by lonv166 » Sat Mar 31, 2012 2:58 pm
First, I agree with Lolly. We don't have garter snakes here, but we do have a very similar type, it is called a house snake due to it wanting to be near (or even in) houses. We had a small problem last fall with rats, but now the house snakes have moved in, no more problems.
In the Philippines, it is terribly easy to grow certain things. I needed to fence off part of the property as cows had decided my plants were edible. I cut some limbs of a very common tree, and stuck them into the ground as posts. Three months later I had trees growing.
The average Filipino throws seeds over the ground. Some, will dig a hole 2 inches wide and place the seed there. There is no tilling as we know it, there is no watering as we know it. While the Filipino will dead-head flowers, they do not see a reason to dead-head other plants.
Ultimately, it works for them, the no-work approach. Land is so fertile here, things grow even when you don't want them to do so. I am now planting tomatoes the first of every month. Got lots of them, but the local market is crazy about beefsteak (I am the only one who has them). Our dirt is virgin, no one had ever (in living memory) tilled this land. In fact, no one would come to the land as it was deemed dangerous, filled with spirits and snakes. A Filipino jungle.