well, we are almost to the max posts, so i wanted to update on my mature syngonium progress. i have 2 new leaves of 'mature form' AND also some variegation near veins - that's totally unexpected! so i have 5 leaves and 2 little 'horns' at the ends, just like other mature leaves. when i took the cutting, the last very young leaf got mangled in xfer , so i cut it off, but left the stalk (where the new leaf develops) - so the 1st leaf was def formed BEFORE i took the cutting. now the 2nd? i am not sure - may be it was already formed inside there too? so i'll have to wait for a few more to be sure. but so far i am happy - i fed it well, so new leaves are dark green, the older leaves are slowly decaying one by one. but that's normal. now the big question is - when do i trim the vine? i think i'll grow may be 10 leaves , so i can trim it and root again and then see what will come out. and then of course i am afraid that after the trim the young immature leaves start popping. but that will be end of summer, not sooner. so, the leaves on the left are new. they have a little hard time unfurling, so they some spots and tears. they are folded in a very interesting 'origami' fashion. next time i'll take pics as they unfold to show you.

Olpea, don't get me started on the unanswered mysteries of animal behavior in relation to fruit trees. OK, too late, I've started. My robins, which are ridiculously plentiful on my property, leave everything but blueberries and mulberries alone (maybe you need those as a diversion crop). Of course they would go for cherries if I had them unnetted. Everyone has crows around and only sometimes do they attack fruit but on sites they do everything must be netted. A loose net will do as they won't climb around under a net. At least that's the behavior of our crows. So far. A very sane and intelligent client of mine told me of a very fat woodchuck making a 4' vertical leap from a dead stop to get above one of my baffles. Mystery- was this an olympian woodchuck or do Michael Jordan acrobatics come as standard equipment at the woodchuck factory. When I told this story to someone else they told me of seeing a cotton tail rabbit clearing a 4' fence- that's a little cotton tail, not a jack rabbit. I have sites nearby where the deer go as high as 7' to strip foliage and fruit. At my site they never go above about 5'. My squirrels used to run up trees to get away from me but once I got a shotgun and slaughtered them for a few weeks they avoided trees and scurry in crazy angles through weeds and rocks at the slightest sign of my motion- even from a window. My wife's movement doesn't disturb them. My son's theory for the squirrels is that I eliminated the local gene pool of confident, tree climbing when stressed, squirrels. That's a theory. One thing I know, the behavior of same species wildlife vary a lot.

Day 22 Update! Peppers and lettuce: The same peppers and lettuce from the previous shot. They're in the second-worst part of the UFO grow chamber -- far from the UFO in the center. Nonetheless, the peppers are doing beautifully. I've got a whole tray of them looking just like that. The lettuce, only so-so. They're putting out leaves at a good rate, but two of them never did stand up like I was hoping they would. Next up, the monsters: Okay, these pumpkins are getting a bit scary: The larger of the two now has three tendrils on it, and leaves the size of my outstretched hand. I don't know how much longer I'm going to be able to keep them in here before they decide to crush everything else in their path, but I'll keep them in as long as I can ;) I realized that last time I forgot to photograph my eggplants. They're doing just shiny: So, now for my crazy okra: If you'll recall, one germinated tall like a freak, but with a strong stem, and dark green leaves; one germinated short with dark green leaves; and two germinated short with pale, chlorotic yellow leaves. I credit this to using old seed. I'm pleased to report that all of them are doing great. The tall one is now working on its second true leaf, while the two chlorotic ones are starting to turn green. All three of the small ones have just started on their first true leaf; I expect they'll look like the tall one (minus the crazy height) next week. My Ronde de Nice squash that just germinated? I transplanted one, and surprisingly, the transplant is doing better than the non-transplant! Now for the one that was my biggest concern last time: my watermelon. If you'll recall, its first true leaves had turned crisp and stopped growing. Well, I'm glad to report that it has not one, but two sets of normal, healthy true leaves now! Here's a shot of some of my miscellaneous squash and melons. Not a complaint from me about a one of them; they're all growing very healthy. My cinnamon basil was looking healthy enough that I felt it time to thin it out into individual pots. The remaining plants in the original pot are below: So, what's my primary concern this time? I'm starting to suspect that I'm getting more growth in the UFO chamber (red, grow) than in the Christmas chamber (blue, veg). I'm not sure yet, though. Now, that is to be expected to some degree, since that chamber is higher wattage (~105W vs. ~85W), it may be more than that. It's really hard to tell, though, because I moved my most mature trays to the red chamber and kept the youngest trays in the veg chamber. However, I do have one good comparison point: basil. I have a basil pot in the veg chamber that's exactly the same as the basil pot in the grow chamber -- same soil, same size, same plants, and same planting time. So, next week I'm going to photograph and measure the two and see how they compare. But overall, another good week :) The plants pretty much take care of themselves (since the LEDs are pretty cool, the soil takes a long time to get dry, so I rarely even have to water). Hence, I've been busying myself readying my outdoors for the new plants, for once it gets warm enough. I'm going to be training my vining plants to strings suspended from guyed poles this year, via vine clips; should be neat to see how they do.

Could be cyclamen mites - I've had the same problem on a few different plants incl. an S. Divinorum, pretty bad, actually, and very similar to the pics posted. Well, curled leaves to me is the first sign of someone nesting underneath, so I looked. And saw nothing. Then looked again. And a tincy-wincy whitish thing appeared to move across. Well, out came the microscope, and yep, it's a cyclamen mite, positive ID on a few female species from different plants. Now, saying they're small means understating things by a few orders of magnitude: you need a 100x microscope to count legs, so you get the idea. At this magnification a pin tip looks like a sphere, and you still couldn't read what's tattooed on the mite's butt. Interestingly enough, they manifest themselves sort of differently on mango plants that have heavy, waxy leaves, but the idea is still the same - browning (like in case of a bad burn) and crookedness of the young leaves. At any rate, I've searched the web and those mites seem to be fairly common and - bad news - fairly hard to get rid of, the last resort measure being soaking them in 100-110F water for half an hour, something I am trying literally as we speak (just put plants in pots into a bathtub full of hot water). I'll see how it goes, but I've seen those mites dying in a drop of water under the microscope in about a minute, so it might work. I'm hoping I won't kill the plants. Makes me think - I've read on some funny sites that those symptoms are very common to S. Divinorum, but "it's a bit of a mystery" - nobody's certain, most authors contradict one another and the best advice I've seen was to try changing every variable one by one to see what works. Now, given that they are all derived from a small progenitor stock and the number of places you can get cuttings from is limited - could it be that they are all infested with mites? It's hardly surprising that mites haven't been notices in the past: as I said, it takes some looking. Thinking about the spread of infestation across my plants and its apparent chronology, I can only suggest that mites were brought on the cutting I planted, there are no other possible sources like other plants or soil. If you want to check your plants, get a really good magnifying glass and check the undersides of the leaves for tiny, 0.1mm or less, bugs. Some are moving fast. And BTW, it appears to be highly contagious, so as most sites suggest, step one is isolating the infested plants.