Gardening

With winter not all that far away, I finally decided to set up a greenhouse. As much as I wanted to build one myself, the cost of materials was going to be about the same as buying a pre-made kit. I ordered a 6x14ft greenhouse kit, somewhere in the mid-range as far as quality goes.

I'm having a hard time figuring out where to place it, though. I have a few options in mind, and they all have their pros and cons.

The option I like the most is a concrete pad just beside my house. It gets good sun (this time of year, direct sun from about 8am to 5pm), it's a convenient location, and it's already a level surface. I'm not so sure about putting a greenhouse over concrete, though. I'll be using an electric heater in the winter, and I'm worried the concrete will pull a lot of heat away from the air in the greenhouse.

I have a few other areas on my property that would work, but they are all a very uneven gravel surface over extremely hard-packed rocky soil. I could dig out a level area for the greenhouse, but I would imagine I still would need to build a raised base, maybe a wooden platform.

Is putting a greenhouse over concrete a bad idea in the winter? What if I decide to put it somewhere else and just level the ground. Can it go over dirt and gravel, or would I need a base?

Any suggestions are welcome. This is my first foray into greenhouse gardening, and I'd like to start off right.

hello,

we live in the Southwest US and recently we re-lanscaped our yard into a xeriscape with decomposed granite and gravel as surface coverings. I have found that, especially around the gravel areas, that weeds will still grow (sometimes they find the cracks between the weed barrier and sometimes they just somehow live off rocks lol).. For weeding work I have been using gloves that are similar to this at Lowes:

https://www.mechanix.com/us-en/leather-work-gloves/LFF.html?dwvar_LFF_color=brown

they claim that the fingertips are reinforced, but the tips of my gloves get trashed after 60-90 minutes of work. I can't afford to keep buying gloves at close to $30 a pop lol. I mean I know that gloves are not and cannot be BIFL but they ought to last longer than one work session? Do you all have any good recommendations for work gloves that will involve digging through gravel with my fingers?

Not perfect, but unless you grow a LOT of corn, it can be hard.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.poundncashdown.com/post/90603

This is a follow up to my previous post linked here.

I’m trying to encourage the trunk to thicken while slowly figuring out which branches to make the main ones and how to balance the overall shape.

I try to let this tree grow out thick and dense with little to no trimming, then chop it back to a state that will let light through to the lower foliage while building the shape. That usually means clipping off upward growing new shoots to push growth into lateral or more downward growing shoots. Rinse and repeat that a couple times a year and we’re here.

I usually propagate most of the cuttings by throwing them in water under a grow light elsewhere.

I'm still lacking some solid, low growing, main branches. Stay tuned for more shenanigans.

There are others, but they're all behind this one.

The vines are 12 feet or longer now. The guards are just starting out now.

I'm curious to see how big I can get them.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.poundncashdown.com/post/79872

This is one of too many Benjaminas. They propagate far too easy for my lizard brain's good.

This tree needs a reduction in foliage and upward growing branches in the upper section. That should help balance out the growth between top and bottom, push some back budding to occur, and let the lower foliage get some proper light.

The Sunflower seed package said tall, but this is crazy.

I hope this isn’t too off-topic for this community. I also posted this in [email protected] so sorry to spam but I’m not sure which is the best place…

I have an old grass patch that I want to replace with Irish moss. Would love some advice on how!

Location: Seattle, USA.

Space: 15x12 foot section, partly under a laurel and a deciduous tree.

Soil: I’m not at all knowledgeable about soil, but heres what I know… It was originally just dirt with a on old lilac in it, then the lilac was replaced by grass, then 95% of the grass died during a construction project last year. Now it’s hard-packed soil and random tufts. It gets a small amount of leaves and other debris from the trees above it.

Sunlight: Direct sun for about half the day, then shaded by a house. Sunnier at one end than the other.

Questions:

1. What organic material (if any) should I use to condition the soil? How should I apply it?
2. I’ve read that 5-5-5 NPK fertilizer is good for Irish moss, but also that too much nitrogen is bad. Should I go lower nitrogen? How much fertilizer anyway?
3. How often should I water? How thoroughly?
4. I bought a small number of plugs to experiment in one corner before going all out. What’s the best way to fill in between them with seeds?

Not much but is honest work. The taste is absolutely delicious!

Those mushrooms have come and gone in my spider plant :) I really really really want to lick them.

So I got my hands on some flower bulbs which are typically meant to be planted in spring and I was wondering what I could do with them now. To be concrete, I have

• Dahlia
• Mirabilis jalapa
• Ixia

I'm in USDA zone 7b/8a and I could either place them on a south facing balcony or inside. I've also read that you can force flowers in a vase with some bulbs such as Hyacinths but I haven't read anything about that with the ones I have. Or should I just keep them in storage until next spring and plant them then?

The cucumbers are going crazy in Zone 6a Rhode Island.

Looking forward to fruiting

Hello, I'm having some trouble figuring out what's the issue for my plants, started with a northern highly blueberry shrub, every couple of days I get about four leaves turning brown just like in the image and they turn brown really quickly. (Takes about a day for half the leaf to go brown, down the midrib)

I've tried these in the past two months:

• keeping the plant leaves dry placed in a ventilated area just in case it was fungal.
• Reducing watering to only water when soil is try to avoid overwatering and underwatering.
• increasing amount of fertilizer slightly to ensure plant has sufficient nutrition
• Neem oil sprays to remove pests

Today, I found a similar leaf on my garden mint that's exhibiting the same brown patch on the tip of the leaf, worried it will start spreading.

Has anyone experienced something similar?

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.poundncashdown.com/post/39385

The mother tree had a pretty large pruning done. So, I figured, why not propagate from it?

I had some left over seeds that I planted after the rest of the garden was in. I thought it was oregano, but clearly this isn't oregano. Can anybody tell what I have (besides a slug problem)?

My corn is coming in.

After having a fantastic squash harvest 2 years ago, last year kind of sucked, and we never figured out why. This year things started great, but then started going south, with plants yellowing and squash wilting. Well apparently there's these asshole moths who lay eggs on the stem, which then produce these little effers that bore into the stem itself and eat the plant from the inside. Cutting into the stems I was able to find and remove a bunch of them. Cutting the stems didn't feel great... I tried to cut along the grain, but had to pretty much cut a chunk out of every plant just so I could even see inside and prod enough to find the squiggly things.

Hoping the plants survive and thrive 🤞. Apparently next year I should get a syringe and inject them with something called BT. I had no idea raising squash required a medical degree 🩺

These are over 10 feet tall and even longer in length. The loofahs are in the back.

I design functional artwork planters and an internet friend told me that Orchid planters kind of suck. They suggested I design one in my own style to apply some engineering and art to compliment the flower.

This is what I came up with.

If you like my designs you can follow me on Substack: https://substack.com/@imakethingsforu or on Instagram: @madebyferguson

If you have a design idea let me know! If you want your own orchid planter, hit me up at: https://www.etsy.com/shop/Imakethingsforu