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What type of plants are you interested in growing? This poll is closed. |
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| Perennials! |
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142 | 20.91% |
| Annuals! |
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30 | 4.42% |
| Woody plants! |
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62 | 9.13% |
| Succulent plants! |
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171 | 25.18% |
| Tropical plants! |
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60 | 8.84% |
| Non-vascular plants are the best! |
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31 | 4.57% |
| Screw you, I'd rather eat them! |
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183 | 26.95% |
| Total: | 679 votes | ||
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I'm looking for a landscaping solution for loud neighbors. Are there any quicker-growing bushes that may block the noise? Our bedroom is near their patio, so when their son and his friends get drunk late on a weeknight I have to go over and ask them to quiet down. I'd rather avoid having to try an build a fence, since I don't want to block a lot of sun and could probably get away with 15' of tall bushes instead of the entire lot (current 4' fence is the neighbors').
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Feb 19, 2015 20:38
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Can anyone help me identify this cactus? I have been trying to get it to flower for two years, but I haven't seen it do anything. Does anyone have any advice on how to take care of it? It's an office plant that I have on my desk. The roots don't seem to be taking to the pot either. 
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Feb 19, 2015 21:56
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Have you repotted at all during the two years? What sort of conditions is it being kept in? Cacti really like sun, so keeping it in a window would help keep it happy. Minimal watering too. How's Porkchop doing? 
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Feb 20, 2015 01:19
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I don't know poo poo about cacti but uh, shouldn't it be way deeper in the soil?
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Feb 20, 2015 02:04
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SynthOrange posted:Have you repotted at all during the two years? What sort of conditions is it being kept in? Cacti really like sun, so keeping it in a window would help keep it happy. Minimal watering too. I think someone else repotted it, but they just stuck it in another pot that used to have some other plant. I can't recall which. I basically inherited this plant afterwards. I rarely water it. It's indoors. The only window faces the South. It's near the window, but not on the window sill. Pork chop is still adorable. Although he still is balding due to alopecia. Here wears sweaters now. :3 We also adopted another dog. His name is Marzipan. He's a doxie/pom mix. I'd post a picture of them together, but this is probably plenty of puppy chat. PM me or resurrect the small dog megathread for more. ghetto wormhole posted:I don't know poo poo about cacti but uh, shouldn't it be way deeper in the soil? Yes it probably should. I inherited it like this and it stayed healthy, but unchanging.
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Feb 20, 2015 03:28
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WeaselWeaz posted:I'm looking for a landscaping solution for loud neighbors. Are there any quicker-growing bushes that may block the noise? Our bedroom is near their patio, so when their son and his friends get drunk late on a weeknight I have to go over and ask them to quiet down. I'd rather avoid having to try an build a fence, since I don't want to block a lot of sun and could probably get away with 15' of tall bushes instead of the entire lot (current 4' fence is the neighbors'). I have no idea if there's a plant out there that can reliably block out the acoustics of loud, drunk people, but maybe something with big, rustle-y leaves so that way when the wind blows, it might help drown out the noise. Alternatively, a windchime? Sorry to hear about your situation, fellow loud neighbor-haver   Pigasus posted:Can anyone help me identify this cactus? I have been trying to get it to flower for two years, but I haven't seen it do anything. Does anyone have any advice on how to take care of it? The hooked needles on it indicate that it's some sort of Mammillaria cactus. Like others have said, the cactus would probably enjoy being out in the sun more in order for flowers to bud reliably, but the little dude actually looks pretty great despite being indoors.  I know that some species of cacti and other species of succulent require absolutely no watering during winter, despite scary signs like wrinkling and literal deflating, in order to flower, so maybe that might be a factor. Also don't worry about the roots not really taking to the pot. Cactus roots are by nature shallow in depth compared to other plants. Judging by the photo, the soil that the cactus is in also looks way too full of moisture-loving organic material. The way the roots are now probably helping out by keeping them out of too much water. Plus if it's been living like that so well after two years, then I think that it's a living arrangement that the cactus is quite cozy with. Fake edit: did anyone ever get the seeds that I sent them? I hope they finally came in, especially after all the postage stamps that I put on those babies.
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Feb 20, 2015 10:00
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WeaselWeaz posted:I'm looking for a landscaping solution for loud neighbors. What zone are you in? Sweet viburnum grow pretty quick, are dirt cheap and can handle any kind of pruning. Italian cypress or sky pencil might also work but can get very tall and don't take pruning too well. There is also a dawrf italian cypress but I have never seen it for sale.
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Feb 20, 2015 15:54
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I currently live in the UK a bit north of London where we have a little garden. It has been years since anyone has paid any real attention to it, but just before winter rolled along I decided to trim the jungle a little bit. As I often do with my beard, I cut off too much and then tried to fix it by keeping going until everything looks patchy and terrible. This is what the garden looks now (probably NMS to some of you): Here is a closer look at the fence:  I would like to have the garden looking a bit less grotty, but I'm not sure where to start (apart from taking the remaining cuttings out to recycling). The dog in the first picture presents an extra challenge because he enjoys digging around in the flowerbed wherever he gets the chance and will occasionally poop in there as well. Some questions: Should I trim away the remaining growths from the fence? If yes, what should go in its place? What could I plant in the flowerbed that grows quickly and is resilient to dog trampling? What should I do about the tree on the right of the first picture? How badly did I gently caress up cutting everything out like I did? Thanks in advance, and hope this is the right thread for my questions!
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Feb 22, 2015 11:34
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Fire Safety Doug posted:I currently live in the UK a bit north of London where we have a little garden. It has been years since anyone has paid any real attention to it, but just before winter rolled along I decided to trim the jungle a little bit. As I often do with my beard, I cut off too much and then tried to fix it by keeping going until everything looks patchy and terrible. This is what the garden looks now (probably NMS to some of you): Rosemary and lavender should resist the dog, if you buy them big enough, but maybe you should get some shrub things that can grow a bit higher and cover up the fence. On a patio like that, clusters of pot plants would look cool. What is the tree on the right growing out of? If you don't want to get rid of it entirely, reduce the height down to just over the level of the wall I guess. It should be fine if you do it sooner rather than later, while it's still cold and not growing. If it is what I think it is, you'll get a ton of cool blue flowers on it.
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Feb 22, 2015 12:10
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For the first time ever this winter, we got a really bad spider mite infestation on our hibiscus that was taken in for the winter. I always tend to bring in a few, but they rarely cause enough damage to notice. When I started noticing serious damage, I drenched it in a dishsoap mixture, which apparently gives them superpowers. Now their numbers have exploded and are starting to spread to a nearby croton. Since temps are hovering around single digits right now, I can't spray outside and I'm limited to the chemicals I can spray inside. Is there anything I can do short of chucking the infested plants? I haven't tried neem because I'm apprehensive about spraying that indoors. I'm dealing with a mix of two-spotted and red mites.
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Feb 24, 2015 18:46
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 African violets are fun and easy to grow. The one on the right is supposedly a mini one, while the one on the left is a normal variety sized one. Please pardon the dishes in the back, I am a goon. Shame Boner, the only way to deal with super mites is to look them straight in the eye, face-to-cephalothorax, and then say to please leave, you are a nuisance to my plant. Repeat the process for each mite, until the problem is solved. No but really, I recommend the neem oil. It's used as an ingredient in many recipes, so it should be safe inside the house, and it should be able to smother out the mites. If not neem oil, maybe a 10% milk/90% water spray? I remember when I was spraying that to cure black mold on my roses that it kept bugs away pretty well.
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Feb 24, 2015 20:13
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I bought some dwarf jade cuttings on Etsy and received more than I can use. I'm also winding down the rest of my collection a bit in anticipation of moving. I have a bunch of aloe veras, a couple rooted hobbit jade cuttings, a small regular jade cutting which might have some roots by now, but I'm not certain. I can post pictures if anyone is interested in some free plants.
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Feb 26, 2015 02:46
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robotindisguise posted:What zone are you in? Sweet viburnum grow pretty quick, are dirt cheap and can handle any kind of pruning. Italian cypress or sky pencil might also work but can get very tall and don't take pruning too well. There is also a dawrf italian cypress but I have never seen it for sale. Zone 7, in Maryland. I was considering cypress since I may need the height to block sound.
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Feb 27, 2015 22:27
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upsciLLion posted:hobbit jade cuttings You mean Gollum jade?
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Mar 1, 2015 00:57
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Crassula 'Hobbit' is an earlier cultivar than C. 'Gollum' that has curved, but not yet tubular, leaves.
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Mar 1, 2015 11:05
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I'm trying to germinate some D. Capensis from seed and my containers keep getting some kind of cottony looking mold in them. What's the best way to prevent or get rid of this fungus?
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Mar 5, 2015 17:06
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A sulfur-based anti-fungal spray is what I usually see recommended. I just had to spray some on my seed tray because I had the same thing happening. It hasn't been long enough to say if it's gonna work though.
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Mar 5, 2015 18:39
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Did you thoroughly rinse your media and are the seeds in very bright light?
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Mar 5, 2015 20:47
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Kenning posted:Did you thoroughly rinse your media and are the seeds in very bright light? They're under a 60W CFL in a mini-greenhouse apparatus and the media I used came in disks I had to hydrate as part of a grow your own carnivorous plants kit. I followed the instructions and they didn't have me do anything more than rehydrate the disk.
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Mar 6, 2015 00:58
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Pictures of a couple of citrus seedlings I'm growing for the hell of it: From left to right we have two Meyer lemon seedlings that are both about two months old (Señor Limón and Maria, because giving names to seedlings makes me take better care of them), and a wee baby blood orange (Ruby). I have four other blood orange seeds in the process of germinating but that aren't quite ready to plant. Ruby was in a hurry and germinated in about three days. Maria is a bit of a "special" seedling. She germinated, I planted her, and then she decided that the best thing to do was to grow back into her seed. Señor Limón was already a few inches high and Maria hadn't even sprouted yet, so I dug her up with the toothpick pictured and found the small sickly leaf on the left growing downwards through the shell in the process of dying. With a little coaxing I got the leaf out of the seed and above ground and about a week ago she sent up a new shoot. Weeeee trees are fun.  Can't wait for the weather to warm up so I can get these guys outside and into some bigger pots.
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Mar 6, 2015 21:03
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I have this idea for the back deck of the house I live in. I'll post pictures later when I get home from work, but my deck is on the second floor facing north, kinda like this: In the picture, the sun rises from the right and bottom and travels left. The garden in the back gets almost a full day of sun - the parts closer to the house get more shade because of the roof + house blocking some of the sunlight. Towards the top (north) the garden gets a ton of sun. I'm in Victoria BC, so I think I'm in zone 9a? Anyway, there's a big apartment to the left of my house, with residential windows just a couple meters past the fence. I'm planning on putting two planters next to the deck, where the arrows are pointing. I'll have trellis' attached as well. The plan is to plant vines (I'm thinking 2/3 different kinds) and guiding them on the trellis' (eventually I want them going overhead to provide some rain cover, I'll tie some string to the chimney from the trellis I'm thinking) for privacy and aesthetics. I've made a list of plants that I think could be suitable? I'm hoping for suggestions/guidance on what to buy, and thoughts on problems that I might run into or haven't thought of yet. Not too experienced with vines:
I'm leaning towards morning glories, even though I don't really like them, cause I know from experience that they grow fast and are pretty hardy. Not really worried about them overtaking the house, as I can always prune/cut back them and they're in planters so they won't be spreading out over the yard. Trumpet vines would be nice as I hear butterflies are attracted to them. I'd like some confederate jasmine, as I hear they smell nice, but I'm not sure if the planters I'm planning on buying will be big enough. That's my main concern actually, is whether or not normal planter boxes (http://www.homedepot.com/p/Unbrande...c1vZc8soZ25ecod) are gonna be big enough to sustain the vines I can plant. I was originally going to go with climber roses but someone told me I need at least 2 m of soil for that, and I'm not gonna hang that much weight off of the deck. The planter on the left will get less sun than the one facing north due to the shade from the house. I'm guessing 2-4 hours of direct sun assuming a full day of sun in the summer? Any ideas as to what else I should plant? Are my planters big enough for this? Is this all just a stupid idea? (if I posted this in the wrong place, let me know, i'll delete the post!).
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Mar 6, 2015 22:08
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Skizzzer posted:I'm in Victoria BC, so I think I'm in zone 9a? I'm just south of you so I think you're more likely zone 8a/b (and AHS zone 2 or 3). I don't know much about vines either (aside from hops), so I'd probably try a variety and see what does well.
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Mar 6, 2015 22:58
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I would agree with you but our city is quite famous for it's climate, which may be different from yours if you're on the mainland (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victoria,_British_Columbia#Climate). We're famous for being mild. I'm considering going for a variety of clematis now and maybe one confederate jasmine, but I'm reasonably confident by now that my planter box will be too small for that.
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Mar 7, 2015 00:33
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The neem oil treatment worked great on my plants! I seem to have the little fuckers on the ropes and my hibiscus, pitiful as it looks now that it's lost most of its leaves, is showing a ton of new growth with the increasing spring sun. I'd like to encourage bushier growth and more development on the interior nodes. Should I be pinching the flower buds back to achieve this? Should I pinch the outermost growth as well? The plant seems to be putting a lot of energy into developing flowers and growth at the ends of the branches.
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Mar 15, 2015 19:27
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I planted my first flower garden yesterday and I had a couple of questions I was hoping to get help with. I planted a snap dragon plant and today it's droopy, how long should I give it to perk back up? I'm concerned that I may have over watered it or that perhaps it's not getting quite enough sun. I'm also not sure if perhaps the night was too cold for this plant. With so many factors at play, how do I go about saving my pant before it too late? And is drooping after one day of being in the ground enough of an indication of a problem?
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Mar 19, 2015 01:25
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Does neem oil help with slugs and snails? I've been putting out tons of Slug-O and they keep eating my young greens and bean leaves. What else can I do?
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Mar 19, 2015 02:59
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Beer traps. http://www.slugoff.co.uk/killing-slugs/beer-trap
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Mar 19, 2015 03:14
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Knyteguy posted:I planted my first flower garden yesterday and I had a couple of questions I was hoping to get help with. I planted a snap dragon plant and today it's droopy, how long should I give it to perk back up? I'm concerned that I may have over watered it or that perhaps it's not getting quite enough sun. I'm also not sure if perhaps the night was too cold for this plant. With so many factors at play, how do I go about saving my pant before it too late? And is drooping after one day of being in the ground enough of an indication of a problem? If you've followed good transplanting procedure (loosening up the root ball a bit, watering the ground after planting, etc.), then a little bit of drooping can be expected as the plant adjusts to the new conditions. It sounds like though your snapdragon has a bit more to contend with if the weather's been pretty brutal where you live. To keep your plant from being way overexposed during it's most tender condition, I recommend placing a couple of plant pots, occupied or not, by the snapdragon to help provide a blanket for the roots as well as a barrier against the wind. Hope this helps! In other news today, me and my plant fiend aunt went to go check out the local nurseries in the area. Even though I swore that I was trying to liquidate my plant collection since I'm living in a smaller place now, I still walked out with an abutilon and a bell pepper plant. Dang it. EagerSleeper fucked around with this message at 07:06 on Mar 19, 2015 |
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Mar 19, 2015 06:59
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Double dang it, and double post, but I come bearing content. So in the last post I was talking about my fellow plant aficionado aunt and how the both of us went shopping yesterday for some plants. No photos yet of the abutilon and bell pepper plant that I bought, but since I was working with my collection of plants, I decided to take some pictures of them.  A closer up of the Echeveria pullidonis that's blooming.  But then the inevitable happens.    The carnage...   rekt. EagerSleeper fucked around with this message at 03:20 on Mar 20, 2015 |
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Mar 20, 2015 03:09
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Noooooooooo!
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Mar 20, 2015 03:12
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now you get to put them in nicer pots. it's not like they won't survive it
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Mar 20, 2015 20:24
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Is this a good place to ask about trees? We bought a house last summer with an apple tree in the backyard. The apples either fell before they were ripe or they were lovely, small, tasteless apples. I wonder if pruning the tree will help? I read a few guides around but the information in those is inconsistent at best.  This is the result of my attempt to prune the lower branches. If it doesn't help with the fruits, I'll at least be able to walk around/under the tree.  This is what I hope it ends up looking like. Lots of room under the tree, but a flat and low top half and easily accessible fruits. Is this doable at all? Should only a few branches per season? Finally, is this pale green film thing something to be worried about? 
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Mar 21, 2015 02:15
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/\/\ Several people in the veggie thread keep mature fruit trees and can help you out. (Mine are immature apple trees, but yes, a solid pruning is what that tree needs. FYI: They prepare for blossoms a year out; so if they have a bad summer or a big pruning, they likely won't flower the following spring. And that branch is normal looking to me. )
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Mar 22, 2015 00:36
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If the apples were tasteless, they will always be tasteless. It's likely not a grafted eating variety, in that case. Treat as an ornamental tree and prune for your desired look, which you've started. If you want to eat yummy varieties, you'll need to graft them onto branches. You'll also want to actually prune the tree lower, not higher. The trees in your picture are likely much shorter than you realize. Tall trees make harvesting inefficient, which is one reason growers use weak root-stocks, as well as it promotes fruiting at a younger age.
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Mar 22, 2015 13:59
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You can always try making cider if the apples aren't tasty. It might still be crap, but it could be a fun experiment. And hey, free apples!
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Mar 22, 2015 21:24
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Question about repotting – how do I know when it's time to repot a seedling? One of my Meyer lemon seedlings is getting pretty big and I've noticed he's sent a first little root tendril down through one of the water drainage holes in his solo cup. Is he ready for a bigger pot? Is there any potential downside to putting a younger seedling into a bigger pot? I've read a few places that small seedlings in a big pot run the risk of "drowning," but I'm not sure how that would really happen... is it that if you have a small plant that's not drinking much water, you can't keep the potted soil from drying out without giving it way more water than the tree can possibly use? And another question about trees. I want to get some more fruit trees going, mostly apples because they fair well in my hardiness zone (7b) as opposed to all these citrus trees. However I've heard that planting random apple seeds can be a bit of a crapshoot since a lot of orchards graft good fruit-bearing limbs onto hardy, lovely fruit-bearing trunks, and the seeds carry the genetics of the trunk rather than the limb. Do I just need to buy seeds somewhere, and if so where's a good place to do so?
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Mar 23, 2015 19:59
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You won't find apples from seeds anywhere because of the way apples reproduce. Most apples are incapable of self-pollination, so the seeds will all be heterozygous and at best only bear a passing resemblance to the parent tree. Most of the commercial apples are branches from known varieties grafted onto rootstocks- which rootstock they use depends on the climate you're growing in and whether you want a dwarf or full-size tree. There's no way to know if your apple will be edible, or even how big it will get, unless you buy a grafted tree. That said, I bucked common sense and have an apple tree I grew from seed- or perhaps I should say it's a tree my daughter grew from seed as an experiment and then I planted it so she wouldn't be heartbroken. Despite it only being 3 years old we got flowers on it last spring- I let one of them develop to see what the apples were like. It's definitely a lot closer to a wild apple than the Golden Delicious the seeds came from. Fruit was about the size of a Lady apple, so just a little bit larger than a crabapple, but with a much better flavor than a crabapple and more sweetness. We're probably going to be making cider from it in a couple years if all goes as I expect. If you want to know more about apples and how they reproduce (as well as where a lot of our current apple varieties came from) the Michael Pollan's book The Botany of Desire is an excellent read. That book also helps you to learn about why McDonalds is even worse than you thought and how  growers really are on the cutting edge of botany.
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Mar 23, 2015 20:30
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Hmmm, well that's a bummer. Also as an aside I totally neglected to read the few posts above mine and didn't realize apples were already the topic of conversation. Weeeirrd. What's a fruit tree that would make more sense for me to grow in that case? I'm not totally attached to growing it from a seed, but I find that to be a lot more rewarding. Maybe cherries or apricots?
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Mar 23, 2015 20:43
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kedo posted:Hmmm, well that's a bummer. Also as an aside I totally neglected to read the few posts above mine and didn't realize apples were already the topic of conversation. Weeeirrd. See if you can find someone with a Fameuse (snow apple) tree and get one of the apples. It's one of the few varieties that grows relatively true to seed.
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Mar 23, 2015 21:47
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| # ? May 16, 2024 07:46 |
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Cool, thanks I'll take a look! I might need to make a craigslist post about it or something... the results of a quick search through all my local pick-your-own orchards isn't promising. None of them appear to have snow apples.
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Mar 23, 2015 22:19
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