Gardening, Home and Nature Thread, Sept. 19

Above, a special photo showing dedication to landscaping by Mr Jimm:

This first picture is the view outside the window of my home office. I sit at my desktop monitor and trade stock options (& read ace.mu.nu, of course) and see this view in front of me. Note the blue and pink hydrangeas in the foreground, the purple coneflowers, the red & yellow daylilies and the lawn in the middle ground, and the 2 pine trees & the crabapple between them in the background.
In fact, I use it as my iPhone's wallpaper.

A lovely scene.

So I had a tattoo made of it last Thursday on my inner left forearm!
It's still healing a bit and the colors & details are coming through more clearly day by day. I keep it covered with a light coating of A&D cream for now and am doing my best to keep it out of the sun,
I count 15 different colors within this! It took 3 hours and it hurt like a m-f but I got by with a lot of winces and a couple of "oooch"s.

WOW!

Mr Jimm is The Horde's Personal Landscaper of the Year!

Edible Gardening/Putting Things By

IT'S THE SEASON

I haven't grown them but a local store was roasting hatch green Chili's this morning. We bought a gunny stack of them and they roasted then for us.
AZ deplorable moron.

Gardens of The Horde

CBD has formatted a little video of a hummer attracted to Salvia in Badgerwx's garden earlier in the season:

This is Gossypium hirsutum 'Nankeen'. I started the seeds late so I'm not sure I'll get a mature boll but the fibers are brown(ish). The cotton first called nankeen is a Chinese species with yellow/brown fibers while this one is from Peru. With similar calored fibers the term nankeen ended up being applied to it too.
Lirio100

Nice information on cotton. It's illegal to buy cotton seeds like these where I live, because commercial cotton is grown nearby.

Hope everyone has a nice weekend.

If you would like to send photos, stories, links, etc. for the Saturday Gardening Thread, the address is:

ktinthegarden at g mail dot com

Remember to include the nic or name by which you wish to be known at AoSHQ, or let us know if you want to remain a lurker.

* * * * *

Last week's thread, Special Garden and Orchard Thread - Apples!

There were a lot of good comments and recommendations on last week's thread. See also apple notes above.

A comment from the author of the special thread, Lex:

I looked at the post more closely now. I'm sorry my pickleball tourney (a charity fundraiser) coincided with the post being up. I like to respond live, but there were some nice pieces of advice. I definitely need to trim. I will do that more heavily in winter. Next year might be a wash but I'm hoping they can rebound in 2028.
Glad I got to write this out after almost 15 years. I've been at work on these things longer than Odysseus was away from Ithaca.

WeirdDave put an apple chart in the ONT last night, and the Wiki for Empire apple includes pollinizers for Empire apple.

The Apple Graph

Apple graph

does not include as many details as the Honeycrisp Apples blog concerning various apple variaties. Maybe we can discuss favorite varieties and what they are best for next week. Lex's apples were named after New York. Golden Delicious are low-acid and need refrigeration, are the parent of many apples on the market today.

Granny Smiths are especially hard to purchase tree-ripened.

Comments on last week's post are closed so you won't ban yourself by trying to comment on a week-old thread. But don't try it anyway.

Posted by: K.T. at 01:42 PM

Comments

(Jump to bottom of comments)

1 What a pretty tattoo!

Is it okay to like tats again?

Posted by: All Hail Eris, She-Wolf of the 'Ettes 'Ettes at September 19, 2026 01:46 PM (4SGBL)

2 Good morning KT!!

Thank you as always for the Saturday threads.

Posted by: AZ deplorable moron at September 19, 2026 01:47 PM (NnhvP)

3 My garden is pretty much spent. Picked the few remaining Lemon Boys and hot peppers.

I'm in line to buy short ribs for Giada's Short Rib Ragu. It's chilly enough outside for it. It calls for cherry tomatoes and I froze a bunch.

Posted by: All Hail Eris, She-Wolf of the 'Ettes 'Ettes at September 19, 2026 01:48 PM (4SGBL)

4 Nooded.

Posted by: AZ deplorable moron at September 19, 2026 01:59 PM (NnhvP)

5 What can I say? I just don't like tattoos. But I guess that train left the station some time ago.

Posted by: Ralph at September 19, 2026 02:02 PM (8WZD4)

6 Mr Jimm is The Horde's Personal Landscaper of the Year.”

Shouldn’t that be ManScaper?

Posted by: Tom Servo at September 19, 2026 02:04 PM (sTKQb)

7 At this stage in life, I can either raise vegetables or flowers. I choose veggies. BUT...
I get to go in the some of the finest gardens in the City every day, so I get my fill of the beauty. Guess I should photograph some now n again, eh?
I'm especially thrilled with the "pollinator" gardens I'm seeing all over now. Cool trend.

Posted by: MkY at September 19, 2026 02:05 PM (q6tQZ)

8 So I had a tattoo made of it last Thursday on my inner left forearm!

Psst. You got some Art Thread in the Garden Thread.

Posted by: mikeski at September 19, 2026 02:10 PM (VHUov)

9 Interesting to have a tattoo that matches the wallpaper on you iPhone PLUS your yard!

Does it remind you of home when you're away?

Posted by: KT at September 19, 2026 02:13 PM (1RGZ5)

10 Red Delicious is the ultimate fakeout. Mushy and mealy. Golden Delicious isn't much better.

Maybe picked fresh off the tree? Anybody grow these apples?

Posted by: All Hail Eris, She-Wolf of the 'Ettes 'Ettes at September 19, 2026 02:17 PM (4SGBL)

11 Oddest bunny we have, she ( think its a female) seems to live in arborvitae bush right by our front door. Can't find a hole or anything more than some old leaves in the middle

Posted by: Skip at September 19, 2026 02:17 PM (Ia/+0)

12 "WeirdDave put an apple chart in the ONT last night"

The chart shows Granny Smith apples as 'underappreciated? That's just simply not true.

Grandfather had a 20 acre Golden Delicious apple orchard near Wenatchee; sold it off in 1962. My parents planted two dwarf golden delicious trees in our backyard in the San Mateo hills (atop shale/limestone soil.) Foggy often, hot almost never! I was the compost pile turner. Those two trees produced tons of very tasty apples. Our neighbors had one crab apple tree - they never pruned or sprayed for worms nor ever picked them - but those apples were really tasty despite the wormy protein.

Posted by: 13times at September 19, 2026 02:22 PM (fnZRl)

13 No Ida Reds ?!

FAKE apple NEWS.

Posted by: Heirloominati at September 19, 2026 02:23 PM (erhDr)

14 My gardening technique is called Survival of the Fittest.
Since I'm retiring soon, I will talk to the plants more.

Posted by: wth at September 19, 2026 02:24 PM (oq9dX)

15 I love Homeycrisp apples.

Posted by: Quarter Twenty at September 19, 2026 02:24 PM (2Ez/1)

16 We had a big old crabapple tree growing up and it had great sour little apples. Mom made crabapple jelly with them.

Posted by: All Hail Eris, She-Wolf of the 'Ettes 'Ettes at September 19, 2026 02:24 PM (4SGBL)

17 My random crop of Parasol Mushrooms has appeared again. Always in the same area.

Posted by: Martini Farmer at September 19, 2026 02:26 PM (2Cry5)

18 I saw a video on apples for pies and the Granny Smith (no surprise) and Honeycrisp came out on top for texture and flavor.

The Fuji was flavorless and the Deliciouses were mushy.

Posted by: All Hail Eris, She-Wolf of the 'Ettes 'Ettes at September 19, 2026 02:26 PM (4SGBL)

19 In Hatch, as well as the rest of New Mexico, it''s "chile", not " chili."

Posted by: DaveSF at September 19, 2026 02:27 PM (sVKz/)

20 I've used the golden delicious in combination w others for apple sauce w great results. They add body, overcoming the otherwise mushy mcintosh.

Posted by: Heirloominati at September 19, 2026 02:29 PM (erhDr)

21 Red Delicious is the ultimate fakeout. Mushy and mealy. Golden Delicious isn't much better.

Maybe picked fresh off the tree? Anybody grow these apples?
Posted by: All Hail Eris
-----------

Had both. "Meh" isn't meh enough, to fully convey the *meh-ness* of them. Was glad to have the trees removed-- it was a PITA to rake up the fruit each week and mow around them.

Posted by: JQ at September 19, 2026 02:32 PM (rdVOm)

22 Honry Crisps ate for eating, Grannie Smith for baking
Red Delicious are over rated,

Posted by: Skip at September 19, 2026 02:36 PM (Ia/+0)

23 Finally dug up an old garlic patch / clump, neglected for years because - spawn's baseball.
One was about the size of a large cantalope!
Separated over 150 bulbs for replanting, so far. Couple more areas to salvage. Now the real work begins to prepare a bed.
Trying to get the garden landscape organized while keeping the jungle from overtaking!

Posted by: Heirloominati at September 19, 2026 02:41 PM (erhDr)

24 I'm having a roast beef and cheddar sammich on toasted pumpkin sourdough with a slather of grainy mustard.

That is all.

Posted by: All Hail Eris, She-Wolf of the 'Ettes 'Ettes at September 19, 2026 02:42 PM (kpS4V)

25 Finally dug up an old garlic patch / clump, neglected for years because - spawn's baseball.
One was about the size of a large cantalope!
----

One bulb to rule them all!

Posted by: All Hail Eris, She-Wolf of the 'Ettes 'Ettes at September 19, 2026 02:44 PM (kpS4V)

26 My biggest complaint about bagged grocery store apples is that they're woody, flavorless and not sweet. I just don't buy eating apples any longer, unless it's a new, untried variety.

Posted by: 13times at September 19, 2026 02:44 PM (Oy5QT)

27 From the Coffee Thread:

69 Hadrian, I was listening to a psych podcast, and the topic was mindfulness (aimed toward shrinks to encourage them to get their patients to do it as part of getting better)

Made me wonder about which type if Catholic prayer practices align with mindfulness
Posted by: vmom deport deport stab deport at September 19, 2026 09:34 AM (Ydd86)

My knee-jerk answer is none. The closest might be prayers of gratitude, or perhaps saying the rosary in a peaceful garden (SWIDT?) and just being in the moment.

Sometime in the last month or two, I saw something about mindfulness meditation being associated with a worsening or even onset of all manner of psychological disturbances. Admittedly, I didn't interrogate it because it confirmed my priors. But this may explain meditation's sketchy reputation as one of those practices that can open you up *too* much, including to demonic influence.

But in general, Catholic prayer focuses on God's will, hearing His voice, or on the needs and intentions of others. Except for what someone may have borrowed from another tradition, there's no deep closed focus on the self, and no inverse opening to whatever is around.

Posted by: SciVo at September 19, 2026 02:48 PM (ke3zm)

28 The ground my house is on was a apple orchard when I was a kid, somehow no apples trees are here anymore or even when bought the house

Posted by: Skip at September 19, 2026 02:51 PM (Ia/+0)

29 I'm not even sure some "apples" are really, you know... apples and not some sort of synthetic garbage.

I've had (and tossed in the trash) several that were bought at the grocery store and had a texture like Styrofoam and were tasteless. Even the skin was "off."

Maybe improper harvesting, storage or shipping... but they were just awful.

Posted by: Martini Farmer at September 19, 2026 02:53 PM (2Cry5)

30 In defense of the Red Delicious apple, they really were delicious when they were first bred. I really liked eating them as a child in the 60s.

But then the industry spent 20-30 years breeding them to look good instead of tasting good. Their shapes got distorted so they looked more like a bell pepper than an apple. That's also when they got mealy. I had stopped eating them by the early 80s. That's when the Fuji apple got popular and I'm sure they started breeding the flavor out of them too. The idea seems to be that all produce in the store had to look good and the taste doesn't matter.

I wonder if any of the original Red Delicious stock is around as an heirloom variety.

Posted by: badgerwx at September 19, 2026 02:53 PM (VnNy+)

31 I guess the other consideration was making all produce tough enough to stand mechanical picking w/o getting bruised and being shipped long distances and sitting in produce bins w/o rotting. Tomatoes are probably the most extreme example of this.

Posted by: badgerwx at September 19, 2026 03:03 PM (VnNy+)

32 >>> landscaping by Mr Jimm:
Note the blue and pink hydrangeas in the foreground, the purple coneflowers, the red & yellow daylilies and the lawn in the middle ground, and the 2 pine trees & the crabapple between them in the background.

Simply wonderful!

Posted by: m at September 19, 2026 03:04 PM (odBC9)

33 Martha Stewart has a beautiful (of course) orchard with many varieties: "These orchard apple trees include Baldwin, Black Oxford, Cortland, Cox’s Orange Pippin, Esopus Spitzenburg, Fuji, Golden Russet, Grimes Golden, Honeycrisp, Liberty, Redfield, Roxbury Russet, Windham Russet, and more."

https://tinyurl.com/bdyjzjke

Posted by: All Hail Eris, She-Wolf of the 'Ettes 'Ettes at September 19, 2026 03:05 PM (kpS4V)

34 When fighting for space the garlic doesn't have room to form the bulb. More a clump of cloves as it where. One top of cloves, plus more cloves...
Shocking how hardy it is, especially w years of neglect!
But after proper spacing & depth this Fall, should have a nice crop come next year.
I'll take some pics for KT.

Posted by: Heirloominati at September 19, 2026 03:07 PM (erhDr)

35 24 roast beef and cheddar sammich on toasted pumpkin sourdough with a slather of grainy mustard
Posted by: All Hail Eris, She-Wolf of the 'Ettes 'Ettes at September 19, 2026 02:42 PM (kpS4V)

yum

Posted by: m at September 19, 2026 03:12 PM (odBC9)

36 No Ida Reds, Martha?
I haz dissapoint.

I did notice under her extensive list of categories for better living imcludes:

Roses
Roku
Seeds
Shoes
...
Snoop Dogg

LOL

Posted by: Heirloominati at September 19, 2026 03:17 PM (erhDr)

37 31 I guess the other consideration was making all produce tough enough to stand mechanical picking w/o getting bruised and being shipped long distances and sitting in produce bins w/o rotting. Tomatoes are probably the most extreme example of this.

And making them bug-resistant, too?

Posted by: m at September 19, 2026 03:23 PM (odBC9)

38 My grandfather knew apples, what to do with every kind

Posted by: Skip at September 19, 2026 03:23 PM (Ia/+0)

39 Tattoos? When the UFOs land they gonna make lampshades

Posted by: Commissar of plenty and festive little hats at September 19, 2026 03:25 PM (rYrOO)

40 m,

I think produce like tomatoes are modified so growers can spray weed killers and pesticides w/o hurting the plants. I do know that's been done for crops like corn & soybeans (that's what the GMO controversy was about) so I wouldn't be surprised if they haven't tried the same with fruits and vegetables.

Posted by: badgerwx at September 19, 2026 03:29 PM (VnNy+)

41 I have gone on and on about grafting apples. The house I bought has the remnant trees from an old orchard, with a Gravenstein and some relative of the red delicious, and what was the emergent rootstock of an old tree that had been cut down. I think the rootstock is a Baldwin, but I planted a dwarf King, and then grafted in wood from Rhode Island Greening, Ribston, and Grimes Golden. I think I also got a graft off of what I suspect is an Antonovka and a Winesap, and some random volunteers that I liked. This is the first year I got anything but lots of Gravensteins, though.

Anyways, one of the best apple database is:

Pomiferous.com

Posted by: Kindltot at September 19, 2026 03:35 PM (rbvCR)

42 FRENCH DRAIN question:

I had a French drain installed by a licensed contractor 2 weeks ago. At the time, I was concerned that the gravity drain extension into the side yard was too short, but what do I know?

We had our first downpour 2 hours ago. I watched the exit from the gravity drain, and it was clear that the pitch was too shallow to actually Drain the system, so the water was just collecting in it. This was supposed to siphon the water away from my house foundation, but without enough slope, it's just accumulating it. Contract warranty only covers "workmanship" and "materials."

Any suggestions?? Will I have to hire someone to extend the thing?

Posted by: Beverly at September 19, 2026 03:36 PM (reMys)

43 NO PET THREAD NO PEACE

Posted by: Commissar of plenty and festive little hats at September 19, 2026 03:37 PM (rYrOO)

44 41 I have gone on and on about grafting apples.
Posted by: Kindltot at September 19, 2026 03:35 PM (rbvCR)

It's a cool thing.

Posted by: m at September 19, 2026 03:42 PM (odBC9)

45 Martha Stewart has plantation slaves that tend to her apple trees.

Posted by: Mr Aspirin Factory at September 19, 2026 03:44 PM (9NN0K)

46 Pets are up!

Posted by: Piper at September 19, 2026 03:44 PM (ZdaMQ)

47 I looked it up and my cotton plant needs a permission slip. There is a commericial grower of colored cotton fibers who has had a great deal of trouble getting a license because of the cross pollination issue. Sally Fox of Fox Fibre. Her company is Vreseis Ltd, it's where I've gotten the seeds.

Posted by: Lirio100 at September 19, 2026 04:02 PM (ky7/T)

48 I enjoy bird-watching swallows!

Partly because there are almost zero flying insects that make my time outdoors more pleasant.

In my neck of the woods, there are almost zero cliffs in the area. The cliff swallows have come up with a brilliant hack. Most of the overpass bridges are constructed with horizontal concrete support beams, that are protected from above by the greater footprint of the bridge deck. There are many bridges that I drive under that have HUNDREDS of swallow nests plastered into the sweet spot!

In the spring when young are in the nests, there are usually several hundred parents dipping and diving around the bridge to catch bugs.

That "ballet" is quite entertaining to me.

Posted by: Pillage Idiot at September 19, 2026 04:17 PM (HlyYF)

49 Pat* says, too tired to post - helping to run an all-weekend, all-day event. Need to sleep. We did see a hummingbird today, and heard quail, so that was a nice addition to the day. Will be back next week.

Posted by: Pat* at September 20, 2026 12:06 AM (U84fZ)

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