All Things Gardening

[Great68]

Originally Posted by sonick

Need some landscaping advice from a n00b homeowner.

I have this strip of dirt between my driveway and my neighbour that i cleared out a shit ton of weeds and bushes on.



However now I don't know what to do with the bare dirt currently, primarily to slow the growth of weeds and re-growth of the bushes on the ground, but its rooty and uneven so laying down landscape fabric cleanly might be difficult.

There's also a bunch of stumps and bushes stuck between rocks and stuff and I don't know how deep the roots go so not sure how difficult it would be to dig that out.

Also the neighbour who's yard is higher than mine, has a bunch of ugly lava rock that keeps spilling over to our side, and so I am afraid if I lay down river rock there, it's just gonna get mixed up with his lava rock and look like shit.

Any thoughts?

A nice thick layer of bark mulch. It will inhibit weeds to a large extent, help keep moisture in your soil, and looks really good.

[Hondaracer]

Yea I was gonna say mulch as well. Take a sawzall or somthing and cut out the roots on the surface, rake it all out then I’d probably still lay down some filter cloth just cut smaller peices and place them around the rocks etc. then get a hood 2-3” of mulch and cover it all. Low maintenance and it looks good

[Razor Ramon HG]

I was given a monstera plant a year back and it has grown a lot since, however as it's the nature of the plant itself, it's growing all over the place.

I am looking to add some a few more plants into my office space, but want something that grows a bit more uniform. Any suggestions?

[Liquid_o2]

Oh man. My monstera grew from one leaf that my friend gave me to 8 giant leaves over the past several years. Got too big for our condo space. I tried cutting it at the nodes and placing the cuttings in water, but they all turned brown for some reason. Ah well.

All my other plants have been more manageable. I have two spider plants, a snake plant, dieffenbachia, peace lily, calla lily, a bunch of cacti, an indoor mini rose plant. All are easier to maintain space wise than the monstera.

[Great68]

Good harvest from the garden, these pictures are just 1 day's harvest not even 10% of the overall. Didn't get a picture but picked and processed about 40lbs of tomatoes.

Peppers are also insane this year, from barely growing other years to too many to know what to do with this year (already dried a bunch, made salsa, hot sauce).

[68style]

Spectacular!!

[Razor Ramon HG]

Any succulent pros?

I recently cut off a branch off my kalanchoe at the base that was growing a bit too outwards. I had an idea to try propagating it (since I had nothing to lose).

I let the cut branch callus for a few days, then put it into a new 9cm pot with moist soil. There is about an inch of the branch in the soil. The soil is 50% perlite and 50% Pro-Mix Potting Soil.

Based on memory, I probably cut it off from the main plant on the 7th, then planted it into soil on the 10th, so it's been about almost a week now in the soil. The pot is sitting on a south-facing window sill that gets a decent amount of direct and indirect sunlight.

Leaves on the cut branch are going a bit wilted/limp and I noticed there are aerial roots growing out now.

Should I be doing anything at this point? I have not done this before, so not too sure if it's dying or not. Should I try misting the aerial roots? There are no aerial roots on the main kalanchoe that is doing well.

https://i.imgur.com/2lc3sf2.jpg

[Razor Ramon HG]

Originally Posted by Liquid_o2

Oh man. My monstera grew from one leaf that my friend gave me to 8 giant leaves over the past several years. Got too big for our condo space. I tried cutting it at the nodes and placing the cuttings in water, but they all turned brown for some reason. Ah well.

All my other plants have been more manageable. I have two spider plants, a snake plant, dieffenbachia, peace lily, calla lily, a bunch of cacti, an indoor mini rose plant. All are easier to maintain space wise than the monstera.

Several weeks ago I bought a birds of paradise, a peace lily, and a ZZ plant from Gardenworks.

Noticed mealybugs on them today. I think they started from the birds of paradise. No giant groups of them, just random ones here and there.



Luckily the plants are still young, so will try to kill them with an isopropyl alcohol spray. I think they hid in the crevices of the new leaf that came out from the birds.

Peace lily grows like a monster!

P.S. My kalanchoe cutting ended up being ok after a few weeks and is growing well now.

[MG1]

Take it back. Gardenworks has a good return policy. If plants you buy from them don't grow or something isn't quite right, they will take them back.

[Razor Ramon HG]

Originally Posted by MG1

Take it back. Gardenworks has a good return policy. If plants you buy from them don't grow or something isn't quite right, they will take them back.

I don't have the receipt and it was purchased several weeks ago. The peace lily has really flourished since I've gotten it, so I'll see if I can contain this since it's quite minor at the moment. No adults, mostly tiny baby mealybugs.

Sprayed a mixture of isopropyl alcohol, water, and dishwashing detergent a few days ago and it seems to be working so far (I've been checking quite religiously since). Will need a few weeks to determine. People recommend spreading some diatomaceous earth on the top of soil as well.



I don't think they're in the soil, so hopefully I get lucky. When I replanted them from the soil at Gardenworks, I sprayed the roots down and then replanted them into a new bag of ProMix Potting Mix with some extra perlite. I have several other plants that used the same mix in another area of the house and they have no mealybugs.

I guess if it comes to it, I do have some some Safer End All that I used for outdoor gardening. Prefer not to have to do that though.

[Razor Ramon HG]

Just an update - but after two weeks, seems like the mealybugs are gone with the spray mixture. I still continue to monitor them every couple of days, but I can rest easy now.

[Razor Ramon HG]

Anyone use grow bulbs for their indoor plants in the winter?

[Razor Ramon HG]

Does anyone else have peace lilies that have black tips at the end of their leaves? I'm reading it could be either a humidity issue or related to the fluoride in the water.

They're watered pretty consistently once the soil gets dry. I am reading the soil should be kept fairly damp as soon as possible since they're in marshes in the wild. Perhaps I might be letting the soil get too dry prior to watering them again?

[Dragon-88]

Any of you guys ever do seed swaps? My gf has managed a couple with about 10 people across Canada where they send 10 packages of a specific seed they own and she will split them up and send them so everyone involved grows their seed bank. Its a pretty neat idea and she's been doing it for the past year and had really grown her seed bank. There are some groups up there where the hosts does up to 100 people(seeds) which takes time but its a super great idea to gain new varieties without spending big bucks at the market..

[vancitylove]

Originally Posted by Dragon-88

Any of you guys ever do seed swaps? My gf has managed a couple with about 10 people across Canada where they send 10 packages of a specific seed they own and she will split them up and send them so everyone involved grows their seed bank. Its a pretty neat idea and she's been doing it for the past year and had really grown her seed bank. There are some groups up there where the hosts does up to 100 people(seeds) which takes time but its a super great idea to gain new varieties without spending big bucks at the market..

Douglas college has a seed bank program where they’ll send you seeds and then you send some back after you’ve harvested

https://www.douglascollege.ca/progra...-urban-ecology

[Great68]

New gardening season, wife has the grow op going full swing:

[Hondaracer]

Man, gonna see ALOT of die off and mature trees getting chopped down if the weather continues to be this volatile

There are some beautiful huge old trees which have been barely clinging to life with these crazy temperature swings lately. But when that heavy wet snow fell a lot of them saw huge limbs snap off or worse.

We have a big bay leaf in our front garden and it was perfectly healthy up until a year ago, now it’s been struggling and when I had an arborist by to show me how to prune it he said these swings from -10/-15 to +40 are things most of these trees have never seen and they struggle to adapt

[xxxrsxxx]

anyone have a lawn person to recommend? Grass full of moss/weed, probably need aeration, power raking, moss killer & fertilizer.

On another note, I have an area where I want to start planting some vegetables. I've dug up the grass. What kind of soil should I get for veggies?

[Hondaracer]

Skookum landscaping, they are a small company but good shit

Only work in Vancouver or north shore though

[Tapioca]

Originally Posted by xxxrsxxx

On another note, I have an area where I want to start planting some vegetables. I've dug up the grass. What kind of soil should I get for veggies?

For setting up a garden bed for vegetables, we first step up a barrier using landscape fabric. To build the base layer of soil, we used a few bags of cheaper potting soil (the large packs you can buy from Costco), then mixed in some organic material, such as leaves. Then, we mixed in some organic topsoil, specifically for growing vegetables, as a top layer. We had great results last year with the tomatoes we grew.

[Alpine]

Looking for some advice in creating flower beds:

I am interested in converting a part of my ratty lawn into flower beds. Would I need to remove the existing grass, or would it be enough to lay down some damp cardboard/newspaper and pile a mound of dirt on top of it? Not looking for perfection, and I don't mind if the flower beds end up being higher than the grass next to it.

[Hondaracer]

I’d probably till the grass a little bit, ecen with a shovel just so the turf isn’t a barrier for roots

[Great68]

Originally Posted by Alpine

Looking for some advice in creating flower beds:

I am interested in converting a part of my ratty lawn into flower beds. Would I need to remove the existing grass, or would it be enough to lay down some damp cardboard/newspaper and pile a mound of dirt on top of it? Not looking for perfection, and I don't mind if the flower beds end up being higher than the grass next to it.

It will kill the grass directly beneath it, until the newspaper/cardboard decomposes and then the grass from beside the bed will start to re-infiltrate the flower bed.

[Great68]

Originally Posted by Tapioca

For setting up a garden bed for vegetables, we first step up a barrier using landscape fabric. To build the base layer of soil, we used a few bags of cheaper potting soil (the large packs you can buy from Costco), then mixed in some organic material, such as leaves. Then, we mixed in some organic topsoil, specifically for growing vegetables, as a top layer. We had great results last year with the tomatoes we grew.

Just adding to this.

Look for soil high in compost, maybe even add some manure.

A lot of soil/aggregate places will have a "Garden Mix" which blends in more compost than regular topsoil and you can buy in bulk. I buy by the pickup truck load (1-2 yards at a time, the place I buy from is about $60/yd), but most will deliver if you don't have a truck.

[Alpine]

Originally Posted by Great68

It will kill the grass directly beneath it, until the newspaper/cardboard decomposes and then the grass from beside the bed will start to re-infiltrate the flower bed.

Thanks, so in theory, I could throw the cardboard/newspaper & dirt down, then dig a border...