How does your Garden grow? part 2

[Silicon Waffle]

Has anyone got any idea why my orchid doesn't have flowers anymore?...

You can also reference https://myfirstorchid.wordpress.com/2011/12/18/my-orchid-wont-bloom/ .

 

[Sophia]

Thanks, I'll replant it to new pot, mist with water and see what happens

 

[Borg]

Today's Google doodle has a tribute to James Scoville with a game to test your ability to cool off the peppers.

 

[JorisL]

So I germinated some chilli and bell pepper seeds.
Today I migrated the first 9 that developed a set of leaves to earth.

Wish me luck!

 

[Sophia]

So I germinated some chilli and bell pepper seeds.
Today I migrated the first 9 that developed a set of leaves to earth.

Wish me luck!

It's always great to have your own veggies and fruit :-)
This year, I've planted new tayberries https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tayberry and sour cherry tree.

I'm so glad that we have a garden only about 1 km from the apartment. Though having a house would be better :-)

 

[ZapperZ]

This season, I planted 3 different types of basil. And I did it not just for decorative purposes. I decided to choose the 3 that I will be using in my food.

The first one is, of course, the Italian sweet basil, which I use frequently with pasta and my caprese salad.

I actually have 3 different pots growing this basil, since I use it quite a lot throughout the summer.

The second one is the Thai basil. You normally find this, of course, in Thai cuisine, and also as one of the leaves that you can use as a garnish if you have Vietnamese Pho.

I use this in Thai curries a lot.

Lastly, this is Vietnamese basil. This is the first time I've planted this plant, since I don't recall finding it before. But when I saw it at a nursery this past Spring, I decided to grow one, and it is doing unbelievably well.

This basil is not as common as the Thai basil. In many Southeast Asia cuisine, it is often used to accompany tamarind-based dishes or dishes with a slightly sour flavor. I use this basil in my Tom Yum soups.

I actually used the Thai basil, Vietnamese basil, and mint leaves when I made some Vietnamese spring rolls a few weeks ago. I placed Thai basil at one end, the mint in the middle, and the Vietnamese basil at the other end of the rolls. It went pretty well with the dipping sauces. Everyone was commenting on the range of flavor they were getting as they bite along the roll, because the flavor and aroma of each of the herbs were quite distinctive.

Wish we have smell-vision. If you rub each of the basil, the aroma is quite interesting.

Zz.

 

[Hoophy]

Hello, I recently noticed that my bonsai tree has a lot of little silver springtails living in the soil, does anybody know if they are harmful? I read on the Internet that they eat rotting material which should be good for me, but I am still skeptical. (do they eat root hairs?) If they are harmful how should I remove them without putting my tree at risk? Thanks for your time and consideration! :)

 

[Sophia]

Hello, I recently noticed that my bonsai tree has a lot of little silver springtails living in the soil, does anybody know if they are harmful? I read on the Internet that they eat rotting material which should be good for me, but I am still skeptical. (do they eat root hairs?) If they are harmful how should I remove them without putting my tree at risk? Thanks for your time and consideration! :)

First option would be to ask for specific chemical product in your gardening shop or eshop. I've used one for aphids and it worked without harming my Chinese pepper tree.
I'm not sure about springtails, but you can get rid of aphids by sprinkling the tree and soil with tobacco water. You would need 10-15g of tobacco (cca one packet of cigarettes) and cook it in 3dl of boiling water for 10min. After it cools down, water the plant with it and cover with plastic bag for few hours.
Another option is to just light the tobacco and let it smoke in the plastic bag with the plant. But I'm not sure if that would be effective for insects in the soil. Many of our customers buy tobacco specifically for this purpose and claim it works.
There's also an excellent bonsai forum called Bonsai empire where you can ask professionals!

Edit: I've just tried to access the forum on my mobile and it appears to be lost/can't connect . I'm not sure whether you can still access it on desktop.

 

[Hoophy]

Sophia, thank you for your detailed post, if the problem persists or if I notice damage I will try the things you said. Should I take action immediately instead? Thanks again! :)

 

[Sophia]

Sophia, thank you for your detailed post, if the problem persists or if I notice damage I will try the things you said. Should I take action immediately instead? Thanks again! :)

According to this site, they are not particularly dangerous, but they suggest getting rid of them. You may want to repot the plant first. They might be a sign of over-watering and lack of drainage as well http://www.houseplantsguru.com/springtails-and-how-they-damage-plants
Is your tree new? Please check that the soil is porous enough. Sometimes bonsai bought at stores are potted in very bad substrate. Akadama (or akadama mixed with other substrates) is best for bonsai.

 

[Hoophy]

According to this site, they are not particularly dangerous, but they suggest getting rid of them. You may want to repot the plant first. They might be a sign of over-watering and lack of drainage as well http://www.houseplantsguru.com/springtails-and-how-they-damage-plants
Is your tree new? Please check that the soil is porous enough. Sometimes bonsai bought at stores are potted in very bad substrate. Akadama (or akadama mixed with other substrates) is best for bonsai.

Ok I will take action soon, the tree is about two years old and is potted in small rocks, as a rough estimate I would say it's 20% soil and 80% rock. It has (annoyingly so) amazingly good drainage. I used to water it every other day (it would always be dry when I watered it) but recently I have been watering every day because it is especially hot here right now and it has been drying out faster. I will try holding back on the watering like you said, now that you mention it I believe it could be a major part in the problem. I would prefer the drying out of leaves to root rot because at least I can see dry leaves! Thanks for your feedback, I really do appreciate the help! :)

 

[Sophia]

OK, than let me know if it worked :-)

 

[Hoophy]

Here is my tree, this is the only picture I have of my bonsai, I am away from home so I can't take a better picture of it right now without the wild Pokémon Go character in the photo. Just ignore it. :)

 

[Sophia]

Your tree's got a potential to become a nice bonsai. ("tree needs to become a bonsai" is something I learned on the forums where older members scold beginners for using the term bonsai inappropriately :p)
You said you've had it for 2 years but do you know how old it is?

 

[Hoophy]

Your tree's got a potential to become a nice bonsai. ("tree needs to become a bonsai" is something I learned on the forums where older members scold beginners for using the term bonsai inappropriately :p)
You said you've had it for 2 years but do you know how old it is?

I'm not sure how old it is, my guess is 3 years but that's really just a guess.

 

[Sophia]

Oh, i thought it had to be older because mine are roughly the same size and 6-8 years old.
I'll need to study how to prune them. I was yet not courageous enough to cut them :-/
I also had an opposite problem than you with one of them - i didn't water it enough and the leaves dried. At the time, I had two of them and watered them every other day which was fine for one but not enough for buxus.

I got Chinese pepper later and found out it's extremely sensitive to cold and draft. In the spring, when the temperature at night was above 0, I was sleeping with a slightly open window (the opening might have been 5-10cm) and put the pepper on the table about 3m from the window. These conditions were always OK with other trees and plants I had in the room for years. But the pepper? Yellow leaves immediately! Even now, in the summer, when it is outside, I noticed that stronger wind harms its leaves. It's the most sensitive plant I've had.
I didn't want to experiment with wiring and cutting before I learn to keep them alive and healthy during all seasons.

 

[Hoophy]

Oh, i thought it had to be older because mine are roughly the same size and 6-8 years old.
I'll need to study how to prune them. I was yet not courageous enough to cut them :-/
I also had an opposite problem than you with one of them - i didn't water it enough and the leaves dried. At the time, I had two of them and watered them every other day which was fine for one but not enough for buxus.

I got Chinese pepper later and found out it's extremely sensitive to cold and draft. In the spring, when the temperature at night was above 0, I was sleeping with a slightly open window (the opening might have been 5-10cm) and put the pepper on the table about 3m from the window. These conditions were always OK with other trees and plants I had in the room for years. But the pepper? Yellow leaves immediately! Even now, in the summer, when it is outside, I noticed that stronger wind harms its leaves. It's the most sensitive plant I've had.
I didn't want to experiment with wiring and cutting before I learn to keep them alive and healthy during all seasons.

Maybe mine is older than I originally thought... I have never wired and don't prune to a 'bonsai' style, I just cut what I think should go, after all it's for my appreciation alone. My tree grows exceptionally fast, new leaves can grow from literally nothing to full sized leaves in 3 days! I once recorded (on a graph) the growth of a specific branch, at its best rate it grew 1.27 cm/day (0.5 inches/day). You sound like you know a lot about the topic, I do not. I am very curious about bonsai and I have recently considered growing a lemon tree (indoors, winters are to cold for lemons where I live) from seeds for fun. Are your trees indoor or outdoor? Also, do you have pictures of your trees that you are willing to share?

 

[Sophia]

Wow that's a fast growing tree! What species is it? I wish mine grew so fast :-) it's cool because in case you mess up, the tree will recover fast.
Growing a tree from seed is a very interesting project and you could learn a lot in the process. It would create a special bond with the tree, too.
I don't know a lot about bonsai at all! I've only had them since January. I learn in the process from my mistakes. For example, I didn't cut off the branches where the buxus had dry leaves hoping they would regrow. But they didn't for 4 months. Finally, I cut them off a month ago and new leaves started growing on other places soon after that.
So far, my trees were inside in the winter, than I moved them on the window from the outside side and after that, they went on terrace in the garden. There was too strong sun on the south - east window as summer approached.
I will post pictures tomorrow or on Monday because I'm at our garden (1km from home) and I only have mobile here and I have no idea how to insert pictures here on tapatalk

 

[Hoophy]

Wow that's a fast growing tree! What species is it? I wish mine grew so fast :-) it's cool because in case you mess up, the tree will recover fast.
Growing a tree from seed is a very interesting project and you could learn a lot in the process. It would create a special bond with the tree, too.
I don't know a lot about bonsai at all! I've only had them since January. I learn in the process from my mistakes. For example, I didn't cut off the branches where the buxus had dry leaves hoping they would regrow. But they didn't for 4 months. Finally, I cut them off a month ago and new leaves started growing on other places soon after that.
So far, my trees were inside in the winter, than I moved them on the window from the outside side and after that, they went on terrace in the garden. There was too strong sun on the south - east window as summer approached.
I will post pictures tomorrow or on Monday because I'm at our garden (1km from home) and I only have mobile here and I have no idea how to insert pictures here on tapatalk

Very cool! I can't wait to see your trees. While my tree grows super fast it also drops most of its leaves readily, this is not a problem though because of how fast it grows, the only problem is cleaning them up. The tree is called Campeche and it is from the Yucatán Peninsula therefore because it is tropical it is an indoor tree for where I live. It needs a lot of sun. Also, do you use the mobile Physics Forum app?

 

[Sophia]

As I promised, here are the pics.
I will definitely need to learn how to trim and shape them. They are still only a raw material. especially the buxus. I thought it was going to die and it still hasn't recovered, but the new leaves at the bottom give me some hope. I saw many posts about dry buxuses on the internet. It seems it's a common beginner mistake or maybe these trees are not suitable for growing in pots. I don't know.
I'm happy that moss started to grow there a bit. That will help with moisture.
They are so wet because it had been raining just before taking the photos.

 

[Pepper Mint]

...
View attachment 103417 View attachment 103418 View attachment 103419

They look pretty. But to make them more valuable, you may need to trim and offer them forms, via which to demonstrate your true pursuit of beauty.

 

[Sophia]

They look pretty. But to make them more valuable, you may need to trim and offer them forms, via which to demonstrate your true pursuit of beauty.

That's exactly what I want to do, but I wasn't sure about how to do it yet. I will have to study the shaping rules first. I didn't want to destroy them by cutting without having learned the rules first. So I didn't do anything yet :)

 

[epenguin]

Olreanders

I'd somehow forgotten about this thread, I think I have a post on the other one, and I have put one or two photos from our terrace garden In the photo competitions. Anyway we do have this garden, rather plants in pots, on our quite large terrace, I chose the flat because of it. Pots means that the plants do not have the volume of soil to draw on that you have in a normal garden so it requires a lot of attention, particularly to irrigation. Although we have bits and pieces flowering most of the year it is really at its best in May and June. Following that it's really hot and exposed, and we are lucky if we can keep it just green in high summer. We'd just been away for a time anyway so coming back I was not expecting to see anything great in late July.

We have four oleanders. They were there when we moved in, they could have been there for 40 or more years. But they had usually disappointed me rather giving a few desultory flowers. Oleanders ought not to be difficult to cultivate – you see tens of thousands of kilometres of them, often in full flower, in the inside the metal crash barriers that separate the directions on Italian autostrade. Which doesn't set them off to their best advantage, and anyway for safety I can only admire them with my second brain. The point is though that I cannot remember having ever seen anybody watering them or in any way tending them, so they are tough and not very demanding for water etc.

This year however, thanks to some savvy pruning and root treatment that we had done in the spring they gave us not a bad show at last.

 

[Sophia]

They are beautiful, epenguin!

Oh... Wish I could be in Italy now!

 

[epenguin]

They are beautiful, epenguin!

Oh... Wish I could be in Italy now!

Wish you could be. As long as you don't mind 34–36° which it has been recently here. I guess that is not too bad, not the 40° which you can sometimes get for days on end. I've been finding it fatiguing to drag myself around though.

I'm told these oleanders were flowering much thicker in June but unfortunately have no photos

 

[Sophia]

Wish you could be. As long as you don't mind 34–36° which it has been recently here. I guess that is not too bad, not the 40° which you can sometimes get for days on end. I've been finding it fatiguing to drag myself around though.

I'm told these oleanders were flowering much thicker in June but unfortunately have no photos

Oh, yes, the temperature! It was above 30 today here as well. But I remember the heat when we were in Italy last year wioth friends. We just went outside in the morning and evening and slept in the hotel during noon :) Once when we stayed on the beach till 11.30 I felt seriously sick from the sun. But hey the food was great! And I loved walking 3-4km along the beach with only feet in the water in the evening.
And i will always regrett not buying a bottle or two of the best wine I've ever tried. We drunk it in one small family-owned restaurant.

 

[JorisL]

Thank god my pepper plants are bearing a lot of peppers.
It rained for two days straight which would've have ensured their blossoms were delayed.
Now it's less profound since they use more water at the moment.

 

[dlgoff]

This season, I planted 3 different types of basil. And I did it not just for decorative purposes. I decided to choose the 3 that I will be using in my food.

I use lots of spices in my cooking but have always used "store bought". Chillies, onions, etc I grow and store as they can be used in a lot of things, but I may give growing some spices a try next season. Question: Does the basil or other spice plants you use flower and produce seeds (if you let them) that you could use for early starts next season? There have been times that I've had to let a few plants seed for those that don't come around very often ...

... Vietnamese basil. This is the first time I've planted this plant, since I don't recall finding it before.

bold by me

 

[Dotini]

I'm looking for some advice on a home-brew weed potion. I'm trying it because people in my neighborhood look down upon Roundup, said to get into the ecosystem and be bad for the fish and all. I'm using a gallon of vinegar treated with 1/2 cup salt and 1 Tblsp liquid dish soap, squirted onto weeds in the cracks of my driveway and sidewalks. It kills the weeds right away. But the question is, if I use it in the garden patch, how long will the soil remain infertile due to the salt?

 

[Rubidium_71]

Pumpkins are doing well so far this year...