Remember those images of the shade changes in the backyard we took last year in mid May after reading about how useful it is to understand which parts of a garden is shaded or not, and when? They were then filed away in the “Progress” folder, and I only found them again this year while hunting for an older picture. Here’s a refresher in case you forgot again: Continue reading “Note to Future Me #6”
Tag: lessons learned
Guardianship update: 5th August 2018
Well, the joke’s on me. The biggest of the four in the keeper is the only one that isn’t currently hanging in their J in this really bad picture below. It’s still munching away on a leaf. Continue reading “Guardianship update: 5th August 2018”
Really? Those are easy to grow!
When our soybeans failed to even break ground this year, it never occurred to me to go back and ask for a chat with the person that had told me before I’d planted them, “They’re so easy to grow!” I never thought to ask questions that might help me learn even one of the possible differences between gardens. We just blamed ourselves. I assumed it was critters because of all the disturbance we’d had in the soil, my partner blamed his black thumb since he was the one that put the seeds in the ground. Today, I had the ah-ha moment, which led to my writing this. Continue reading “Really? Those are easy to grow!”
Note to future me #4
Don’t forget to actually utilize the data you’ve collected. Look over it from time to time, especially if you are doing something similar to what you’ve recorded before. (Use that search function on this site too for when you didn’t record things in the plantings list that are relevant to whatever you need to know. It’s easy to forget it’s there some days.)
You’ll be less impatient if you remember maybe you haven’t waited long enough for results because our memory isn’t always as good as we want it to be.
Just when I had almost given up…
…I noticed something had changed while we were failing to photograph the monarch egg and I stepped into the kitchen for some reason I can’t recall now. I happened to glance over at the pot on the counter, and was five years old all over again.
Note to future me #3
Any time insomnia has kicked in, and you find yourself trying to get a post up before you trundle off to bed whether the sun is in the sky or not yet, preview it entirely TWICE before posting. Also, don’t forget to check your math.
What is it? Part 2
Courtesy Notice: This did get a bit more rambly than planned, but I don’t have time to try to knock it down because I have a promise to keep today.
It finally opened! The other one also suddenly has a second bud forming. So I had to take some pictures. I want to point out that last year I have no photo evidence of anything like that in that bed.
Here’s what’s odd. When I look at my 2018 Plantings notes, I wrote that I planted “Black eyed susans – porch – June 8”. From pictures I’ve looked at, this is a fairly likely candidate but the “porch” designation is supposed to mean something else. Continue reading “What is it? Part 2”
What is it?
So the two about foot tall flowers on the west bed in front of the porch have become a daily (ok, since the petals started showing, multiple times daily) ponderance I feel the need to lift.
I’ve done some comparisons. I’ve sworn at a few plant ID sites that lack the details I wish I could input to maybe get a closer result. Still, I am unsure. Eventually, I hope, I’ll learn what they really are.
The last time I guessed something was a flower, it turned out to be a tree. Last time I thought I found a certain larvae that would grow to be a butterfly, I instead had found a larvae that is growing to be a moth. I’m obviously terrible at the guessing game, but knowing that doesn’t quiet my brain.
Any day now…any day…I will learn.
Note to future me #2
You may have done some record keeping in 2018 you were (or maybe still are?) proud of, but you really need to remember to note where you planted certain flower seeds if you haven’t figured out a good way to start them indoors without artificial lighting again and decide to direct sow. If only for the possible amusement of what flowers grow nowhere near the spot you think (or even know) you planted them.
It just might save you a plant ID search when it’s growing but not quite obvious yet since we get so many great volunteers here. That’s time better spent doing other things.