Penny Carnathan

Penny’s a Nurture And Hold (NAH): Nah, I won’t pull that out yet, it’s still got a green shoot. She likes dragonflies, lady bugs and new stuff only after weeding, pruning and fertilizing.

Kim Franke-Folstad

Kim’s a Want It Now (WIN): Everything pretty, everything now. She will resort to full-spectrum insecticides in desperate situations, and believes it’s her duty and right to buy new plants every weekend.

Both advocate Plant Choice (SOMEthing besides crotons. Please!), lots of color and low maintenance. We don’t agree on everything, but we’re smart enough to learn from each other - and from you.

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There must be 50 ways to kill a lubber [so if you’re my neighbor, please pick one]

Posted Jun 28, 2009 by Loren Omoto

Updated Jun 28, 2009 at 02:19 PM

Dear Neighbors,

Please. Kill your lubbers.

I know they’re yours because I already killed mine. Months ago. When they were teeny-tiny. I knew what they’d grow up to be so I got ‘er done.

You didn’t, and now your Eastern lubber grasshoppers are the size of small dogs. Small herbivorous dogs completely encased in body armor. And they’ve discovered my yard. Which has led me to do things I never thought I would.

It’s hard to kill small dogs encased in body armor. It’s harder still if you’re the kind of person who rights upside-down beetles and rescues lizards from cats. I wouldn’t even swat a fly (unlike a certain president).

But it’s us against the lubbers. No animal in its right mind eats them.

The other day, while snipping scaly branches off a jatropha, I came face to face with yet another lubber. (Your lubber, dear neighbor.) I reached out and snipped him in two with my garden shears. Just like that. Heartless.

It was a first for me. It is not who I am.

But snipping is, at least, humane.

The next day, I came upon a lubber on a mammoth sunflower. Having no shears handy, I picked up two rocks and clapped them together. The cold spray of lubber guts on my neck was — ohmygosh. But even worse was looking down and seeing the poor crushed creature still trying to get up. The heavily armored do not go gentle …

This isn’t the soothing tranquility I seek in my garden. And I don’t like what I’m becoming.

So please, beloved neighbors, kill your lubbers.

I’m not asking you to put a Cuban tree frog in a baggie in the freezer, or even to stop feeding the Muscovy ducks so they’ll move away. Just the lubbers.

Cause they’re eating your garden, too.