Your houseplants and gardens - Yellow leaf means underwatered AND overwatered?! What a country!

[Anasa Tristis]

yesterday, i found an onion that had fallen into a corner of my pantry. it's put up a shoot about a foot tall.
if an onion can survive in the corner of a dark pantry for at least a month, surely i'll be able to avoid killing it... right??
it's a standard white onion from a grocery. any tips for planting it? is it even viable?


one time i felt bad picking leaves from a relatively small basil plant
something about the way i was picking from it and not harvesting it entirely got me..!

Sorry I’m running late here but if spring is close to beginning or already started where you are you can try planting it outdoors. Just dig a hole and plop it in and cover it up to the bottom of the stalk. Since the growth on yours is already well along that may not work though, as it’s already used a lot of its stored energy to grow. In general they prefer to be planted before they sprout but I’ve gotten away with 2-3 inches of growth before. They can take cold temps, and some freezing nights, but not for weeks on end and no substantial snow.

Onions are biennials, so that means in Year Two they flower and set seed. So many weeks from now it’ll form a cool flower ball that the bees and wasps really like. After the flower ball is dead and fully dried you can crunch it up to release the small and oddly shaped black seeds that you can stash in a plastic bag in your fridge and plant next season. I’ve grown my own onions from saved seed for a long time. I’m not always successful (some saved batches turn out to be duds due to poor pollination) but when it works it’s very satisfying. I plant a few different varieties near each other so they cross pollinate. Some harvests are entertaining with lots of different shapes and sizes. And the more generations I keep going the more acclimated they are to my soil, light and weather.

Is the rescue mission pointless?

Rescue missions are never pointless, IMO. I’d pot them up and try to keep them alive until they could go back in the soil again. Just park them in a sheltered spot and keep an eye on them.

buddleia

Buddleia bloom on new wood, so it’s really up to you how much live wood you want to prune off. I’m not a fan of whacking them back to nubs. I like them to have a decent height and fullness when they’re blooming. So I generally take off the dead stuff and weirdly crossing branches and whatnot first and then I trim the top foot or so off. If you’re still getting freezing temps and it hasn’t leafed out much you still have plenty of time.

 

[Greatest Gonger]

Part of the grain/substrate that came in the bag - I imagine it's the coir, since I use it in the garden and the stringy bits are normal. Been keeping the bin as humid as possible and have a little meter inside. In the move, I knocked off several of the little guys and didn't want them to go to waste. Just enough to know that we're coming along nicely. I am very excited for the batch, lol.

What type of mushroom are you growing? It sort of looks like the magic kind.

 

[a hapless toad]

What type of mushroom are you growing? It sort of looks like the magic kind.

The last three sentences you quoted answer your question, fren.

(I'm curious as to the species though.)

 

[Greatest Gonger]

The last three sentences you quoted answer your question, fren.

(I'm curious as to the species though.)

Gooooood point. Vaguely related, i have a 2 year old jar of oyster liquid culture sitting in my fridge. I should try to see if it survived.

 

[Swagstika]

Is this flowers?
Is Steven a Stephanie?

 

[Otterly]

My succulents have a thing on them. On the leaves.
It’s like a shiny grey/brown scab. It is NOT mealy bugs or scale bugs as far as I can see. Scraping it reveals healthy looking tissue underneath.
Any ideas?

 

[an_actual_reptilian]

My succulents have a thing on them. On the leaves.
It’s like a shiny grey/brown scab. It is NOT mealy bugs or scale bugs as far as I can see. Scraping it reveals healthy looking tissue underneath.
Any ideas?

Did you figure it out? Because it does sound like a scale bug of some sort

 

[Otterly]

Did you figure it out? Because it does sound like a scale bug of some sort

I can’t see any bugs. I looked up mealy bugs and it doesn’t seem to be them, and I looked up scale bugs and it doesn’t look like that either. It’s large silvery patches on the leaves. How would I check if it’s bugs? Or treat that?

 

[suspended animation]

large silvery patches on the leaves

Could it be insect eggs? Google Lens search is sometimes helpful in identifying insects.

 

[Otterly]

Hmmmm no I don’t think it is. I can take a pic tomorrow when it’s light

 

[Imp]

My red Japanese lace leaf maple survived drought, deer and the winter. It is a replacement for one that was about 4 years old (planted time) that died of drought. I hope this guy can last a few lot more years. They're so pretty and unfortunately we don't have sprinklers so watering them is so hit or miss, One garden center had a beautiful one that gave me so much lust in my heart for it but I couldn't stand the $700 price tag.

 

[Aunt Carol]

My red Japanese lace leaf maple survived drought, deer and the winter. It is a replacement for one that was about 4 years old (planted time) that died of drought. I hope this guy can last a few lot more years. They're so pretty and unfortunately we don't have sprinklers so watering them is so hit or miss, One garden center had a beautiful one that gave me so much lust in my heart for it but I couldn't stand the $700 price tag.

Would a watering bag help? You still have to fill it so it isn't automatic like a sprinkler, but it's less hassle than standing there with a hose every day.

 

[Swagstika]

I see pollen in the flowers.
Steven is a real boy confirmed

 

[one_time_user]

Has anyone used epson salts in their plants? I was reading it's really good for them and did it. One tablespoon per gallon of water. My plants look happier from it! You know how your plants can look happy or miserable? They just look kind of smiley and perky from it.

 

[Pickman's Modeling Agency]

What type of mushroom are you growing? It sort of looks like the magic kind.

(I'm curious as to the species though.)

Sorry for the late response - they're basic-bitch Golden Teachers. Figured I'd start my mycology journey on an "easy" one. The tub isn't producing big all-at-once flushes, but seems to be steadily growing new shrooms as I pick the mature ones. I've harvested only about 160 grams (wet) so far.

But yeah. They work!

 

[Stan]

My kalanchoe blossfeldiana bloomed again and I must have totally misremembered the flower color cause once I set it to 12h light per day it bloomed up hot pink.

I also got a waxed amaryllis that used to live on my desk. I peeled it clean & repotted and it seems to be sending out taproots and the leaves are growing a bit since being replanted.

All my pot plants are gifts I’m really more of an outdoor veg garden person. Here’s a closeup of my asparagus from last year starting to peek out the ground. Yeah they are purple. That’s the variety my MIL grows and she gave me the seedlings.

 

[Anasa Tristis]

Has anyone used epson salts in their plants? I was reading it's really good for them and did it. One tablespoon per gallon of water. My plants look happier from it! You know how your plants can look happy or miserable? They just look kind of smiley and perky from it.

Your plants perked up from a nice hit of magnesium. https://www.gardenmyths.com/epsom-salt-for-plants/.
Which is ok but you’re better off using an all purpose fertilizer so your plants get N P and K and some micro nutrients too.

 

[one_time_user]

@Anasa Tristis I do that too, I think they just loved the magnesium tq, especially the ones that flower.

 

[Lichen Bark]

Has anyone used epson salts in their plants? I was reading it's really good for them and did it. One tablespoon per gallon of water. My plants look happier from it! You know how your plants can look happy or miserable? They just look kind of smiley and perky from it.

I always used to sprinkle a few spoons of it around the area I was going to plant tomatoes in. Now I am scratching my head and wondering if I forgot to do it the last two years.....well this year I won't forget. Thanks for the reminder.

 

[Kiwisee]

This year, I am planning on expanding my pollinator garden.

I have the following plants:
•Butterfly Bush
•Coneheads
•Milkweeds
•Delphiniums

I’ll be installing posts for the humming bird feeder. Don’t buy the artificial nectar crap from Walmart, they’ll rot and potentially cause life threatening fungal infections in their beaks. Use plain white sugar, with 4 cups of water for every 1 cup of sugar.

Clean your feeders every day or two, or this will happen:

Spoiler

Swollen tongue syndrome is caused by a fungal infection.