria are not the ones you want.  The stinky compost will have to dry out and become populated with aerobic bacteria before it is useful.  Actually, before it is not harmful.
The solution is to also put in dry carbonous material when filling the bucket---to balance the wet nitrogen rich vegies.

I make ghee because I can't tolerate the cassein protein = I discard the bottom-of-the-pan stuff.  Am writing to just say it's not necessary to skim the foam during the process, because it is the water boiling off and will soon be gone.  When the foam is all gone and you can see the bottom of the pan through the clear ghee, it's time to pour out of the pan.  If all the milk solids haven't settled, straining will catch them, but you have clarified butter.  More cooking will get you to ghee.

I've experienced gophers not crossing a bed of daffodils to get into the garden....

My question would be to ask you about her diet.  How much research have you done on the topic?  Wet food vs dry food.  Any raw?  Grain free isn't enough, because some brands use potato and tapioca starch.  Carrageenan and gum free?  American pet food rules say if the food contains more than 25% fish, vitamin K must be added (because vitamin K isn't available from fish) and the only approved (synthetic) vitamin k supplement is bad.

I'm sorry you all are having such a difficult time.  It sounds like you are investing lots of effort and energy into reversing the flea situation.  I wish you all a success!

Until it freezes, you could be bringing fleas into the house from the yard on your shoes.  I went through the flea fight with my indoor cats---even in a 3rd floor apt. in a cement block building!