Gardening

[the Jester]

It's hard work, but it's sooo rewarding eating what you grow.

We have a lot of fruit trees that haven't produced yet because they've only been in the ground a year or two; but eventually we'll have blood oranges, kumquats, mandarins, tangelos, limes, Meyer lemons, figs, and apples, as well as the cherries, nectaplums, plums, apricots, and grapes (not a tree, I know) that we're already getting.

On top of that, we have a bunch of herbs and veggies- rosemary for days, oregano, mint, lemon thyme, peas, about three types of beans, squash, tomatoes, peppers, lettuce, spinach, pak choi, potatoes, radishes... I'm probably overlooking something.

There are also berries: blackberries, raspberries, goji berries, and several others that haven't produced yet: blueberries (brand new), honey berries, and josta berries.

Oh, and there's a dragonfruit (which also hasn't produced) and a mango tree that I don't think will make it in our climate but we're trying.

 

[thirdkingdom]

Ooh, an Enworld garden thread. Will have to start posting pics when I get a chance.

 

[Kaodi]

This is it in June after 3 months of labour:

View attachment 433942

I loathe both gardening and yardwork (for the most part) but you have a really nice place there, Morrus.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Gardening/yardwork Tip: if you have vines near a wooden fence, you need to keep a close eye on the fence’s condition.

We’ve been in this house since 1998, and originally, we had a big trellis of crossvine near the back alley section our wooden fence. When it was in bloom, it looked great and attracted all kinds of bees, butterflies, and hummingbirds.

Winds knocked down other parts of the fence, but not that section. We figured the crossvine was protecting it.

Well…not quite.

When my folks decided to replace the wooden fence with a metal one (to minimize future maintenance and replacement costs), we had to take down the trellis and remove the crossvine. This is what was revealed:

Our dogs could have gotten out of the yard at any time, but even though they went underneath the vines, the growth into the alley outside was so dense it looked like it was like a solid wall. We couldn’t see through, and neither could they.

After the work was done, that corner looked more like this:

(We’ve been replanting that area with some nice shrubs.)

 

[jian]

Gardening/yardwork Tip: if you have vines near a wooden fence, you need to keep a close eye on the fence’s condition.

We’ve been in this house since 1998, and originally, we had a big trellis of crossvine near the back alley section our wooden fence. When it was in bloom, it looked great and attracted all kinds of bees, butterflies, and hummingbirds.

View attachment 434088
Winds knocked down other parts of the fence, but not that section. We figured the crossvine was protecting it.

Well…not quite.

When my folks decided to replace the wooden fence with a metal one (to minimize future maintenance and replacement costs), we had to take down the trellis and remove the crossvine. This is what was revealed:
View attachment 434086
View attachment 434087
Our dogs could have gotten out of the yard at any time, but even though they went underneath the vines, the growth into the alley outside was so dense it looked like it was like a solid wall. We couldn’t see through, and neither could they.

After the work was done, that corner looked more like this:
View attachment 434091
(We’ve been replanting that area with some nice shrubs.)

Yeah, it’s not unlike the issue with some tree roots (especially willows) anywhere near fences or structures, which is that they could do some significant damage to the stability. A colleague once had a willow tree removed more than 40’ from their house because they were affecting the pipes. General advice is at least 50’ distance, which is a hell of a threat range for attacks of opportunity.

 

[thirdkingdom]

Photo from last fall. Asian persimmons.

 

[BookTenTiger]

We were living for a while in San Francisco, in a neighborhood that was encased in fog for 25 - 100% of each day. The apartment building had a little shared back yard that we adopted. We pulled all the weeds and dropped cuttings of succulents into the sandy soil. By the time we left we had a lovely succulent garden.

Now we are in Atlanta. It's rainy and sunny most of the year. Our soil is very clay-heavy but also full of good bugs. Everything grows here! I've been able to cultivate a yard as well as a number of trees and flowering bushes. We have an herb garden in the back with rosemary, thyme, sage, and chives, and garden boxes in the front that we plant seasonally. The fig tree I planted almost 4 years ago is finally fruiting!

I love spending time out in the garden. It takes a lot of work in the Spring and Summer, but in the winter everything freezes and I don't have to mow the lawn, which is nice.

Here are some pictures I took today.

 

[R_J_K75]

I watched a really good 2-part series over the weekend called "Secrets of the Bees". I have Disney+ and Hulu, and thar where I watched it and it was free with my subscription. It was really interesting how smart bees are. I highly recommend investing the hour and a half to watch it.

Watch Secrets of the Bees TV Show - Streaming Online | Nat Geo TV

Watch full episodes of Secrets of the Bees online. Get sneak peeks and free episodes all on Nat Geo TV.

www.nationalgeographic.com

 

[Meech17]

I think next month will be my first anniversary of being a homeowner, and it's been quite the experience.

I will say. I loathe yard work. Growing up in more rural areas I was subjected to a lot of it in my childhood and teen years. Now as an adult suburbanite, I've got just a small patch of land to call my own, and it's still far more than I want to deal with. If it were affordable I'd honestly consider replacing it with astro turf or something.

A friend of mine who's also a new home owner sent me a meme that said "Your greatest nemesis in life is the person who owned your home before you." and I can relate to that, so.. so much. We have two small flower beds that stretch almost the entire length of the front of our house, and I found an old picture online that showed they used to have some nice shrubs in them.. For whatever reason the previous owner cut them all down and left just the stumps.

On top of that they sort-of filled the beds with rocks.. If I had to guess, the previous owner found someone with a bunch of free rocks online or something, and thought "Heck yeah, I'm going to rock over my flower beds." Then he did it, and realized he only had about 1/3 of the needed rocks, and then said "Eh... Good enough".

Last summer the only thing we did with them was try to remove the stumps. It is such laborious, back breaking work. You'd think little shrub/hedge stumps wouldn't be that bad, but they're huge! Shovelling, hatcheting.. Crying, begging the stump to just leave of it's own accord... We thought we had gotten all of the stumps last summer. So just this last weekend we decided to go through, and weed out the beds really good, till over the dirt, try and remove as many of the rocks as we could, and then lay down mulch. I don't know if we plan on planting anything this year but we at least want to keep the weeds at bay.

Turns out we missed a stump last year. So we spent over an hour digging this jerk out and were left with a massive crater where the roots previously lived. What did we do? Raked all the rocks into the hole, and filled over the top with dirt, then cardboard, and finally mulch, as if it never happened.

Laying in bed yesterday morning, I look to my girlfriend and say "You know what.. I've been talking about how I'd like to throw hands with the previous owner.. And here we are starting our own villainous origin story. 10-15 years from now, we're going to sell this house to some poor kids and they're going to dig up that flower bed and find a pit full of rocks, and they'll want to fight me. And I'll deserve it."

 

[SkidAce]

I think next month will be my first anniversary of being a homeowner, and it's been quite the experience.

I will say. I loathe yard work. Growing up in more rural areas I was subjected to a lot of it in my childhood and teen years. Now as an adult suburbanite, I've got just a small patch of land to call my own, and it's still far more than I want to deal with. If it were affordable I'd honestly consider replacing it with astro turf or something.

A friend of mine who's also a new home owner sent me a meme that said "Your greatest nemesis in life is the person who owned your home before you." and I can relate to that, so.. so much. We have two small flower beds that stretch almost the entire length of the front of our house, and I found an old picture online that showed they used to have some nice shrubs in them.. For whatever reason the previous owner cut them all down and left just the stumps.

On top of that they sort-of filled the beds with rocks.. If I had to guess, the previous owner found someone with a bunch of free rocks online or something, and thought "Heck yeah, I'm going to rock over my flower beds." Then he did it, and realized he only had about 1/3 of the needed rocks, and then said "Eh... Good enough".

Last summer the only thing we did with them was try to remove the stumps. It is such laborious, back breaking work. You'd think little shrub/hedge stumps wouldn't be that bad, but they're huge! Shovelling, hatcheting.. Crying, begging the stump to just leave of it's own accord... We thought we had gotten all of the stumps last summer. So just this last weekend we decided to go through, and weed out the beds really good, till over the dirt, try and remove as many of the rocks as we could, and then lay down mulch. I don't know if we plan on planting anything this year but we at least want to keep the weeds at bay.

Turns out we missed a stump last year. So we spent over an hour digging this jerk out and were left with a massive crater where the roots previously lived. What did we do? Raked all the rocks into the hole, and filled over the top with dirt, then cardboard, and finally mulch, as if it never happened.

Laying in bed yesterday morning, I look to my girlfriend and say "You know what.. I've been talking about how I'd like to throw hands with the previous owner.. And here we are starting our own villainous origin story. 10-15 years from now, we're going to sell this house to some poor kids and they're going to dig up that flower bed and find a pit full of rocks, and they'll want to fight me. And I'll deserve it."

Quoted for truth. Chores were cutting grass, picking weeds out of food garden, picking vegetables, till soil, bleh, bleh, bleh.

I'm 60 plus now, and the most I "LIKE" to do is where I just planted some sunflowers out front. Hopefully they are fire and forget.