[Red_Devil 232]

Ping to the Weekly Gardening Ping List.

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[rightly_dividing]

Morning Red. Nothing new here from the drought strickened area north of Houston. A little rain two weeks ago, nothing since. That made twice in three months.

[Celtic Cross]

Ahhh......(streeeeeeeeeeeeech)

I'm growing couch potatoes.

[hoosiermama]

Morning...still no rain here....

[Tatze]

Morning!

Master Gardener class is still going well. First of the weekly quizzes was this past Tuesday. It was based on the previous class's topics, Basic Botany and Basic Plant Physiology. I did alright. Nailed everything I studied. Got a few other things that I just remembered. And missed a few other questions.

Tuesday's class was Plant Pathology. Quiz on that next Tuesday.

Tip of the Week: If you have a sweet gum tree and hate the prickly sweet gum balls it drops, collect them and use them in the garden. After planting bulbs, lay down a thick layer of sweet gum balls as mulch. It will keep the neighborhood critters from digging up the new plantings.

[DollyCali]

good morning everyone. It has been great here for fall clean up (and there is plenty here on the homestead)

I have a question. This year I bought my first solar landscaping lights. About 18. I live in NE Ohio. Rough winters, lots of snow from Lake Effect.

Should I bring those inside for winter? What do you do with them? take apart? remove batteries etc.

I want to have them last as long as possible so want to winterize the correct way

thanks..

d

[Melian]

SoCal has had a few days of warm winds. I love the wind, so I am happy, but most people here dread the “Santa Ana winds.” We had one casualty: a small potted ficus tree blew over and the pot broke.

I read an article about a gardener who advocates not getting too attached to your plants. Rather than nursing the sickly, poor-performers along; she advocated pulling them up immediately and trying something else. She is constantly plugging in new plants in areas that need it and it forces her to try plants she normally would not have tried.

My first thoughts were that this is an expensive idea and it seemed wasteful to throw away a living plant. But as I look around my yard and see the poor-performers, I wonder. It IS very frustrating every time I look at the plants to see the ones that aren’t doing well. Perhaps I would enjoy my yard even more if I just yanked those out and started over.

[LomanBill]

I moved one of my potted squash plants indoors before the freeze... just to, well, see what happens.

The plant is healthy and producing flowers; but the flowers just shrivel up and fall off.

Anybody have ideas for indoor pollination of winter squash?

[sneakers]

Other than getting in my garlic (which is putting up shoots in spite of the cooler weather)I’m not doing much but dreaming of next year’s garden. However, I DID make two purchases toward that. I bought a two-tiered raised garden marked down at Lowes from $100 to $20. Then, yesterday, I found a tumbler composter marked from $90 to $10! I’m already starting compost in it! I’ve learned to love compost!

[Arrowhead1952]

I didn't get on the net yesterday, so here is my report. Squash and lettuce are doing great and picking as we need them. I will be pulling some radishes later today.

Turnips are starting to look eating size soon. Cauliflower, cabbage and broccoli are starting to twist the top leaves for heads.