Intermarkets' Privacy Policy
Support


Donate to Ace of Spades HQ!



Recent Entries
Absent Friends
Bandersnatch 2024
GnuBreed 2024
Captain Hate 2023
moon_over_vermont 2023
westminsterdogshow 2023
Ann Wilson(Empire1) 2022
Dave In Texas 2022
Jesse in D.C. 2022
OregonMuse 2022
redc1c4 2021
Tami 2021
Chavez the Hugo 2020
Ibguy 2020
Rickl 2019
Joffen 2014
AoSHQ Writers Group
A site for members of the Horde to post their stories seeking beta readers, editing help, brainstorming, and story ideas. Also to share links to potential publishing outlets, writing help sites, and videos posting tips to get published. Contact OrangeEnt for info:
maildrop62 at proton dot me
Cutting The Cord And Email Security
Moron Meet-Ups






















« Toqueville, "Crystallization" and Tyranny | Main | Fifth Circuit Court of Appeal Issues Emergency Injunction Blocking Biden's Vaccine Mandate »
November 06, 2021

Saturday Gardening and Puttering Thread, November 6

Pitaya Blossom w Bees.jpg

Hi, everybody! Thanksgiving is coming. Are you thinking of serving any cactus from the garden? jim in Kalifornia might:

A pic of one of the cactus flowers open the other day. They only open up in the early morning and close up when the sun comes up (makes sense; why lose excess water if you're a cactus?). Finger and bee(s) for scale.

If you zoom in closely into the blossom, you'll see what looks like a bee posing for the photo! In reality, it's two bees, one side-ways, the other facing the camera.

Pitaya Blossom w Bees (1).jpg

A photo of fruit that's already set hold. When ripe will turn a lovely lavender-red color, and if not picked soon enough, will split open revealing the yumminess inside.

Pic of about a dozen of the 20 or so blossoms this year from part of the cactus; I've never seen so many! In a normal year I'll get maybe 3 to 6 blossoms and maybe a fruit or two if I'm lucky. Seems to be happy this year! I got a lobe from my mother about 15 years ago; she said it was a "cancer cactus". Dunno about that, but the fruit is tasty.

Green Pitaya.jpg

Pic of about a dozen of the 20 or so blossoms this year from part of the cactus; I've never seen so many! In a normal year I'll get maybe 3 to 6 blossoms and maybe a fruit or two if I'm lucky. Seems to be happy this year! I got a lobe from my mother about 15 years ago; she said it was a "cancer cactus". Dunno about that, but the fruit is tasty.

Don't mind the black berry in the background...it's gone rogue, escaped from where it started. One year got ? 70 lbs of black berries in my cramped little yard (neighbors are not amused with the plant). On the opposite side of the blackberries, to the back of me when I was taking this photo is a Pecan tree and some Guavas. I've had the pecan from a seedling (someone threw a nut in my yard it germinated, now is 24 years old). It gave about 20 lbs of nuts last year (at least what I could steal back from the crows), but there won't be many this year as I cut it back. The guavas I have are Taiwanese guavas; one year got some fruit that was the size of a softball. My MIL, God rest her soul, loved the fruit.

Oh, and yes, my yard is a MESS and I know it. One day I'll clean it up again.

Pitaya Blossoms.jpg

We'll post a photo of the ripe fruit later.

Edible Gardening

A while ago, TANSTAAFL sent us some garden photos:

First, Scottish Kate and I planted 2 basil plants early this year, just to see how it turned out. And, if you look at the planter, there is a third one, a poor scrawny orphan on its last legs from a previous attempt. Well, that little thins, along with the two new ones are thriving.

And they are flowering, something I didn't even know basil did. Cute little things, too.

Most years we have a ton of flowers in our front lawn, but this year never got around to it.

Ready for pesto - You can cut those plants back when they flower!

basil plantrrr.jpg

Nice basil leaves here:

basil stemm.jpg

If you get some tweezers out, you can harvest the blossoms, and eat those as fancy garnishes, too.

basil flowr T.jpg

Big Garden Pests (or Visitors?)

Garden developments last week chez MarkY:

Well, I spent the morning prepping the garden for the glean. Got to 35 last night, and colder is coming.

If all goes well, may have red sliced maters at T Giving.
Problem is, i forgot to shut the gate, and the deer got in.
Wife is still out there, assessing damage. Worst case scenario, one jumps over the 8' fence, and they learn it's possible.

Digging sweet taters tomorrow.

Deer in the garden. Uh-oh. The other things sound nice.

George V seems to have sort of given up keeping them out of the garden:

I saw the video of the deer in the trail camera today and remembered the buck fight in our back yard about 10 days ago. It lasted about 10 or 12 minutes but here's a short video. A couple of does were in the area too, watching it. This corner of our yard seems to be a place the bucks like to mark and scrape.

I live about 23 miles as the crow flies (or the buck walks?) northwest from the heart of downtown Detroit on the Detroit River. There are lots of trees and wooded areas in our township. The deer moved in about 15-16 years ago. Magnificent animals but they eat most all of the flowers.

Not everyone has action like that in their yard! (Thanks to CBD for formatting the video for us.)

Post-Halloween Activities

K.T.

My neighbor's front yard.

My compliments of the season.

Been Lurking

brandon lurkin.JPG

Heh.

What to do with old pumpkins

Photos (Ewww) and ideas at the link, including:

- Attending a pumpkin smash and smush event

Take them to a zoo that gives pumpkins to animals.

Thanksgiving is coming, too. You may have new pumpkins. Choose kinds bred for the kitchen (or similar squashes). What to do with pumpkin guts.

Breakfast in the countryside

After a few hours of farmwork. In Azerbaijan.

No music on this video. Kind of restful, somehow. Tomatoes, olives and mulberry syrup show up in the same meal.

The video says they are harvesting saffron for morning tea, but it is really safflower. Rare Seeds offers a (no-spine or low-spine) variety called Corrales Azafran Safflower.

A wonderful and easy-to-grow,substitute for true saffron in cooking! Safflower is a wonderful plant with several uses and one of humanity's oldest crops. Long before true saffron was cultivated, safflower was already a major crop in ancient Egypt. It later spread to ancient Greece where it was called Karthamos, and all the way to China. The Arabs brought it to southern Spain where in the 12th century they selected a spineless strain (safflower is from the "thistle" family). The village of Corrales was founded on the banks of the Rio Grande, and the Spanish colonists had brought safflower seeds possibly collected from their stop in the Island of La Palma, in the Canary Islands, where a famous strain was then cultivated. This Corrales Azafran strain has stayed close to this original seed brought to New Mexico. It is widely adapted; flowers can be used as a coloring spice, dried to brew tea and also, a dye with a deep orange, almost red, pigment. The young plants make a delicious leafy green. The seeds can be pressed into oil. The deep taproots are a very efficient soil breaker.

About their deep orange, prickly variety, they say:

This uncanny similarity to saffron is responsible for safflower's nickname as "poor man's saffron". Not only useful in the kitchen, Dark Orange-Red is a gorgeous ornamental that is a well disguised garden tool. The stiff, almost prickly, plants, have been used for centuries as natural fencing to keep animals out of the garden.

Safflower is a commercial crop near us. It is VERY prickly in most fields. Generally shorter than the kinds sold for the garden.

Seedaholic sells a Japanese cut flower variety called "Kinko". They give detailed cultural directions. The leaves are spineless and charmingly rounded. They don't think it has much flavor, but think it adds nice color to soups.

mus safflower seedaholic.jpg

Gardens of The Horde

badgerwx sent in the following:

Here are a couple of pictures I took this week while I wait for my first frost to end what's left of the growing season. Usually I get one in the 2nd half of October, then it warms up again. But this Oct has been so warm I haven't come close yet.

My fall flowers are still blooming a little, but they're slowing down as
the days keep getting shorter. The picture from 25 Oct is a Monkshood
(Aconitum, also called wolfsbane). It takes full sun to part-shade &
mine likes the morning sun. But it doesn't like drought conditions so
it suffered some in August.

The warm temperatures have triggered some of my iris to try for a fall
bloom. When I started my garden I bought some iris advertised as fall
rebloomers, but I've found that even ordinary bearded iris can rebloom -
if the first frost delays long enough. I have several iris stalks
growing in protected areas, but the others are in a race to bloom before
the first frost comes. Things are looking chilly here by the end of
next week.

oct 25 blue.jpg

oct26 yel iris.jpg

Lovely flowers.

If you would like to send information and/or photos for the Saturday Gardening Thread, the address is:

ktinthegarden
at that g mail dot com place

Include the nic by which you wish to be known when you comment at AoSHQ,
unless you want to remain a lurker.

digg this
posted by K.T. at 01:24 PM

| Access Comments




Recent Comments
Mr Aspirin Factory, garbage human: "I would expect a few random outages as the utility ..."

Bebe Ives: "Woman B: I think looking at porn has certainly des ..."

Anonymous Rogue in Kalifornistan (ARiK): "Any minute now...... ..."

Alberta Oil Peon: " Shit. Power just went down. Posted by: Mike Hamm ..."

Joe Kidd: "364 And scoping out your fire lanes. It might ma ..."

[/i][/b]andycanuck (hovnC)[/s][/u]: "Cleanup needed before you retire for the night, We ..."

Eromero: "362 But how many self-defense engagements take pla ..."

Mike Hammer, etc., etc.: "Shit. Power just went down. ..."

Verna Sapp: "In 2004, Justin Timberlake was onstage and perform ..."

[/i][/b]andycanuck (hovnC)[/s][/u]: "But how many self-defense engagements take place a ..."

Mirta Bassett: "Variety pointed out that, "Anderson, exhibiting so ..."

Joe Kidd: "Had a three hour phone call with my kid sister. S ..."

Recent Entries
Search


Polls! Polls! Polls!
Frequently Asked Questions
The (Almost) Complete Paul Anka Integrity Kick
Top Top Tens
Greatest Hitjobs

The Ace of Spades HQ Sex-for-Money Skankathon
A D&D Guide to the Democratic Candidates
Margaret Cho: Just Not Funny
More Margaret Cho Abuse
Margaret Cho: Still Not Funny
Iraqi Prisoner Claims He Was Raped... By Woman
Wonkette Announces "Morning Zoo" Format
John Kerry's "Plan" Causes Surrender of Moqtada al-Sadr's Militia
World Muslim Leaders Apologize for Nick Berg's Beheading
Michael Moore Goes on Lunchtime Manhattan Death-Spree
Milestone: Oliver Willis Posts 400th "Fake News Article" Referencing Britney Spears
Liberal Economists Rue a "New Decade of Greed"
Artificial Insouciance: Maureen Dowd's Word Processor Revolts Against Her Numbing Imbecility
Intelligence Officials Eye Blogs for Tips
They Done Found Us Out, Cletus: Intrepid Internet Detective Figures Out Our Master Plan
Shock: Josh Marshall Almost Mentions Sarin Discovery in Iraq
Leather-Clad Biker Freaks Terrorize Australian Town
When Clinton Was President, Torture Was Cool
What Wonkette Means When She Explains What Tina Brown Means
Wonkette's Stand-Up Act
Wankette HQ Gay-Rumors Du Jour
Here's What's Bugging Me: Goose and Slider
My Own Micah Wright Style Confession of Dishonesty
Outraged "Conservatives" React to the FMA
An On-Line Impression of Dennis Miller Having Sex with a Kodiak Bear
The Story the Rightwing Media Refuses to Report!
Our Lunch with David "Glengarry Glen Ross" Mamet
The House of Love: Paul Krugman
A Michael Moore Mystery (TM)
The Dowd-O-Matic!
Liberal Consistency and Other Myths
Kepler's Laws of Liberal Media Bias
John Kerry-- The Splunge! Candidate
"Divisive" Politics & "Attacks on Patriotism" (very long)
The Donkey ("The Raven" parody)
Powered by
Movable Type 2.64