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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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What's the thread consensus on using saucers for outdoor potted herbs? My Vietnamese Mint seems to love having a little water in its saucer at all times. While just recently I think I've hosed my parsley due to the roots rotting because I left the saucer filled while I was away for 4 days. Also mealybugs: my sage is absolutely covered and I'm giving up on it but now there are some on my Marigolds?! I thought bugs hated Marigolds? That's why I have them 
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Feb 8, 2020 00:58
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Should I use Stark Tre-Pep Fertilizer on my cherry tree that I planted last year, and if so, when is a good time of year to do it? The website says it’s safe (and made) to use on newly-planted trees, but y’all told me using any kind of fertilizer on just-planted trees is a bad idea. I would think Stark Bros would know better though.
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Feb 8, 2020 03:56
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I. M. Gei posted:Should I use Stark Tre-Pep Fertilizer on my cherry tree that I planted last year, and if so, when is a good time of year to do it? I don't think that a tree you planted last year counts as "newly planted", but if I'm wrong someone please correct me. As an aside, this will be the first year I'm fertilizing my japanese maples for similar reasons.
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Feb 8, 2020 04:26
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Red_Fred posted:What's the thread consensus on using saucers for outdoor potted herbs? You will find it varies from plant to plant. It's physically impossible to overeater mint as far as I can tell -- it (and basil?) are close relatives to aquatic plants, and it shows. Rosemary on the other hand likes it dry and rocky.
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Feb 8, 2020 04:48
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If it’s been in the ground a year and is happy and healthy it should be fine. Early spring (whenever that is in your area-usually when the redbuds start blooming in the eastern US) is a good time to fertilize trees. What you don’t want to do is fertilize with a high nitrogen fertilizer right when you transplant a tree and force it to grow a bunch of leaves that the transplant-shocked roots can’t support. For similar reasons, fertilizing a stressed or weak tree is usually a bad idea.
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Feb 8, 2020 04:51
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Hubis posted:You will find it varies from plant to plant. It's physically impossible to overeater mint as far as I can tell -- it (and basil?) are close relatives to aquatic plants, and it shows. Rosemary on the other hand likes it dry and rocky. uh I'm going to have to hard disagree and say you can definitely overeater meat but its up to each persons palate, but I throw a little in a lot of dishes for sure. Definitely can't overeater basil though  As for over-watering.. The mint on the outflow of my pond needs to be taken back or its roots will actually clog it. A different kind of spearmint I have in a pot sits with water in it regularly because I still haven't drilled a hole in the bottom of it... its fine. (I'm sure it depends a little on the species)
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Feb 8, 2020 17:47
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Harry Potter on Ice posted:uh I'm going to have to hard disagree and say you can definitely overeater meat but its up to each persons palate, but I throw a little in a lot of dishes for sure. Definitely can't overeater basil though lol hoisted on your own autocorrect petard
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Feb 9, 2020 04:28
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Had fun brutally axe murdering a sago palm yesterday. I hate those bastards-possibly the most unfriendly plant I can imagine. Before (a few years ago):  Murder in Progress:  I started with clippers but then found out a very sharp axe was perfect. It was like chopping up a giant turnip or pineapple or something-not woody at all. After:  Not sure what I'm going to do with with that bed. I do need a sort of vertical element there about where the palm was (and it did look nice, just made doing anything in that bed miserable), maybe a camellia or limelight hydrangea that will stay small and add some winter interest or japanese magnolia/maple. Let it be mostly flowers until the tree gets bigger, and then slowly phase out to more shade tolerant bulbs and stuff? I need to divide all the daylillies and agapanthus that are in that bed anyway, so I'll have some of those to spread around, and costco has huge cheap things of gladiolus and acidanthera so I may cover it in those for the time being.
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Feb 9, 2020 16:07
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Man, my houseplants have been doing SO MUCH better this winter since I repotted them last spring into a custom soil mix.Kaiser Schnitzel posted:Had fun brutally axe murdering a sago palm yesterday. I hate those bastards-possibly the most unfriendly plant I can imagine. Coral Bark Maple?
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Feb 9, 2020 16:25
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Hubis posted:Coral Bark Maple? This is one of my favorite trees in my yard, stunning most of the year to me.
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Feb 9, 2020 16:30
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Harry Potter on Ice posted:This is one of my favorite trees in my yard, stunning most of the year to me. Yes, these are absolutely stunning cultivars, an incredible accent tree! If you go with a coral bark (specifically Acer palmatum var. "Sango Kaku"), know that you're going to want space. They get around 25' tall with a spread of 20'. It's too common that folks plant smaller trees close to the building then later have to prune the hell out of it. So plant it in the center of that bed, if not a little forward. Incidentally, if you'd prefer bright green bark over red, look for Acer palmatum var. "Aoyagi".
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Feb 9, 2020 17:18
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Hubis posted:Man, my houseplants have been doing SO MUCH better this winter since I repotted them last spring into a custom soil mix. Solkanar512 posted:Yes, these are absolutely stunning cultivars, an incredible accent tree! Harry Potter on Ice posted:This is one of my favorite trees in my yard, stunning most of the year to me. I love those, but I don't know that they'd handle the full blazing sun that spots get 85% of the day in summer. The Bloodgoods and a few other varieties can take all day full sun here, but given the cost of a decent size japanese maples, I'm not sure I want to experiment with one in such a risky spot. I have a little delicate mounding cut-leaf one of some variety in the back that gets some shade and it is happy as a clam though. I wish I could have a whole yard of japanese maples and camellias. I think I've decided to just fill it up with herbaceous perennial flowering bulby things for now and reassess in a few years. That'll give the stump/roots of the palm some time to rot down too, and that stump is exactly where I'd want to put something. I've just realized the power line comes into the house right above that as well, so I may stick with something more shrubby that will only come to the height of the porch or so. I really need to get some planters for the shelves beside my steps and figure out some kind of automatic irrigation for them because I am baaaaaad at remembering to water stuff in pots. Camellias are blooming all over right now and they're maybe my favorite plant. My great-grandfather was really into breeding them, and they are just such handsome damned plants. Might have to make a Camellia Appreciation  post
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Feb 9, 2020 19:51
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Kaiser Schnitzel posted:I love those, but I don't know that they'd handle the full blazing sun that spots get 85% of the day in summer. The Bloodgoods and a few other varieties can take all day full sun here, but given the cost of a decent size japanese maples, I'm not sure I want to experiment with one in such a risky spot. I have a little delicate mounding cut-leaf one of some variety in the back that gets some shade and it is happy as a clam though. I wish I could have a whole yard of japanese maples and camellias. Hard call. On the one hand, you're concern is well founded, but on the other the vibrancy of the bark is apparently associated with the sun it gets.
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Feb 9, 2020 20:22
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Kaiser Schnitzel posted:I love those, but I don't know that they'd handle the full blazing sun that spots get 85% of the day in summer. The Bloodgoods and a few other varieties can take all day full sun here, but given the cost of a decent size japanese maples, I'm not sure I want to experiment with one in such a risky spot. I have a little delicate mounding cut-leaf one of some variety in the back that gets some shade and it is happy as a clam though. I wish I could have a whole yard of japanese maples and camellias. Make that effort post, that sounds awesome! Well then the solution is to plant a large shade tree, then plant a bunch of dwarf japanese maples underneath! If that sunny spot is morning sun rather than afternoon, that will give you a bit of breathing room but if that's afternoon sun it can be rough. But seriously, I can understand the worry. I'm in the PNW and yeah we were getting week after week of 80+ degrees and my 6' Sango Kaku did fine in full sun (PNW, 80+ degree weeks in the summer, eastern side of the house) but it's because it's a larger tree and I was deep watering it once a week or so. The much smaller trees had to be watered almost daily (in pots) and kept in the shade a bit more and even then there were more than my share of crispy leaves. I did notice that your back fence seems to be slightly shady however... Costco has a really nice selection of perennial flowering tubers right now, bags of like 6 Dahlias or 18 Lilies for $12.99 in tons of colors if you need any inspiration. Tons of great stuff, you could fill out that bed pretty inexpensively with a poo poo ton of color if you're a member. Also if you're feeling frisky, you could stick something for a nice (NON-INVASIVE HOLY poo poo) vine to give the bed some height and help shade your porch a little bit as well. But I also like to cram in as much color like I'm loving Willy Wanka, so double-check with someone who has actual good taste. Edit, here are some vines I'm ordering right now in fact, both are varieties of Black Eyed Susan vines: "Sunrise Surprise"  "Blushing Susie"  Apparently you take cuttings and propagate them indoors to keep them over the winter. And they can be grown as houseplants. Solkanar512 fucked around with this message at 20:42 on Feb 9, 2020 |
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Feb 9, 2020 20:38
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Solkanar512 posted:Make that effort post, that sounds awesome! Yeah I’m def. headed to Costco this week for some bulbs. I don’t think dahlias do well here, but I might try some anyway. I’ve thought about growing a big climbing rose up that corner of the porch, but the termite people don’t like you to have anything growing on the house, which is super lame. I’m on the gulf coast and so summer here is 3 months of 90+ degrees and 80% humidity with a thunderstorm most afternoons, and it never gets below 70-75 at night for a few weeks. The wet and humidity and high nighttime temps are apparently what really fucks with a lot of stuff more than the heat (dahlias being one of them, IIRC), but then tropical stuff loves it so you can grow a fun mix of stuff, but often at opposite seasons from the rest of the country. Growing stuff in containers/raised beds can help some with the drainage and being wet all the time, but it all combines to make the standard gardening advice for most of the country sort of hard to use. My whole back yard is mostly shaded by a huge live oak, and mostly stuff (including Japanese maples) does a little to a lot better back there than in the full sun front. That shady back fence you mentioned is covered in dead stuff since rn we had a freeze, but in the summer it’s 8’ tall elephant ears and gingers. One day I’d like to maybe replace that with camellias that would have more year-round appeal and not leave me looking at a fence for 2 months.
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Feb 9, 2020 21:01
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I don’t suppose there’s a way to get rid of weeks-old outdoor cat poo poo besides scooping it, is there? We have a few stray cats living in our yard that’ve turned the spot where my espalier trees are about to go into their personal litter box. I’ve got some guys coming to my house this weekend to excavate a bunch of the dirt in this spot and put in new dirt mixed with some of the excavated, and I sure would love it if I could get rid of all that cat poo poo so I’m not digging around in dirt mixed with kitty turds. I would just scoop it, but the poo poo that’s out there now is kinda old and has pretty well blended in with the dirt at this point so I’m sure I’d end up missing some. Also...... well I’m gonna be honest here, scooping poop grosses me the gently caress out. There I said it.
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Feb 11, 2020 00:14
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If there is a way to get rid of dog and cat poo poo without picking it up and I find out about it now I'm gonna be so mad. I'll ask a question though... you're at least using a bag right?
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Feb 11, 2020 00:20
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Wear gloves and wash your hands etc. because my dad legit got giardia when I was little from playing in the cat poop filled sandbox with me.
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Feb 11, 2020 01:25
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Kaiser Schnitzel posted:Wear gloves and wash your hands etc. because my dad legit got giardia when I was little from playing in the cat poop filled sandbox with me. And that is why sand boxes are the worst
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Feb 11, 2020 01:46
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There are products that claim that the enzymes in them will help poop biodegrade faster, but even if they worked well (I’ve never used them), five days isn’t enough to for them to do much I would suit up and get scooping.
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Feb 11, 2020 02:00
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Are we doing pesticide/insecticide chat in here? It's getting to be that time of year, and I'm in an all out fight with emerald ash borers. My Arbor Systems direct injection kit just came in:  I'll be starting out with Boxer (https://www.arborsystems.com/find-a-product/tree-care-2/insecticides/boxer/) in April. I've also got some spotted lantern fly issues near me, and with how they have been moving I wouldn't be surprised to find them in my yard this year. I was dealing with them on a friend's new property last year, so there will be much tree taping happening in the spring.
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Feb 11, 2020 18:18
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Ugh, the app ate my last post. So I completed a little project this weekend:   If you’ve never seen one of these before, it likely has several regional names but I grew up calling it a hot bed. As you can see, you have a bottomless box with hinged doors at the top, at an angle, covered in semi-transparent plastic. On the floor, you have nursery cloth and a soil heating cable buried in sand. As the cable is set to anywhere from 60 to 80 (it can go to 100 for some reason), you can then plant trays of seeds right now and have them ready as plant starts once last frost has hit. Right now I have a tray of tomato plants going, and a tray of peppers as an experiment. I might plant up some green onion or lettuce as well. Through out the season I’ll also use it to speed up succumb planting to try and get more harvests. All the electrical connections seem to be well covered by the doors and what not, but I’ll be looking into better securing them from any accidents. The stuff is rated for outdoor use and is plugged into an appropriate GFCI outdoor outlet, so I think I’m ok. If someone thinks this would fit in at the Grover-haus, please speak up!
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Feb 11, 2020 18:29
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Solkanar512 posted:Ugh, the app ate my last post. Nice! It's a heated cold frame. I guess the one thing I'd be careful of is the plants overheating if you get a warm or particularly sunny day. I haven't used one, but you can get things like this temperature-sensitive hinge to automatically open the window if it gets too hot. Also is there a reason you went with opaque plastic rather than transparent over the top? The big issue with starting seedlings early is light.
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Feb 11, 2020 20:35
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Lead out in cuffs posted:Nice! It's a heated cold frame. So the coil is connected to a thermostat (the probe is at the end of the black wire in the picture) that will turn off when it gets warm, and I do have a few dowels ready to hold it open when it starts to warm up. That's how I plan to harden things off as well. That temperature sensitive hinge is mighty tempting though, maybe I'll upgrade later on. I went with that plastic because I basically bought the whole thing from my brother and that's what came with (admittedly a lazy reason, I know!). I remember growing up that we used similar stuff and it worked fine (it's like being inside a plastic/fiberglass greenhouse) and my brother used it successfully but since you mention it I'll certainly keep an eye it if germination rates are bad or the plants get leggy. The plastic is just tacked on, so it's no big deal to change it out. So anyone here ever grow dahlias from seed before? There's a flower farm within driving distance of my house that was selling these online and I bought a few packs. I figure that being able to start them really early means that I give them tons of time to really get a good first year tuber and them I'm good to go. And look at these, how could you resist? 
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Feb 11, 2020 21:53
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Ugh, I probably need to clean up my basement so I can get my vegetable seeds started soon, huh?
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Feb 12, 2020 00:01
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there wolf posted:There's one daffodil that escaped the great front bed purge, swaying defiantly by the steps and mocking my ambitions.
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Feb 12, 2020 04:17
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Hubis posted:And that is why sand boxes are the worst *extremely Dale Gribble voice* “Studies show that your average sandbox is only 15% sand. The rest is a melange of urine, feces, animal feces, and et cetera.” Platystemon posted:There are products that claim that the enzymes in them will help poop biodegrade faster, but even if they worked well (I’ve never used them), five days isn’t enough to for them to do much uggghhhhhhhh FINE Kaiser Schnitzel posted:Wear gloves and wash your hands etc. because my dad legit got giardia when I was little from playing in the cat poop filled sandbox with me. I mean this is something I’d do anyway just to make it feel less gross. I’ll probably wear a dust mask too. Maybe wrap both of my legs in trash bags.
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Feb 12, 2020 06:56
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I. M. Gei posted:*extremely Dale Gribble voice* Yeah, given how many loving 50lb bags you need to fill one, it's really the easiest way. "What do you mean that this 50lb bag is only half a cubic foot? I need HOW MANY BAGS?!"
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Feb 12, 2020 16:28
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It just rained a little over 6 inches at my house and I’m pretty sure this is gonna make picking up the cat poo poo about 100 times harder. Pray for me.
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Feb 12, 2020 20:59
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We had a great sandbox when I was a kid that had a couple dowels that held up an oilcloth cover for shade that you then removed the sticks and put the cover directly on the box so no animals got in. Of course we made "chocolate" sand with dirt, but that's not the point. I'm getting my dining room ready for seed starting too, I found a fuckton of seeds I'd bought but never used so we'll see what germinates. eta: I'm think of those little peat pods since I prefer to water from the bottom, but how do the plastic cells compare in y'alls opinion?
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Feb 12, 2020 21:07
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I. M. Gei posted:It just rained a little over 6 inches at my house and I’m pretty sure this is gonna make picking up the cat poo poo about 100 times harder. It's really not that bad, friend..
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Feb 12, 2020 21:13
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That70sHeidi posted:We had a great sandbox when I was a kid that had a couple dowels that held up an oilcloth cover for shade that you then removed the sticks and put the cover directly on the box so no animals got in. I’m using whole trays myself, but when using plastic cells just make sure that they don’t go too long or you risk root binding. By the way, has anyone ever started carrot seeds early? I read that they take around three weeks to germinate but they’re also massive taproots and apparently very delicate. Any thoughts?
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Feb 12, 2020 21:26
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I. M. Gei posted:It just rained a little over 6 inches at my house and I’m pretty sure this is gonna make picking up the cat poo poo about 100 times harder. How big of an area are we talking about? I'm wondering if the rain may be your friend, giving you softer soil to deal with and a decent reason to just shovel the contaminated soil into waste bags and discard it. I wouldn't think that the catstuff would get down beyond about 6-7 inches? So you could just skim off that much with your shovel, throw it out, cover the area with a tarp so that the cats can't get at it again, and then rest easy knowing that lovely people will be arriving with new planting soil for you this weekend. That's what I'd do, but maybe there is something about the affected area that I do not understand.
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Feb 12, 2020 21:33
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Eek, I broke up and repotted my OG Christmas cactus, but one of the plants is looking really peaked (and will drop a segment at the slightest touch). What does it need? The other three pieces in the same pot look great, fleshy and firm.  eta: The little piece on the left is separate and healthy. Hirayuki fucked around with this message at 21:41 on Feb 12, 2020 |
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Feb 12, 2020 21:38
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Commercial landscapers have dealt with way worse than some dried up cat poo, so I wouldn’t worry toooo much about it. I remember planting pansies outside some condos at the beach in my week-long career as a commercial flower planter and scooping out a little dirt to make a hole for a plant and just grabbing a huge pile of wet dog poo poo that had gotten tilled into the bed.
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Feb 12, 2020 22:47
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I've got grubs. Help me goons I am unclean. Seriously though....are the pesticides going to kill my plants or can I get away with some of these spore-based ones?
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Feb 12, 2020 23:18
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Jaxyon posted:I've got grubs. You probably want to start with diatomaceous earth. Totally non-toxic. You can find it at any big box/hardware store.
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Feb 12, 2020 23:42
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Motronic posted:You probably want to start with diatomaceous earth. Totally non-toxic. You can find it at any big box/hardware store. That's something I have on hand already, so cool. Though I don't know if that helps below the surface. Does anyone have experience with spraying nematodes?
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Feb 12, 2020 23:57
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Motronic posted:You probably want to start with diatomaceous earth. Totally non-toxic. You can find it at any big box/hardware store. DE won't do much to grubs. I mean, it will, but they have to come into physical contact with it first, and they will have done their damage. There are basically two ways to deal with grubs: preventative and curative. Grubs hatch deep below the turf in spring, then slowly make their way up to the surface developing and feeding on your roots as they grow until dmerge in the summer, so the nasty, and burrow down into the turf again. Curative is your standard insecticides, and can happen mid summer but runs the risk of all the nasty stuff things like Seven entail like PPE, re-entry intervals, and concerns about non-target species being affected. Preventative control on the other hand essentially tricks the grubs into not eating/developing so that they die off and can be way more targeted in terms of affecting other species and human toxicity. The trick is that it has to be applied early in the season while grubs are still vulnerable and watered in properly. The active ingredient in Scott's GrubEx is pretty unique and is both very effective and has minimal risk of harming non target species, so it would be my go to recommendation. Here's a good video: https://youtu.be/H7cP1KWqXoA Hubis fucked around with this message at 04:30 on Feb 13, 2020 |
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Feb 13, 2020 04:27
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| # ? May 29, 2024 00:24 |
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I also like these guys: https://youtu.be/5z_wKqIKPls https://youtu.be/0FWJklcXR5U https://youtu.be/mUURfNxJZwc
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Feb 13, 2020 04:33
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