Yard Woes

June 25, 2008 at 1:42 am (yard)
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For background, check this out.

We live in a cute new subdivision – all the houses are less than 5 years old so there isn’t much in the way of landscaping yet.  Well, when we moved in, the owner of our house decided to hire a random handyman he knew to do our landscaping.  Bad idea.

Very bad idea.

We wound up with a front yard that is nothing but beauty bark.  Big, huge chunks of nasty bark.  There wasn’t any tarp put down under the bark so weeds grow up.  We’ve been dealing with this for 2 years now and finally the property management people have sent someone out to look at it.  The fabulous news is that we might be getting nice lush sod out front and hopefully on the sides, along with some nice mulch-type bark instead of the huge chunks!  Yay!

Of course, while out in the yard, walking around with the real landscape guru today, I got eaten up by carpenter ants.  Apparently, they love the bark and make their nests in it.  When they bite you, they actually inject a smidge of formic acid into the bite.  No wonder my feet aren’t happy tonight.

Glad to know that something loves the bark because I sure as hell do not.

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Let’s Learn About the Crocodile Fern

June 25, 2008 at 1:27 am (houseplants)
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Also called the Crocodyllus (Microsorum musifolium), this plant is a fern that is native to South Africa.  It has long, somewhat broad leaves that have a distinctly reptilian pattern to them.  I purchased a plant in a 6″ pot 3 weeks ago and thus far it is very happy hanging out on a semi-shaded counter in my kitchen.  Its ultimate desitination will be my son’s shower, where it will get some bright indirect morning light from the wee window and a lot of humidity from the boy’s neverending showers.  I have noticed that it doesn’t really like to have wet soil, so I switched it up and made the soil more porous, which seems to have made it happier.

I am nervous about this plant, to be honest.  I don’t have the best track record with ferns at all so it shall be interesting to see how long this one lasts.

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I fell off the wagon

June 20, 2008 at 10:12 pm (cactus)
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I bought a plant today – Euphorbia tirucalli – pencil cactus.  In my defense, it was cheap and its a small plant.

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It lives!

June 20, 2008 at 1:08 am (dead, dying, houseplants)
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The Coleus isn’t dead!  In case you have no idea what I’m talking about, check out these posts for background.  “Molten Lava” is still kinda dead looking, but there is new growth on the stems and they have regained their stiffness, i.e. they’re not limp anymore (viagra for plants perhaps?).  It is still outside in the baking sun on our patio and I water it in the mornings.  So I’m not sure what to think of it at all.  Is it dead?  Living?  Is it a zombie Coleus?

More importantly, why am I obsessed with this plant? lol

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Updates

June 17, 2008 at 12:32 am (dead, dying, herbs, houseplants)
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I managed to kill my wee herb garden that was on my west facing patio.  There was just too much sun and by the time I realized it, they were dead.  I ended up losing 2 thyme, 4 lavender, 1 rosemary and 1dill.  At least I did have the lavender long enough to harvest some flowers from it, so I’m making progress compared to years past.

I also killed my ‘Red Spikes’ Dracaena.  It also got too much sun, even though it was located in the office in an east facing window.

I’m keeping my fingers crossed that I’m not going to kill anymore plants for a while.

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I have got to try this!

June 17, 2008 at 12:27 am (yard)
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I need to find a place in my yard for this!  I don’t do flowers very well, but I’m thinking that you could do the same thing with some trailing succulents, perhaps some cacti?  You’d have to be very careful about placement as I don’t think it would move easily at all, but how cool would it look?

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Kalanchoe with One Bloom

June 13, 2008 at 11:47 pm (pics)
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Blooming Kalanchoe

This is my Kalanchoe that I picked up out of a clearance bin last fall for approximately $1.99.  It had tons of blooms on it at that time and it seemed happy in the kitchen.  At some point it got powdery mildew, which pisses me off for no other reason than it reminds me of the mealybugs.  After trying various remedies on the web, I got frustrated and put the thing outside.  Lo and behold, the powdery mildew is gone and this one little blossom showed up.  I hope there is more to come!

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Confession regarding compost and worms

June 13, 2008 at 11:28 pm (yard)
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Confession – I am befuddled by the composter.  It appears to have no airholes.  More importantly, the lid sticks on so tight I can’t get it off, lol.  So, perhaps my amazing find from Freecycle isn’t so amazing after all.  I’ve been reading about composting with worms and it appears that if the compost tumbler has airholes, there can be worms in it.  See the second sentence above.  No airholes=no worms.

However, I have located plans to build my own worm composter.  Why am I so into building things myself?  I could just shell out the cash and have the nice, new thing that is pretty much guaranteed to work shipped to my door.  But no, not me.  I always have to do things the complicated way and in this particular case, I will be drilling holes through plastic bins and whatnot.

Part of me is tempted to put the compost project aside, but then I get distracted by visions of gorgeous dark moist nutritious humus.  I’ll give it a go and see what happens, what can it hurt?

Randomly, every time I see the word “humus” it always reminds me of “hummus” and makes me hungry.  Not that I want to eat soil or anything…

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The Joys of Composting

June 9, 2008 at 11:04 pm (yard)
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I’ve been wanting to do some composting, but did’nt want to shell out the cash for a compost bin/tumbler until I kind of had the idea down.  Well, I still don’t have the idea down all the way, but I have now got a compost tumbler! lol

Thanks to the wonder of Freecycle, I acquired a compost tumbler and if I suck at composting, I’ve not lost any money.  And if I’m good at it, my plants will be loving nice, nutrient rich soil!

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Jibber Jabber

June 9, 2008 at 12:48 am (cactus, dead, houseplants, plagues!)
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I’m proud to say that I’ve not bought a plant for a few days now.  Yay me!  Well, I guess techinically I did buy one, an African violet for the boy’s teacher, but since I don’t get to keep it, it doesn’t count.

The “Molten Lava” Coleus is definitely on its way to being very dead.  I staked it up and repotted it, put it in a bright shady spot outside and its still droopy as all hell.  I’ll give it a few more days to see what happens.

My Aspidistra is just there.  I know that they are slow growing, but mine is very slow growing.  Of course, I don’t have vast resevoirs of patience either, so perhaps that has something to do with it.  I just repotted it and it perked up quite a bit.  I also gave it a bit of the worm poop food (which is amazing stuff) and it seems as if the color is a bit brighter now.    That could just be wishful thinking on my part.

My Christmas cactus is setting some new blooms – I’ve had the best luck with it!  I purchased it last November (actually on my 30th…errrr…29th  birthday) and it bloomed in December, then again in late February/early March.  The Spring cactus is happily growing and the new little pads are just the cutest things!  I keep calling the boy and the boyfriend over to marvel at the cuteness and they just don’t get it.

My Jades keep getting mealybugs and that pisses me off (see previous posts here and here).  I’m just keeping on with what I’m doing as it seems to keep them at bay for a month or so, but sheesh, it is really frustrating.  And, to be honest, the mealybugs creep me out.

The palm tree is thriving!  As is the bamboo and most of the plants that are outside right now.  I am not sure what I’m going to do with all these plants in the winter time as most of them will need to come back inside.  But, I’ll deal with that when it happens.

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