Yo zen_man!
gltrap54
7 years ago
Howdy neighbor! Hope ya haven't lost your internet in the ice!
I'm thinking I've got a Benary's Giant issue cropping up. First let me say, I lost my entire crop of Magellans last spring with some form of fungus, I guess (never responded to Daconil) & this brings me to question if I'm having the same issue with these..... Notice the brown tips on the leaves....
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ken_adrian Adrian MI cold Z5
7 years agoRelated Discussions
Yo zen_man....... Benary Giants As Promised.......
Comments (5)Hello neighbor! Gltrap, it has been a while. Those are great looking Benary's Giants and it is great that you have been selling some arrangements at the Topeka Downtown Farmer's Market. Are you winning the battle against the Honeysuckle? Have you expanded your garden, or do you have plans to expand your garden? Do you still have chickens? We do, and ours free-range now. We did lose a lot of our chickens to a pack of coyotes, though. And we lost a bunch of young guineas to raccoons. Raccoons are formidable varmints, and we seem to have a lot of them this year. My son shot one last night. Fortunately no indications of a mountain lion this year. Your zinnias look well grown and healthy. Good for you. Did you get any wind damage from that storm last Thursday night? A bunch of my zinnias got flattened. Not killed though. I think they will recover. I'm going out to hoe a few weeds now. ZM...See MoreIt can be fun to breed your own zinnias - Part 44
Comments (122)CeeKay - Alex, can you let the cuttings stay in the Klone King until the roots are really well developed (say 2 inches or so)? Absolutely. Actually, you want the roots to be pretty well growing (I waited for at least 3 different 1+ inch roots) before you try to transplant or it may not make the transition to potting soil. I lost some things, I believe because I jumped the gun. I didn't buy any, but there's also a special liquid nutrient that is offered for cloning, so the cuttings are getting fed at the same time. I mostly don't see this as necessary unless you were leaving something in the machine for months. I did buy some rooting hormone gel which is made specifically for the clone machines. I had some regular powdered stuff - RootTone, I think it was, but it was old, and when those yellow roses I mentioned just wouldn't root for me, and I was getting antsy to shut the thing down for the end of season, I bought it and that seemed to do the trick. The three cuttings had callused, and eventually probably would have rooted, but that sped them up, thankfully. My other two roses, as mentioned, only took a week to root as opposed to the several weeks the yellow rose took. As for your antique moss rose, I feel pretty confident that you could get successful green cuttings come Spring, using the Klone King or one of the other cloning machines. I can't say whether any of the other machines are any better, but I will say that if you see one with a dome, avoid it. After reading the material, I am in agreement that too much heat would be generated under it because of the heat from the water pump and being under lights. I think, reading that, was what settled me on the Klone King - intuition spoke to me. :) Use some rooting hormone from the beginning, though, to give things the extra edge. I was cocky and thought I wouldn't need it. Another blow to my gardening ego. Sigh. Oh, and there are different sizes - some have only 12 slots for cuttings, I think. I was "in the mode" at the time, and John said: "Go for it!", so I bought the one with 36 slots. Nice, but possibly unnecessary. Wish I'd been "in the mode" about 3 months earlier, though, when I first saw the thing advertised, because by the time I bought it, the price had upped about $25! We're also predicted to get first frost here in the morning. It's been a long season - longest I remember in ages. I have things I need to do outside still, but they are for after the annuals die, so I've been puttering around, twiddling my thumbs waiting. Am not anxious for winter, but am anxious for shutting the garden down for the season, so I can concentrate on other things. Alex, you mentioned a greenhouse- do you ever grow zinnias there? Lucky ZenMan having that sweet setup to grow zinnias in his basement. No, my greenhouse, which is about 8 x 18 ft up against the south side of the house, is not heated. Perennials can overwinter, and many annuals can handle the cold by the time May rolls around and outside temps aren't going into deep freeze for extended periods. As for ZM's basement setup, he'll be the first to tell you that you can have an indoor setup, too with just a shelf or two - or more - and a 4 ft utility light suspended over it. Doesn't have to be anything fancy. You don't have to have temperature controlled germination shelves (sniff), or even high intensity grow lights, etc, etc. My set up is pretty simple, though it's bigger now than it used to be. I have space for 12 flats that are about 16" x 23" and only 6" high. These will hold about 14 6-cell seed starters or 35 (more or less) styrofoam cups which I use instead of plastic pots for various reasons. You could set up a single shelf with one 4 ft light that would handle the equivalent of 2 of these flats worth of plants. That's still alot of plants. And if you wanted to grow some zinnias indoors, you could simply elevate your trays with books or boxes underneath, removing them as the plants grow taller. You getting me? Think I've talked enough. Whew. Alex...See MoreIt can be fun to breed your own zinnias - Part 46
Comments (103)Well, I have missed a bit, I see. Firstly, let me address Sayuri's statement: I assumed most of you guys to be well off retirees. Chuckle, snicker, SNORT! You can definitely leave me out of that assessment - ha! Well, yes, I'm semi-retired, if one can call it that, but far from being well off. Certainly not living in the manner to which I wish I'd become accustomed. But we manage to keep the cats (and ourselves) fed. And I'm a very accomplished scrounger. :) Now, secondly, I don't have a cat walking across my keyboard as I did earlier, but I can't find the pic I'd been thinking about of the newly made beds. Instead, here's a somewhat later photo which shows the raised beds already planted. As you can see, Sayuri, I don't have sides to my beds - I've just shoveled the loose dirt from the paths (after tilling) onto the bed areas, raising them up somewhat. The looser the dirt, the easier it is to scoop it up and pile on the beds. And this area was soft and clear of grass and weeds because it had been under tarps for about a year and a half. I've done this in other areas, but none have worked as well as this, probably because the other spots had poorer, less loamy soil to begin with. You're in a hurry, though, so I get the idea of the herbicide, even if, personally, I can't bring myself to trust a chemical that supposedly kills some plants, but not others. History has proven me wrong, but I still have a problem with the concept. Oh well - whatever. My point is, you can make raised beds without the bother of being fancy about it. I do it every year, though I've been working on this area in particular, using straw mulch, to make it so I never have to till again, or rebuild the beds. I don't have a shot from 2017 corresponding to this exact location, but here's one from July 2017 in a couple of beds that would be to the left of these pictured: You can't really tell, but the beds are still slightly higher than the paths, even after a couple of years. It's because, once built, they never get walked on. They'll be even higher this year because I intend to dump a load of composted manure on them. That may cost a bit, but it will be worth it. Ninecrow - that is one audacious, bodacious snail!!! Wow - have never seen one like it. Cool. Go Gatchaman! Namaste, Alex...See MoreWhat are the small black bugs that leave sticky residue on begonias?
Comments (37)"I am not sure why you are so resistant to making any changes"....I just have to laugh a bit since I heard this same thing on a totally different forum (dealing with cub cadet tractors). It got to the point where I actually left the forum. I'm not sure what you are suggesting I do? Start taking apart all my potted plants down to a depth of several inches...or even farther....and add new ground to each? As to "productive plant growth"...I guess I should have shown a picture of the entire sunroom where those begonias are in. There is enough 'productive plant growth' going on out there (should be with 20 windows on all but the north side) for me. Much more and I'll need another addition. There are plants out there still going strong that I've had since the late 70s....in the same exact type of mix that I still use. All these annuals - which prompted me to post in the first place - are going to be outside hopefully by mid-May. I WILL look very carefully at what type of soil I want to put them in come fall (although whatever is around the roots, etc., will still be there anyway since I don't bring in bare root stock...I dig out the annuals in different sized clumps to fit my pots). AND I will look more closely at what sort of potting mix I'm buying - perhaps go with a bit higher quality brand (is there such a thing?) or at least a more recognizable one. BUT (sorry) I will continue to add peat moss and vermiculite. I still think (and this has not been addressed here other than my mentioning it) that the springtail situation has come into play nor am I convinced that what I'm seeing is NOT springtails. Could easily be. I think they came with huge amounts of new ground and mulch that was added within feet of the room where all my plants are!! There is a large maple tree that we had added a bed around. To accomplish that, the entire area (on a slope) had to be regraded...taking considerable amount of soil/mulch PLUS large areas needing to be seeded with new grass so now we also had large amounts of straw that was kept constantly moist for the grass seed. Definitely the conditions were right for an invasion of anything that loved moisture and damp soil, etc. We NEVER had these springtails before this project was done, and I NEVER had any of whatever is flying around the plant room and the rest of the house. Coincidence? I doubt it. So I'm still leaning towards the possibility that the plant mix may well have nothing to do with any of this. I'm wondering if perhaps things other than springtails came along with the landscaper's soil as well? End of story. I think I'm done with this thread now. Again...thanks for all the advice and thoughts. I'll report back later in the spring and/or fall....See Moregltrap54
7 years agozen_man
7 years agozen_man
7 years agolast modified: 7 years agogltrap54
7 years agozen_man
7 years agoken_adrian Adrian MI cold Z5
7 years agogltrap54
7 years agozen_man
7 years agogltrap54
7 years agozen_man
7 years agogltrap54
7 years agozen_man
7 years agogltrap54
7 years agozen_man
7 years agogltrap54
7 years agozen_man
7 years agoHi Trapper,
" Your well episode reminded me of my years growing up as the youngest of 9
with an absent father & all we had was an old dilapidated cistern
that we hauled water for..... Only by the grace of God were we not
poisoned! "It's possible that the cistern water actually exposed you to low levels of infectious germs that had the effect of "vaccinating" you against them.
" I've done a bit of research (mainly price) on Amazon for RO systems, but haven't pulled the trigger. "
You may not need an RO system. They cost money up front, can be a hassle to install, and you have a yearly expense of replacing the filter cartridges. Like I said, "if its not broke, don't fix it." I have been making heavy demands on my RO system this Winter, and probably should order a replacement set of filter cartridges, just to have them on hand in case the ones I have quit producing.
This is an example of a couple of my indoor zinnias a few days ago, just before I finally re-potted them to 5-inch square black plastic pots. I have some 8-inch square black plastic pots for when the 5-inch pots aren't big enough.
Those 3¼-inch orchid pots were woefully too small for those zinnias. You can see the roots through the "clear" pots. Those little pots don't hold a lot of Pro-Mix.
ZM
gltrap54
7 years agozen_man
7 years agogltrap54
7 years agozen_man
7 years agogltrap54
7 years agozen_man
7 years agolast modified: 7 years ago
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