Out of season rain editionpastebin:https://pastebin.com/Mvfh8b87New USDA zone map has been released: https://planthardiness.ars.usda.gov/Koppen Climate Map: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/fb/K%C3%B6ppen_World_Map_High_Resolution.pngSearch terms:Agrarian, Agriculture, Agrology, Agronomy, Aquaculture, Aquaponics, Berkeley Method Hot Composting, Cold Frames, Companion Planting, Composting, Container Gardening, Core Gardening Method, Cultivation, Deep Water Culture (DWC), Dry Farming, Espalier, Farmer's Market, Forest Gardening, Forestry, Fungiculture, Geoponics, Greenhouses, Homesteading, Horticulture, Hot Boxes, Hügelkultur, Humanure, Hydroponic Dutch Bucket System, Hydroponics, Keyhole Garden, Korean Natural Farming, Kratky Method, Landscaping, Lasagna Gardening, Ley Farming, Market Garden, Mulching, No-till Method, Ollas Irrigation, Orchard, Permaculture, Polyculture, Polytunnels, Propagation, Rain Gutter Garden, Raised Beds, Ranch, Rooftop Gardening, Ruth Stout Garden, Sharecropping, City Slicker Composting, Shifting Cultivation, Soil-bag Gardening, Square Foot Gardening, Stale Seed Bed, Sugar Bush, Truck Farming, Vermiculture, Vertical Gardening, Window Frame Garden, Windrow Composting, Alpaca, Snail, Toad, Trumpeter, Turkey, Worm, biochar, vermicompostingLast thread: >>2868554(Un)official /HGM/ discord: https://discord.gg/TvN3Ed4Geh
Transplanted a dozen hostas from the in laws yesterday. Everything else is still just growing but I’m getting some tiny peppers.
Took this picture the other day, she showed up in my lawn and ate my guinea fowls corn bran, she wouldn't get any closer because my dog was sleeping next to me.
>>2872029I don't know why but I have an irrational hatred of hostas. They're just the most vanilla grandma-tier plant of all time
>>2872031Is that a fucking tapir?
>>2872031Is that cassava?
>>2872033There are cool variants
>>2872034Yes, a couple came here at night once, I guy that worked here said he saw the calf with the mother a couple of months ago.>>2872035Yes, I planted it first to give shade to the other trees, turns out the partridges love them and now dozens of them come here each day to eat the roots.
>>2872036Surely you're joking?
>>2872033Kek. I like em.>>2872036This is as blue as they get. Trust me. Gotta pull out that wandering jew.
>>2872033cant beat em? eat em!
>>2872031Just kill it and eat it.Might i recommend a hosta garnish?>>2872047
>>287203811/10 would buy.But mines real and not AI
For the season I'm at:>87 quarts of green beans>35 pints of salsa>14 chics (id normally be around 400 at this point in the season but the grandbaby is a lot of work so we're just focusing on stabilizing the flock- will probably get around 50 hatchings)>snapdragon seeds from last year are blooming.These are my favorite flowers of all time and ive never been able to keep them alive and I got some plants that kept going for over 2 years- they even bloomed in the fucking snow!>planted buttercrunch lettuce 2 years ago, they seeded out and came back this year, seeded again. Need to collect seeds.>stuck onion that was growing in the pantry in a pot. Forgot about it. Died off in winter. Started growing in spring and I was like "wtf is this?!" Kept watering it. Came back this year, flowered and seeded. Need to collect seed.>garlic always does well. We use a lot of garlic. Store bought is "just as good!" since its just dried and not processed but its awesome to just go out in the yard and dig it up when you need fresh. Probably my favorite part of growing shit.Pic is garlic just starting to seed.We have so much that just spreads from root that we dont actually "plant" any (that pic is from my lawn) but im thinking of taking the seeds and nurturing it across about a half acre.Fuck it.I love garlic and have property so why not...
>>2872080Onion seeds.I was really excited about this because ive had onions flower but never seed.I like to cook and ive seen recipes with "onion seed" so I was pumped and then i actually googled it and "onion seeds" in cooking recipes isnt actually "onion seeds" but some shit called "Nigella" and actual onion seeds are only used to grow more onions.So im going to grow a fuckload of onions.
>>2872081Snapdragon I grew from seed from hard-core stock that lasted 2+ years and bloomed in the snow.I was afraid that the seeds would be like morning glory and instantly regress to the "big blue" dominant gene variant but I have tons of colors so this is my second highlight of the natural world (first being catching a wild scarlet kingsnake- dont worry I released it in the treeline. Got some good pics to match the pattern if I find it again someday)
I don't like the new mower I got a month ago, I can't return it because I used it and it's been a little over a month. Oh well, thank you for reading my blog
>>2872084Ive seen your future and it was glorious.
>>2872086I want to get a Stihl mower or go balls to the wall and get a ferris 15fw.
>>2872089>brandfag
>>2872078>mines real and not AII hate to be the bearer of bad news
>>2872095>Using names makes you a brandfagWew
>raspberry already producing the first fruits of the season>one of the banana pepper plants i bought already produced a long thin pepper>tons of flowers on the squash alreadycan't wait for more stuff to get blooming and growingThe biggest problem i have right now is what i believe is sawfly larvae eating the rosebush leaves. This is the third year they've been eating away at the plant. Is there a better spray i should be using to try and get rid of them? I was using neem oil but that seems to only work for a little bit and then they eat the shit out of the plant even if i spray some more.
>>2872143Have you tried first press neem oil and mixing it with water and a surfactant of your own?
>>2872145hmm no i haven't. would that be like mixing it with a little dawn dish soap then?
>>2872154Yes or the most mild soap you have
I put my radishes in my raised bed using seed tape. The north side are doing great, but the south aren't looking as healthy (same for the cucumbers on the left but its less extreme). I thought it might be a nutrient deficiency and mixed a few coffee grounds into the soil on the weaker ones but it hasn't done anything. Any idea of what's going on and what I could do?
>>2872163Does the shed cast a shadow on them during the morning?Some plants strongly prefer gentle morning light during the cooler part of the day. So for mid-day and evening they'll go into "survival mode" during the brightest and hottest times of the day. So the southern ones have a smaller window of photosynthesis. Unironically the solution might be to add shade cloth to keep them cool and give them a longer window of gentle light. Then maybe removing shade cloth as they mature and can handle more direct sun. You also should have filled up that bed more. The sides are also casting a shadow onto your plants. Check the soil temp of the cucumbers, which may also need shade cloth over the plant and around black bucket.
>>2872191based post. shade cloth can be crucial for sensitive plants, and that does include radishes, beets, and cucumbers. they all do great with only about 3-4 hours is direct sun per day, and benefit from shade cloth if the sun exposure exceeds that.
>>2871293Spider mites and fungus gnats killed my sick strawberry plant.Some other mysterious insect is causing leaf burn and sticky sap on my indoor avocados. Google says leafhopper, but I've only ever seen a few leafminers, which are dead now. For now I'm going systemic with imidacloprid, since I won't be getting any avocados for 2 years.
>>2872026why are the leaves drying up and falling off my pepper plants. i dont see any bugs.. do they need more fertilizer? i put rabbit poop and compost on them and thats it this year
>>2872467the stems seem to be very brittle, they break by barely moving them
>>2872468Yep. I bought a pepper plant from a bigbox store and it snapped in half when repotting. It survived and hardened, but new leaves with thin stems would get damaged by wind.
>>2872474these are Tabasco seeds i saved from a plant grown from seeds from baker creek. ive grown them 3 yrs in a row and this is the first time ive had trouble
>>2872026Went to allotment for first time in probably a month, it's now a nature reserve. Bee's a loving it though. You can see the amount of wild flowers we have which it nice. Trimmed paths and watered what was still surviving. Early potatoes need pulling up, broad beans have survived, so have the peas next to them. They seem to be using the flowers as ad-hoc supports to grow up. They're salvageable.Noob question: When trimming weeds/unwanted plants, would you recommend putting them all in a compost pile? Or would you burn some and compost others i.e. Compost grass & burn brambles?Ta in advance.
Bees are going crazy on my poppies. Seems like there’s some opiates in the pollen or something.
Bees also love my lovage, especially the various non-domesticated ones. Too bad that it’s making too much shade now at 2 meters and is in the way for harvesting my black currant. Left some smaller flower stalks though. Really need to hang up some more wood with various holes and stuff to attract some more of those bees.
>>2872519Depends on the species' root system. Some you can cut once and drop it as mulch and you're done. Others will tolerate that abuse and grow back so they need to be dug up or cut repeatedly. Brambles have an interconnected network underground and are a bit much to deal with by hand. It just depends on whether you have enough stuff to fill up a whole compost bed, otherwise you can drop it on the ground and let nature digest it. Some stuff that will aggressively root and grow back might be better off in a hot compost to ensure it's destroyed, but that's about it. I don't think you have to burn anything, I *think* that's just a way of avoiding handling thorns.
got a bunch of free municipal compost. it is like a paste/clay consistency and goes rock hard when it dries. what can i do with this stuff?I planted 3 tomato plants in the ground and sort of mixed some of the compost into the soil by hand. Is there a way to make this stuff more workable and not so clumpy? is there a way of aging/curing it?
>>2872547Post a pic of it. Maybe just use it as a mulch if it's not good as a soil amendment
>>2872548I'll try mulching some stuff with it
>>2872547>municipal compost. it is like a paste/clay consistencyDude.Thats sediment from the settling tanks at the sewage treatment plant.Not even kidding.It used to be legally required to go to the landfill but (((they))) passed laws in multiple countries (including the U.S.) to relabel it and sell to the public.Atleast yours was free....
>>2872552Sounds like it can be high in heavy metals
>>2872552>>2872553here its tested for heavy metals and stuff and approved for agriculture. kinda regret using it though. the store bought stuff blended with the soil way betterhttps://www.toronto.ca/services-payments/recycling-organics-garbage/houses/what-happens-to-organics/
>>2872554If it's not toxic then I wouldn't be too afraid of it. As long as it's broken up, it should be good to mix into new beds or top dress perennials. Sounds like ass to try and germinate seeds in though.
>>2872555>Sounds like assSmells like it too.
>>2872561Does it actually? Then it should be high in nitrogen and not used like compost.
>>2872565Ya I bought a bag of the cheapest "potting soil" at home depot and it actually smelled exactly like you'd expect a 50 pound bag of shit to smell like.Thats when I did some research and found out about the "reclassification of" human waste from a bio hazard to an "organic gardening compound". >you will eat the bugs, grown in human shit and accept it as the new norm.
>>2872554>>2872561Mature compost should not stinkAlso enjoy your fluoride/aluminum/other heavy metals.Good compost costs a fortune, they're giving away poison.
>>2872561>>2872565no it barely smells, its faintly earthy. its fully composted and matured before they send it out>>2872570um actually its tested for metals and stuff. it has to meet category A/AA compost standards.
>>2872569I find that waterlogged soil at the bottom of a pot tends to be sludge and have that sewer smell, not even compost just potting soil. Composted shit doesn't stink because it's been thoroughly digested and lost all of its nutrients. It's there as a medium mainly because of its texture and surface area, not for fertilization, so it should not have any detectable nitrogen smells.
>>2872573Now post the reports for pfas and pharmaceutical metabolites. "Biomass" from sewage treatment plants shouldn't be used as fertilizer by anyone.
>>2872577You mean I don't have to make tampon tea anymore and can get all my estrogen and ssris from eating shit tomatoes?
>>2872582Youre just as likely to get testosterone.So good luck with that.
Just moved one beehive of stingless bees inside the bee box yesterday, I told you guys I would take pictures of the process but I couldn't, I tore some of the honey pots by mistake so I had to improvise and I could not take pictures while doing it.
Box looks like this on the inside, first level is the entrance/exit and where the nest stays, second level is the "overnest", some space for the nest to grow upwards, queen puts the eggs in a small circle that goes up like a tower, then the level where they put the honey is from the third layer upwards.
Lots of birds eating bananas today.
>>2872594Friend had a beehive and the slats had a preformed slightly raised honeycomb pattern for the bees to follow so they didnt just start in random areas (like the lid)
>>2872596The way I make the baits with 2 liter coca-cola bottles, they make the entrance/exit at the tip near the bottleneck and go downwards, when I open the bottles and put the entire nest inside the boxes and open a small hole at the bottom edge which becomes their new entrance, and then every thing stay as is.It is so sensitive, sometimes their honey jars are attached to the walls of the bottle and then when I open they crack, which is dangerous since honey drops around a new nest can attract ants, I used part of their own nest to close the honey jars, hard to do alone. since I have to hold it with one hand and keep the entire beehive steady, if you jiggle too much you can drown the bees inside the eggs on the liquid inside.
>>2872587>get excess exogenous testosterone, testicles shrivel up and shut down endogenous testosterone productionwin/win
My red lilies have bloomed, they seem to bloom first every year.
I was really busy lately, didn't check the thread in two weeksFound this absolute unit when digging>>2871629Which cultivar do you have?A lot of older cultivars are very tartIf you let them hang a few days after they turn dark blue they get sweeter, they might also drop though, although newer cultivars have much lower tendency to dropIf you want sweet I recommend Boreal Blizzard especially Do you have at least two different cultivars?They need cross pollination for good crop
Clover everywhere>>2871663Looking objects far away or close up trains your eye's muscles responsible for changing focal length much like gym does your other musclesAfter a while of this "training" the range of focal length your eyes have increases Most people spend all day looking only at screens close up hence short slightness
If you have lupine I strongly advise removing seed pods after flowers expire unless you want to have hundreds of them next year (not an exaggeration btw)
>>2872014We had a miserable week, very wet with temperatures going as low as 3 C at night, my peppers and watermelons are just barely hanging on
>>2872643For comparison, about the same time two years ago when weather was much better
Early serviceberries are starting to ripen >>2872080Garlic doesn't actually make true seeds (it can but it's extremely rare and requires specific conditions, it's a fascinating rabbit hole if you want to read more on it, unfortunately I can't find great blog I read about it) All the "seeds" will be genetic clones of the mother plant
Watermelon on verge of death from cold and wet nights, this really suck, I had nice harvest last three years but I'm afraid I might get nothing this time>>2872519>When trimming weeds/unwanted plants, would you recommend putting them all in a compost pile?I put everything inJust get it hot (60+ C) so they decompose from heat>>2872522I have a ton of bees on clover, have to be carful when walking, they love it
Zucchinis on the other took cold pretty well, only "Atena Polka" took damage, all the zucchinis with yellow leaves here are "Atena Polka", it might be nice yellow color but I'm considering not using it again because of this >>2872552>>2872554I'm glad I make my own compost now, buying compost is such a gamble, you might get something with herbicides or it might be full of small plastic scraps, with your own you always know what you have
Close up on zucchinis themselves, I can't wait to eat them >>2872592>>2872594Beehives used here are much larger, is there a reason why yours are so small?
This was supposed to be watermelon bed but they took so much damage from cold tomatoes and cape gooseberries I have grown here 3 years ago took over I haven't planted even a single one of them, they keep seeding themselves here because I always let a few of them grow between watermelons
Ripe currants, very tasty I'll be making wine with them and gooseberries tomorrow, I could post some pictures and describe the process like last year if anyone is interested how it's done
>>2872646What variety have you got there?
Maybe too many squash for this planter. Totally mogging the 2 cucumber plants on the left. Starting to get male flowers already. Probably a week or two before any female flowers develop.
The garlic that survived the winter is doing well. I planted some closer to the edge of the planter and much of that stuff didn't make it so I filled the gaps with onions. Tomatoes are big enough to start string trellising. I planted mostly Amish Paste variety since I've been doing a lot of canning in recent years. Got about a dozen peppers growing already.
i need a new hose. i fucking hate my cheap garden hose. i've just had enough.sell me on your hose
>>2872677just got a decent one on marketplace for $15 after dealing with one with holes for like 2 years. see if you can find one on marketplace. wish I had sooner
>>2872677I have an eley hose, hose reel, nozzles, and quick connects. They are the best hose and hose accessories I have ever used, expensive as shit though.
>>2872689that is an unreal price for a hose. how good could it be?
>>2872698The hoses are drinking water safe with no lead solder used as are all of their other things. They are easily the best hose related things I have ever used.
I really want to buy a new fucking mower, the one I have now bogs down all the time in my yard full of tttf and prg.
>>2872677I like my zero-g no hoses. No kink and lightweight compared to cheap rubber hoses. It's so nice I bought one for my workplace, but it exploded. 180F water caused the crimp fitting to fail. The ones at my house have survived 5 years so far.>>2872739I want a new one too because this year I've decided to take better care of my lawn. Now it's so thick and lush it has trouble cutting every blade to the same height. I have to go back over the same spots like one of those schizos that stripe their lawns.I already got a new string trimmer because my old one doesn't work with other attachments. The old one was a ryobi with a carbon fiber shaft to reduce overall weight, but the balance was awful.
I just bought 425 feet of hoses- (3) 100s, (2) 50s and (1) 25.Just to water the new junipers i planted to "box in" the end of my shotgun range (that was the closest yard spigot).Im not dragging hoses around during the summer to keep these things alive so I bought the cheapest ones I could find.The ridiculous part is that it would have been about the same cost for pvc pipe for a permanent run but if im going to rent a trencher im going to do a lot more than that and dont feel like it right now.I actually have this cool stainless sink from a park or something im going to put down there and run electric at the same time so I dont have to deal with batteries for the throwers and I have one of those under cabinet "instahot" hot water heaters for kitchens im going to add.So there will be a stainless sink bolted to a pine tree in the middle of the forest with hot&cold running water.
>>2872746I got a new mower this year on short notice because my old one died and I didn't want the city to give me a code violation. Its been nearly two months now with it and I deeply regret the purchase, I wish I had time to look at more mowers and get a better one.
Behold
>>2872649They are designed for a bee whose size is 4 milimeters, they are called "Tetragonisca angustula".The mango trees and the Eugenia uniflora L. trees are flowering.
>>2872677i had to replace mine last year after it got a leak in it since the garden is pretty far away from the house.I took a look at i decided to spend the money and get a retractable hose. Its lifechanging.It was a little bit of a pain in the ass to drill onto the house (probably would be better with its own pole but didn't feel like digging a hole for it and buying a post) but since then its been great. You pull it out and then when you're done, you walk back and let it retract back in.
So I have narrowed it down to three mowers to cut my luscious thick lawn:Scag sfc 21 7cvStihl rm 756 yc (this is the least strong and I'm liking it less and less but still considering it) Ferris fw15 (this is overkill but it would never bog down and force me to take half passes) Honestly I should probably just get the Scag as it's the cheapest and around where I live it would be most easy to get parts as they are made in state. I'm just sick of taking half passes with my mower and wasting all that time when I could take full passes and be done in half the time.
>>2872824Get a lawn roomba.
>>2872838No, I actually enjoy mowing my lawn, I just want something that works better on the grass I have.
>>2872824>$4k for a push mowerWhat the actual fuck.You might as well buy a zero turn at that point.
>>2872845Good zero turns are twice the price, the ferris has a hydro transmission so it's less a push mower and more walk behind.
>>2872739Go ahead if you want to, but have you tried the normal maintainance of the one you have?>sharpen/change blades>replace air filter/fuel filter/plugs/hoses (usually come as a kit)>tune carburettor/clean carburettor/replace carburettor In my experience mowers will all bog if you're trying to mow something you shouldn't, and old mowers magically work as if new again if serviced.Happy to step through it with you
>>2872848I know how to do all that though, I do all the required maintenance and probably more than most people do for their mowers. My old mower died this past spring mid mow and nothing I did could fix it, I flushed both the oil and gas, replaced the entire carb, new spark plug, made sure everything could move and the choke was working, still wouldn't work. To my knowledge I didn't hit anything but whenever it started again after that, I let it sit for a week, then tried it again and it started, I thought I was fine and started mowing again. Now it surges all the time, shudders randomly, and smokes.I said fuck it and sold it on Craigslist, got a new one from the store from the same brand and took it home.I spent 500 dollars for the new mower and this brand new mower cannot do full deck width passes at walking speed on prg that has had one weeks growth, just as shit as the old mower. I'm just going to get a strong commercial mower and see if it can cut the prg and not shit itself.
when ammending native soil with compost, is it best to leave the soil sort of clumpy, work it until its fine or somewhere between the two? does it depend on the soil type?
>>2872854Make holes to dump compost in for really bad soil that needs to be fixed asap. Otherwise clumpy is fine applied once a year during your lawn's growing season.Combining compost with the right plants like clover, comfrey, daikon radish can speed up soil improvement. It will still take multiple years/seasons to fix.
>>2872858americans are wild
>>2872653Post if you still can, I've only made kit wines in the past
I walked a new trail today and found two pure or almost pure female red mulberries. The leaves and fruit were too high to grab to confirm but everything about their leaf shape is telling me pure, which would be exceptionally rare this far north
>>2872898fucked the image up lol
Is poking the dirt of a potted plant with a bamboo skewer good for aireation or am I just fucking up the roots doing that?
I guess all the maple seeds flying around were viable because I just pulled up like 50 sprouts
>>2872936Ya I get a shitload every year.I try to dig them up and take them out to my cabin because maples are cool and fuck pines.
>>2872919No, when you water your plant the soil will settle again especially if your potting soil is low quality and yes especially depending on the type of plant it'll stress it out. Repot your plants every few years when the peat and coco coir breakdown and invest in a bigass bag of pumice. Pumice is reusable, reduces the need to repot every year, and lasts longer than you will live. Vermiculite and Perlite are also good, but break down into smaller bits.
what if I over ammend with compost? I dug about 40% compost into like the top 5 inches of soil.
>>2872936yeah felt bad pulling them at first. some had woody stems
>>2872958Compost adds volume. It'll breakdown and your soil will "shrink". Since it's impossible for one man to mix it in perfectly, your lawn will develop low spots in a few years.I thought my sewage line had a leak and slowly making sinkholes because I had a big dip along it, so I had it inspected. It was fine. Previous owner amended the clay soil with compost and just dumped a bunch of it in one spot when he got lazy. His adult kids live in the neighborhood and told me about it when I asked. Then I realized why I had a bunch of random dips all over my front yard. He didn't bother amending the back.
I cannot understand why some people go out of their way to grow "bird-magnet" plants. My experience with these animals so far has been waking up to half eaten produce and shittier trees every day, some of them which I use for making tea so having to sort out the clean leaves from the shitty ones when harvesting feels more and more like a humiliation ritual as the days go by.
>>2872990gun
Oldest fava beans are ripe now and taste quite good>>2872869I haven't made any phots but I can make some tomorrow when I'll be getting rid of pulp and use some of my older photos to illustrate the process
Found dead bird again when watering today, done by some local cat I assume, there is a lot of them around here >>2872659I have Smoky and Thiessen, both are pretty good
>>2872990All the "muh native plants to support wildlife" shit is from a place of privileged redditors who live in the suburbs and don't have to deal with that. Now I don't disagree with it in priniciple, but the only wildlife they seem to care about are pests like birds and bugs. Why aren't they leaving rotting logs and rock piles for snakes?
>>2873043Based snek bro. If you don’t get reptiles and amphibians in your yard you’re doing something wrong.
>>2873043I have only seen one garden snake in the past 5 years and I have had rotting logs and rock piles for the same amount of time. How do I snake max?>>2873045>let native frogfruit grow instead of killing with herbicides>start seeing frogs in backyardHuh?
>>2873050You either don't have an actual population in your local area or it could be a lack of hibernacula. Snakes are kind of weird though, they could be there and you just don't see them. I haven't actually seen a snake in my yard this year even though I know they're here. Meanwhile I see lizards and frogs pretty much everyday.
>110F>stock birdbath with fresh water nearly every day>twenty wrens just hang out on my porch all day goofing around, staying hydrated, and just shitting everywhere holy shit i need a hose it's on the walls i dont know how
>>2873050Have areas of decaying trees and or water. I had a turtle wander through the yard five years ago and have snakes all the time.Finally got my first tree frogs to show up this spring. It takes time. I don’t care about native or not. I want frogs and bees back. I miss seeing toads.
>>2873060>I miss seeing toads.I found one chilling a few weeks ago.
>>2872990>>2873043>birbsYeah, there are asshole birds, like pigeons, but having plenty different birds would be nice. While they also can and will eat fruit and seeds they’ll also eat pests, so in theory it should even out. But the pest eating birds are kinda gone since pests tend to be pesticided, so now you’ve got to many that fuck up your shit. Also:Fuck cats. >>2873042It should be legal to shoot cats on sight if they’re not on a leash. Unless you’ve got a farm and need some cats to catch mice to protect your grains, you have no business having a cat. >>2873050>snekI’ve got quite a few and dozens of lizards. Plenty of sunny, rocky places help. Also, the plaster on my wall is peeling off and leaves lot of spots for them to hide. But eventually, I’ve gotta fix that.
>>2872026What are your lots thoughts on compostable bin bags? Do they work in your experience?
I move toads out of the driveway every night if I go to the store so I dont run them over.This year ive seen l: the big female black hognose (theres a male here too), a scarlet snake (not a scarlet king, although I found one of those a couple years ago) a smooth green snake, a juvenile eastern king and a rat snake.I have a breeding colony of box turtles on property. Found a new one this year (i take pics and file them in a book and record when ive seen each one). I think the book is at l4 individuals.
>>2873090Stop. I can only kneel so much! No wait post those fucking box turtles!Here’s the big bastard I found wandering through the yard a couple years back. I’m super jealous of your situation.
>>2873100Here's that recent box turtle.Its a female. Found.her next to the house. Was probably looking for a spot to lay eggs.The individual plates that make up their shells get new growth on the edges as they age so the pattern thats there remains unchanged for their entire lives, makes them.easy to identify if you can get a pic like this.I still.need to look back at another scarlet snake I found a year or two ago and see if the pattern matches the one from this year.
>>2872919>>2872950Don't listen to him. As long as you're not poking through strong resistance (I.E. a root in your way) like a retard, you can loosen compacted soil quite a bit.I do agree that reporting and amending the soil is the correct way to go long term tho, but for the short term, it helps.Just don't go overboard
>>2872990
>>2872869I'll use my photos from grape wine two years ago since I don't have any good photos for the first phaseFirst acquire fruits, there are so many you could use, grapes, gooseberries, currants, serviceberries, bananas, tomatoes, strawberries, rhubarb, elderberries, cherries of all kinds and so on
>>2873129Next clean, sperate all the woody parts out and pulp them, do not use a blender if it's a seedy fruit, damaging seeds will ruin taste, just damage the skin
>>2873130Optionally you can measure BLG / potential alcohol / specific gravity Here I have BLG of about 15 which should give me about 7% alcohol after it's done, it's not super accurate but good enough for home brewing
>>2873131Next prep the yeast, packaging will tell you how much you should use You can also use natural yeast (basically do nothing, it's already on fruits) but that can be inconsistent and take much longer to start, since yeast is cheap buying is a good optionYou can also add pectic enzyme to speed up breakdown of fruits, entirely optional
>>2873132Pour everything into a fermentation jar, if your fruits don't have enough juice to submerge everything add waterYou can also add sugar at this step, dissolve into boiling water For deciding how much I'll give an example, this wine is 7% of potential alcohol for one percent in one liter you need 17 grams of sugar, keep in mind added water has 0%So I have 8 liters of grape wine at 7%, let's say I want 12%, I need 5*17*8 = 680 grams of sugar to bring it to 12% but I need to dissolve that in waterLet's say I'm going to mix it with 1.5 liters of water to add volume too so I add 1.5 liters of 0% so I need to add 1.5*12*17 = 306 grams to account for added water ar 12% of alcoholBut there is a problem if we do that, it'll put us above 10% of potential alcohol which means yeast will struggle initially so instead of doing that we only add half a kilogram in 0.75 liters of water now and a few days to a week later when it goes through some of that sugar add second dose, this is how high alcohol wine is made, you never add everything at once
>>2873133I forgot, of course you wait until sugar mixture cools down before you add it, you don't want to kill the yeastYou are pretty much done for now, mix everything up and close the jarPut your jar into cool, dark place, you don't want any direct sunlight and temperature between 18 and 25 C, cooler and fermentation will slow down, stops almost completely below 12 C, yeast might die if it gets even colder but also don't get it too hot, it damages flavor, fermentation will rise the temperature by a few degrees so keep it somewhere where it isn't hotter than about 25 C, definitely don't exceed 30 CNow all you have to do is come daily and stir it to make sure it's all wettedYou'll know it's working by bubbles coming out of the airlock, if there are no bubbles after a day and you used bought yeast something went wrong, start troubleshooting by checking if you didn't exceed 12% of potential alcohol (happend to me) if so add water to dilute it, if that is not the case add yeast again, it might work this time It could also be acidity but that's pretty rare problem unless you are doing something like banana that has no acid of it's own, in this case you need to add acid, I recommend ascorbic acid, it's a rabbit hole if anyone is curious about acidification I'll elaborate
Ok now the second step, removal of fruit pulpAfter how many days you want to do it will depend on fruit, flavor you are aiming for and speed of fermentation which depends on temperature mostly, you can also do it sooner if you added pectic enzymeIn my case for this gooseberry wine I'm doing it after four days because it's warm and I want lighter flavor that comes with shorter time of keeping fruits inFirst you want to clean your equipment, I use potassium metabisulfite dissolved in water to get rid of any unwanted microorganismsYou'll need something to squeeze fruit in manually if you don't have a fruit press, big funnel with a filter will also help a lot but it's optionalRinse everything with water after potassium metabisulfite, you don't want it to kill yeast in your wine
>>2873136Pour your fruit must into cloth for squeezing fruit (not sure how it's called in English) do it in small portions for easier squeezing, wait for liquid to drain then squeeze the rest of it, dispose of fruit pulp (in the bowl here) It'll take a while, fruit press is a good idea if you intend on making a lot of wine
>>2873137Taste what you have Optionally you can measure sugar content, as you can see here it's almost zero What you do now will depend on what you want to achieve, I want less tart wine and more alcohol so I'll add 3 liters of water for dilution with 600 grams of sugar dissolved for more alcohol
>>2873138Sugar mixture cooled down enough to add it to wine, I'm done for now, should give me 9% of alcohol
>>2873145Now over time remaining fragments will clump and fall to the bottom, example on the bottom in this photo, after some of it builds up I'll syphon wine out into other jar to remove it, I'll do it several times before wine clears up probably in about half a yearSo for now it's going into storage for at least 3 weeksIt's already good to drink though, early wine has really nice tasteI used 6.5 kg of gooseberries and 1.5 kg of red currant for this wine, pure gooseberry wine is good but it has boring white clear color, red currant adds nice light red color and it also tastes good
>>2873146If you want more details on any part of the process or have any wine making questions in general go ahead
>>2873147I always used glass 5 gallon jugs with bubblers.Its been decades.Dont even know if I could find another 5 gallon in glass nowadays
>>2873060>>2873051I think I'm just lacking a nice water source for sneks. I was already looking at aqua gardens with a sprinkler thingy for evaporative cooling to keep my plants cool. So now I have to plan some kind of snake ramp. With enough snakes they can probably scare off birds and squirrels.
glow in the dark plants just dropped
>>2873163More of the jellyfish gene splicing?
>>2873163This thing is gonna kill so many insects
>>2873200I'm from Buenos Aires and I say kill em all.
>>2873212Would you like to know >more?
>>2873163>>2873200i wanna grow a bug zapper cactus. like bug zapper mexican fenceposts
>>2873100New box turtle from today.9 year old female.Ill print this out and add to the book.
>>2873244Turtle ID catalog.
>>2873245One of my favorites.Big female.Only seen her once (July 13th, 2023).I write down all spottings in the catalog.Some I see every year.One particular female that I see multiple times every year I even caught laying eggs and built a frame around the nest site to protect it4 hatched.
>>2873246>>2873245>>2873244I fucken love you my guy! No homo. Never stop being awesome!
>>2872368Fungus gnats are almost eradicated through mosquito bits in potting soil and watering can, bottom watering, and sticky traps. Goddamn bottom watering is awesome, I've been underwatering my strawberries this entire time, but also fuck fungus gnats for even growing in underwatered potting soil.Indoor leafminers are gone. Imidacloprid has also killed whatever was causing leafburn and sap.Finally made a grow tent out of panda film and PVC pipes, repotted into white pots, and added perlite as topdressing. Lower leaves are now receiving 3x as much PPFD.>>2873246>>2873245>>2873244This turtle pervert can recognize turtles by the patterns on their shells at a glance. Can turtles recognize each other?I know that tigers can recognize each other by the patterns in their fur.
>>2873251Here's one of the scutes (one of the individual "panels" that make up the shell).You can count the years growth like rings on a tree until theyre about 20 years old so I know this girl is 9. After 20 it just gets too obscure/compact as their growth rate slows down for a good reading and you have to guess from overall size (they never stop growing).The one with a maze pattern I posted is aroind 50 years old. She's a big girl.Also- males have an indent on their belly plate for mounting during mating- females are flat so that makes sexing them very easy.
>>2873258I was just looking at the pic and noticed something.The bands can be difficult to decipher but theyre basically "wake uo from hibernation, this was my year, hibernate again".Circled is the year we had a cat 3 hurricane come through. It was very destructive storm that was centralized to a small swath that normally doesnt see that type of destruction- we lost millions of trees that have stood for 150 years.
>>2873254Dude I guarantee they cruise around the forest and are giving head nods to eachother from 50 yards away (because thats a long fucking way for a turtle to mosey over and fist bunp) and im walking by at 10 feet and missed every single one of them.This is probably.the prettiest male ive found.The picture does not do him justice.The orange and yellow dots on his head and legs are crazy vibrant. He'd be a $1,500 turtle at a rep show.
>>2873261Pretty sure this is one of his kids.Alright.This is "grow your own shit" general not "look at all my wild herps" so ill get back on tract here.
>>2873264I lied.I have 6 steps up to the porch and (i dont understand how they figured it out to begin with)- tonight theres 8 pepes here.Apparently cat food is the trick.Yes.I take pics if them too but I dont have a book.
>>2873251Oh ya.BTW.Fuck snapping turtles.Ive tried to get them off the road and didn't have a shovel or anything in my truck so used my fucking $100 birkenstocks and that dickbag decided that I didnt need that part of my shoe so now I have a set of birkenless.Fuck them.Let 'em play frogger with the next F250 that comes along.On another note-I was sitting on the porch one day (cabin innawoods) and heard some weird ass noises. I cant explain it. Like some Toy Story army attacking the neighbor kid through the lawn kind of noise.Looked over and saw a HUGE MOTHERFUCKINGASS gopher tortoise just trumbling through the yard like he's going to walmart.I actually thought it was weird and said "hey man".....He stopped.Looked at me.>I swear to fucking GodHe bobbed his head in a "hey man, whats up" kind of reply.Then continued on.He actually got closer to me after that and then continued on his way.I just watched him pass by and thought "ok, we're good here, I've been accepted into the fold"
>>2873271Just for reference An adult gopher tortoise is the size of a bowlng ball.
>>2873271I agree but that’s the only one I had saved recently. My dad and uncle caught a comparable sized snapped out fishing and made me sit on a cooler on top of it until we got to shore. Motherfucker bit through the plastic igloo cooler and almost got a toe.I went ahead and made a herp thread. Reptiles and amphibians need love too.>>2873283 I hope you dump some more of them badass turtles.
Moved three more meliponines from the baits to boxes, they have more room now so they can lay more eggs and stockpile more honey.
Including that one box I posted here ( >>2872594 ), now it has a meliponine beehive living inside it.It got attacked by ants earlier today but I removed them.
This is the weakest one, the beehive was really small, I am supplementing them with honey outside of the beehive.
First zucchinis of this season, made a soup from them>>2873153I still have several old 25 liter round balon style fermentation jars I started with They suck compared to the ones I use now, very small opening makes cleaning difficult, they are much taller and wider for the same total volume and have no carrying harness, I don't think I'll ever use them again
>people posting crops ready to consume>best i can do right now is alfalfa and thats a battleevolve faster damn you
>>2873312Very nice, I started a herb garden around the house now, to make different teas to treat bad conditions like stomach ache and insomnia.Little bit of every thing rosemary, Clitoria ternatea, Ocimum basilicum, Melissa officinalis, mint, lemongrass, Plectranthus barbatus
Cordia verbenacea, really hard to get, more common near the coast, anti-inflammatory and analgesic.
>>2873361Herbs are comfy.Cilantro, sage, rosemary, thyme, basil, lavender, lemon balm, tarragon, oregano, and chives. Tomatoes and peppers in all the buckets.
>>2873370Oh and a lonely volunteer dill. Slugs ate pretty much all the dill last year so it was a surprise.
This pic is a little old (2 weeks ago?) But I can't wait for my baby tomato plants to produce. They are getting ready soon and I have many other seedlings. Im a bit late in the season but better late than never!
I hate mugwort so much
>>2873506That bad? I was looking into it since I guess it's used for some dishes as an aromatic. Never got around to it.
>>2873515It could be nice to use. I've honestly never really tried. Might be neat to make a beer with it. It just grows everywhere here. Cracks of pavement, in mulch, along borders, etc. If the soil is loose you can pull up the rhizomes which are thin and long but it tends to snap.
I let my weed situation get out of control out of lazinessI think I'm going back to using landscaping fabric next year, I never had to weed so much when I was still using it
>>2873518For me it just made weeds easier to pull.
Well my lawn is doing great so far, although parts of my backyard now have fungus that seems to be spreading from creeping charlie that I don't know how to address. My asiatic lilies are all doing well too, as are my native late season flowering plants. I need to decide if I'm going to wipe out or keep the ground elderflower I have, I kind of hate it but fireflies love to live in it.
>>2873371i dont think ive ever met someone who could successfully grow dill. it is the most underwhelming plant ever
>>2873584It's the parsley of parsleys. I don't think it tolerates temperatures above 70 degrees.
>>2873527>seems to be spreading from creeping charlie that I don't know how to address. I got it under control in my lawn by spot spraying with Ortho weed b gone and pulling survivors by hand.Mulching lawn mowers will make it worse. The clippings can take root and multiply. Even when pulling by hand put them in a container to throw away or let them cook before putting in compost.
>>2873588I truthfully don't care too much about it right now, I have two aging dogs that now struggle to get far out into the lawn but still manage to do so. So after they die I'll just go nuts with chemicals for a summer and kill everything in the grass areas that isn't grass and reseed with more prg.
>>2873584>>2873587I've been growing dill and parsley in big pots this year and it's been in the 90s for about a week. They seem to be doing well.
>>2873584I’ve only been unsuccessful nine years running now…That’s why it’s a volunteer… I didn’t even fucking bother after the slug fest of ‘25.We’ll see how it goes. I put some bricks around it to keep it safe.
>>2873584>>2873614Surely you guys don't mean this stuff, it's once you plant you'll never get rid of it kind of plant
I was initially sceptical about this so called rigid stem "Maliniak" tomato but it's holding strong even in 60 km/h gusts Even stronger winds are coming so I'll stake it just in case but it's pretty impressive how rigid those stems are
First blueberry of this season
After 2 years my kumquat finally decided to flower, I'm quite excited I have never grown citrus before, let's see if I can get fruits on first try
>>2873621Good for you. Congratulations. Fantastic. Great Job! Winner! THE BEST!Got anything constructive to add?
>>2873626I'm genuinely confused anon, no need to be salty, this shit grows like a weed here, you can hardly get rid of it after it's planted somewhereFor example I seeded them last year in-between climbing beans in here to have some for pickling, this year I planted bush beans here and nothing more but it came back and is in the process of outcompeting beans
>>2873626>>2873629And here some random dills decided to grow in-between tomatoes, onions and garlic, no idea where did it come from, never seeded it anywhere closeSo I'm quite confused how you can fail to grow dill, for all I know all you have to do is sprinkle some seeds and you will struggle to get rid of it for years
>>2873629Fennel grows like that here. Not tried dill
>>2873629>>2873630I can and will be salty because you were being a dick and still are “I use kilometers and I’m confused why something grows differently in a completely different environment.”Yeah that checks.“Uh it’s east where I am so it should be easy for everyone.” I’m not over here boasting about my 6ft tarragon… but I could. Why try to flex about dill of all things and then play dumb when you’re called on it?
>>2873638Shit.
Finally it's fucking RAINING
How do I save my basil?Soil is hydrophobicLeaves turning yellow despite fertilizing and watering (liquid fert)Only lightly mulched so that was defenitely my mistake. Zone 8b north texas
>>2873650Get soil that isnt a bigot for starters.
>>2873650>Soil is hydrophobicLike permanently or just until it gets slightly moist
Huston we have budding, I repeat, fruit is going to happen this year
My second year growing a handful tomatoes on my balcony.last year I didn't prune them, just tied them to some poles, so they could grow tall.But heard somewhere, that people recommend to trim the side branches, so they grow tall instead of wide. Can anyone give me some advice on that?I got the plants of some friends who didn't need them and they told me that two of the ones I have are supposed to grow wide like brushes and the other ones should be pruned.
Some type of wild strawberry, it has thorns, it is not barren strawberry because I have seen some weird fruits, it is spreading really fast like bermuda grass.
Fruit looks like this
Searched online, found nothing, guess I will see if it is poisonous or not
>>2873747I am curious on this as well. I had one tomato plant that I didn't really prune. It got huge and gave a lot of tomatoes. Is the idea that I plant a bunch of them but keep the suckers off? Why would I do that?
>>2873758(I'm >>2873747)I think if you prune it you end up getting about the same amount of plant, it just grows taller instead of in all directions. And takes up less space and doesn't interfere with the plants beside it. But I'm just guessing and would like to hear someone who actually knows what they're talking about on this.
>>2873753Looks like a blackberry to me.
>>28737533 leaflets is also a Rubus trait. There's no risk of poison. The petals seem really small compared to the calyx which doesn't look familiar to me. A lot of photos of black raspberry look similar though. Do you have a picture where the petals aren't eaten?
>>2873759>>2873758The new growth are called "suckers" because they suck the life from the older growth. On many plants you just get into a cycle of older growth never reaching full maturity or production because the new growth steals nutrients.On cultivars the new growth is usually root stock and not of the named type you wanted to grow to begin with. So a Fuji apple turns into a crab apple.
>>2873747It's genetic. Determinate varieties will stop at a specific size, indeterminates will keep growing taller without stopping. The big difference here is the later growth on the indeterminates will have new flowers, which means the harvest goes on longer. Some of them will be more vigorous and sucker a lot more, which is hard to physically support unless pruned.Plants also grow using a fixed amount of resources, which pruning frees up to use elsewhere rather than wasting energy to heal like would happen in an animal. More leaves help a little but the root isn't going to get bigger, so more branching (therefore more fruits) is doing more with less. Main stems and flowers especially hog resources and are good targets for pruning, which is what the tomato suckers are: new main stems, not branches. They come up diagonally in the armpit between the original stem and the branches and will grow straight up.So when you do this, pinch off the suckers, you assign more resources to the (main) main stem, first to grow it faster and then to develop the fruits that are on it. Indeterminates will never stop growing so their suckers will never stop growing either and nobody ever gets the full pot. People might also tell you to remove the first couple of flowers for the same reason, as they slow things down early on.You prune as they grow, typically while they're still tiny since they come in at predictable spots, and otherwise indeterminate tomatoes naturally grow as a single long stem, so it's not as much work as it sounds like. It's nice using indeterminates because you can pack them tight and there are a lot of good trellis designs for it, but for your purposes just keep in mind it will get 2 meters tall so support it a little more. You can probably leave a couple of suckers and let it fork out a bit since you're not keeping it in a neat optimal row, but you will have to support those too. If it flops over, that's fine as long as it doesn't touch the ground.
>>2873768Best I can do.
>>2873766It seems it is spreading by rhizome, a lot of smaller plants near where it was, used to be just one plant.
Banana trees coming out fine on sandy loam
Smaller banana trees already sprouting near them.
>>2873814>>2873816Not the other guy but what I think you have there are boysenberries. Too dark green for black raspberry and the berry looks more boysenberry to me.Just my take.Definitely raspberries for contrast.
>>2873819>boysenberriesIt really looks like it, even the thorns.
>>2873819I have some elderberry coming on strong this year too but don’t have any decent pics right now.I’m still stuck in town but we have a large lot and old trees. I turned the back 20 yards under the big maple into a mini food forest. Wild garlic, chives, asparagus, strawberries, 4 mature mulberries 3 females and a male, a mature fruit bearing grape vine growing up the male mulberry, raspberries, and elderberries.
Thick fog here today.
Almost like a horror movie.
>>2873817are you gonna machete it once it yields fruit? thats sounds kinda cool ngl>>2873825Nice
>>2873830You have to keep it clean, otherwise snakes and mice start moving in, they like to use the dead leaves and the plant as shelter.
>>2873830Also, I forgot to mention, there is this bird, he pulls the fibers from the banana leaves to make his nest like a hammock, he is called Icterus pyrrhopterus, he loves eating bananas, too.
>>2873822
>>2873831>>2873832Oh I see. Birds are always nice to have, unless you're growing berries
>>2873816Rubus rosifolius?
>>2873848Either that or boysenberries, guess I wait on the fruit to find out.
Strong wind claimed a few victims, pretty bad wound on zucchini, I reattached it and maybe it'll heal>>2873638>>2873639>I’m confused why something grows differently in a completely different environment.”Yes>I’m not over here boasting about my 6ft tarragon… but I could.Why not?Boast about your plants all you want, why shouldn't you do that in a thread about growing plants?>Why try to flex about dill of all things and then play dumb when you’re called on it?You stated you never met anyone who has ever grown dill successfully >>2873584 so I posted mine to show it can be doneTo fly into such a rage over it >>2873626 and then cry like you are some kind of victim of bullying because of dill of all things is very silly behaviour
Kohlrabi in the dark at the back. The mini cantaloupe is not an aggressive grower.
Fava beans blown over despite being partially sheltered, kind of a shame, some of those were over 180 cm tall>>2873747I find trimming to not be necessary usually, if it's overcrowded sure, clean it up a bit but heavy trimming will negatively impact your yields in my experience
Zucchini haul and there is even more coming, I planted too much of it third year in the row, I'll have to give away some again>>2873822I somewhat regret removing wild old elderberry that was growing in my garden, I wanted space for serviceberries and aspragus and it didn't yield a lot but it was still a nice plant
Easy man's carrots. Note the left side is how they should be, everything else had their true leaves clear cut by earwigs then I remembered to go out at night and slaughter them all with a pointy rock.
>>2873873 After cooking >>2873817>>2873818Nice, I know a guy who grows them in pots takes a ton of effort to get them growing hereAre those normal grocery bananas or do you have something special like with home grown tomatoes you can't get in groceries?>>2873869What kind of cantaloupe is this and is it worth growing? I'm looking for good stuff to try out
Pumpkins have enjoyed the heatwave, 3 under the mulberry bombarded by berries and bird shit. They're looking much clear now after several rains.
>>2873875>What kind of cantaloupe is this and is it worth growing?I still have the package in the shed, its raining now I might get it later. mini cantaloupe is really all they're called.Not for me it isn't, that place gets sun after 1200pm. as you can see there is too much competition otherwise it is well taken care of.picrelHave you seen these beetles google seems to say they pests, they're in all the flowers not sure if they eat the leaves or cause other damage.
This years pathetic comfrey harvest, about 1.5gl sludge. Need 1gl rotten/drained to 4gl leaf compost to make comfrey compost.
This is it.
Beehive inside the bait.
You can see the bees walking inside on this picture.
Their new home after I was done moving them.
I have moved them one hour ago they are already rebuilding the entrance and sealing their new home.
can you sell me some green tomatoes for cheap?
Onion flower, surprisingly pretty for something grown for the bulb part>>2873877I don't recall ever seeing those, I get a lot of tiny black bugs in flowers, they steal nectar but they don't have much impact on plant and fruit overall>>2873882Damn, they don't sell those here, a shame>>2873881Is comfrey worth the hype?I see a lot of people growing it for green manure online but it always felt like waste of space that could be used for something productive to me
>>2873961>Is comfrey worth the hype?I think so. Whether or not its labor intensive is up to you.
Elderberry coming on strong.
>>2873964Not same anon but I thought of adding Dandelions because they're easy green manure and I like the flowers. I don't wanna bother with comfrey
>>2872838Never ever. I took the scythepill
>>2873254>Fungus gnats are almost eradicatedFungus gnats have exploded in population. I didn't keep adding fresh mosquito bits to my watering can, so the potency dropped.>>2873961>Onion flower, surprisingly pretty for something grown for the bulb partWe have a bunch at my hospital's garden, but purple.
>>2873988elderflower syrup is so good, next year i will harvest flowers for 20 liters of syrup
>>2872026Re beans/peas picking/drying: From what's I've read there's a lot of encouragement to keep picking, because this causes the plant to produce more pods. But if I left the pods on the plant with intent to mature for drying, would this not result in a lower yield overall? I seek your knowledge anons, what do you prefer to do when seeking dried beans/peas? Should I have separate plants for drying/plants for picking?
>>2873988Elderberry gang. I cut mine to the ground every year and they've grown about 9-10ft(~3m) so far. The passion flower climbing it is around 12ft
>>2874025They grow all around the place here so you can forage them. Not heard of making them into syrup, I'll try that this year. I mainly have seen people making the flowers into a wine>>2874018If we mean the same thing by green manure - dandelion and comfrey are not a great pick because the tap root makes them difficult to remove. But comfrey is often grown as a perennial in a patch for composting the leaf in various ways
>>2872026Is this herbicide damage on my tomatoes. They're heirloom san marzano redorta but I've been getting tiny leaves and shitty new growth ever since transplant. The same this happened last year but I transplanted way later this year. The compost I've been using is coast of maine lobster and crab. How do I fix this?
Bees started swarming on the side of my house where I left the tip of other baits on the floor.I ran out of bee boxes tho.
I hammered a fence post on the ground and tied a two liter coca cola bottle bait with a wire, best I can do now.
>>2874303>>2874304what kind of bees are those man, they look like wasps/big mosquitos
>>2874340for little while i thought it's myrmecoid, now I think it's a blurry south american bee, it's not a mosquitoi hope OP can say more
>>2873819Boysenberry is a hybrid so only God knows what its offspring will look like.Its blackberry-ish to me but im in the land of wild blackberries (2 types) and they do weird shit.I posted this already but on one of my properties the blackberries are done and at the last stage of harvest before "use it or lose it" stage and the other property thats 12 miles away with 50 feet higher elevation is still in flower mode.And a month after the last berry is a prune theres some weirdo plant that has new flowers.... (the higher property).Anyways....My point is where is the plant located?Although you should see fruit by now...
I'll have to give some of those away, too many for me to process
Globe artichoke, I have too much of other veggies so I just let them flower>>2874088Are you sure it's not light/heat stress?Especially because it happend the same way second time in a rowTomatoes closer to subtropics don't actually enjoy full sun there, people sometimes use shading cloth to relive it
Apricots, this tree in the front is older than I am, it's main trunk actually decayed and broke off, you can still see the scar, that was about 15 years ago>>2874303>>2874304Those are so tiny, I have never seen bees this small
Getting peachy over here.
>>2874385This was the first year my peaches set fruit and plum curculio got almost all of them, gonna kms
>>2874388Rise and rise again and again like The Phoenix from the ashes; until the lambs have become lions.
Honeynuts coming in
>>2874340>>28743764 millimeters total in size, they are called Tetragonisca angustula, they are very famous in Mexico, Colombia, Venezuela and Ecuador they call the honey "miel de angelita", they say it treats cataracts but I am not sure about that one, I just started raising them, where I live they are every where, if you throw a beer can on the road they go inside and make a nest.Last year I said ITT I would start fiddling around to see if I managed to catch them, took me a while but I have over 20 captured on baits and several beehives inside boxes already, they were making nests in my tools in the barn when I mentioned them before.
They are in the process of moving in, if the queen likes the bait they stay, otherwise they find somewhere else to make a beehive.
>bri'ish>Looking to buy a house, find a new build that looks nice and green>Building nature reserve around it>Bat boxes >Hedgehog routes for gardens because modern terraced gardens are ecological deadlines>House we're looking at has a crabapple tree Can you actually do anything with these? I know builders put them in because they make nice looking blossoms, but I've heard you can make okay jams and cider from them. Anyone with any experience? I just remember throwing them at friends as a kid rather than doing anything productive with them. I'm planning on growing lots of veg in the garden once we're actually in and I don't think the tree will get in the way.
>>2874429I use them in jams, not just apple based ones but as a pectin source for any other jam. Usually I just grab all the shit you can find in the hedgerows like blackberries, sloes,rosehips and mix them with crab apples.May well make a decent cider, you should try
>>2874429There are many species of apple. Crab apple just means sour, so it's the shitty ones. They do have flavor just without the sugar, and a lot of pectin for making jam. There are actually a lot of sweet eating-quality varieties of crab apple, but if you chopped it to graft on a better crabapple, you could also just graft on an actual apple.
Bats have been numerous this year and not so many mosquito, they can fly any direction anytime they want. Tonight they've been flying very low, over my head I could reach them. They chase each other while screeching as if playing or pissed off someone ate their hunt.Too fast for photos and catbox load fails for videos.
I have THREE (3) cottontails that hang around my raised beds and I found nests under two of my plants again. It's like they're asking to be a part of the food chain.
>mfw I had a mental breakdown and threw away all my seed packets
>>2874455How bad is that really? Was it a huge collection with rare ones or what?
>>2874455Only a frog poster would. You are like a rimworld pawn, pathetic. Someone should have beat your ass down to the ground.
Onion harvest is coming, I don't think I have ever had so many onions of this sizeThis is 'Hercules' cultivar, seems really good>>2874394How do they taste, what do you make with them?>>2874403>>2874405Really cool stuff, always nice to see foreign plants and animals I have never seen >>2874429You can do jam or cider but it's more effort than it's worth it imo, you can buy better tasting, larger apples really cheap in season
>>2874480I always forget to do anything with the onions I plant.Sometimes ill have one growing in the cupboard but I need it for dinner. I discovered that if you "core" it by just slicing off the sides the core will grow.Best pic to show what im talking about.This one was cut in half but you can cut off everything thats purple and plant the remainder.
>raspberries and loganberries in half barrel barrel planters>oh fug, they're getting big>AI growfriend tells me to buy a trellis for $99+ on Amazon so I can get maximum yields>smugly make a trellis using old pieces of wood and rusty nailsFeels good man
Mint flowering.Planted a few varieties a decade ago and it grows like a weed now.
I had this guy come up about three feet from last years garden because I hate mowing and am lazy so I just put a cage around it.
>>2874593Nabbed some seeds last year on one of my walks and my lemon beebalm is finally starting to bloom. Good flavor.
>>2874598My lemon balm is going as well. My mom bought one plant for me… now there is lemon balm in like 20 percent of the yard.
>>2874598I've never tried eating any of them but this is my favorite of the four bee balm species I have. Monarda punctata
>>2874601Gorgeous!
>>2874592>>2874600The compost smelling good
>>2874601I think that's one of the stronger ones that's more medicinal tasting. The standard didymas have a kinda mild oregano flavor. Chemically they range from oregano to thyme.
>me when I find squash bugs
>>2874606the squash bugs become squashed bugs
>>2874607I've been blasting the eggs with a torch lighter.
Spent the morning pruning brambles at the allotment/nature reserve. Looks like they're going to throw a tonne out this year. Despite losing most of the plants to being smothered in my absence, I'm looking forward to these.
Are hori-hori knives any good? The missus was asking for birthday recommendations for me. I just use a cheap trowel right now but I prefer a tool that does a few different things. Price isn't an issue.
>can't post my garlic harvest because we reached the image limitGonna kms>>2874666I quite like the root slayer line. I don't have the soil knife but I do have the trowel and XL shovelhttps://radiusgarden.com/collections/root-slayer/products/root-slayer-hand-tool-set
>>2874666I use mine all the time for digging up weeds, just wear gloves when using it in case you slip.
>>2874667We could probably have another thread. Image limit and not far from bump limit either.
>>2874688Its pretty easy to just hit bump limit.
Welp just saw Vine Borer land on my squash looks like it's game over
I have a dog he likes to run around outside and he will eat or chew on leaves of a tree or small sticks ,he runs around near the garden and sniffs but dosent eat any off the plants I grow,I was concerned about the garlic because it’s poisonous to dogs he has sniffed them a few times but I can tell he doesn’t like the smell,I want to grow winecap,blewit and some oyster mushrooms in the garden to,do any of you have dogs?do they tend to eat the mushrooms?.its rare for mushrooms to grow in the yard so I can’t tell if he will try to eat them,nor if there even safe for the dog to eat .
>>2874694It probably depends on the dog, but I don't think they will. It doesn't seem like there's anything in edible ones that would harm them.You could grow some tall grass for him to eat. My dog loves to browse for his "salad."
>>2874693My yard is infested with them, hopefully after a few years of not growing any I can try again but right now it's just not worth my time.
>>2874694I've found that animals pretty much completely ignore garlic/onions. Turns out critters don't like sulfurous compounds like we do
>>2874703Theres a book called "roses love garlic".Its about companion plants.
>>2874703What about mushrooms
