The Gardening & Puttering Thread - May 31, 2025 [TRex]

Good afternoon and welcome to the big beautiful Gardening and Puttering thread. Your usual host is still recovering, so you're stuck with a dinosaur with a small brain and short arms for this week.

[Top photo: Schloss Hellbrunn, Salzburg, Austria]

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Short content today, so looking to the Gray Box friends to keep the momentum going. What are you working on in your garden? What's blooming? What other puttering projects are underway?

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As per usual Gardening thread etiquette, keep this thread limited to gardening and puttering. Politics, current events and religious debates can live in threads elsewhere. Play nice. Do not be a troll and do not feed the trolls. Pants, as always, are optional.

Lots among the Horde bearing heavy loads these days. Please know that we collectively lift up our Horde family and those adjacent in prayer. We also stand ready to help whenever and however needed.

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What's popping with color in your garden or around your yard or neighborhood?

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Sticking with the theme in the top photo, does anyone favor statuary in their garden?

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Is it a weed? Is it a flower? Dunno. Happy gardening and puttering. Best wishes to KT.

Posted by: Open Blogger at 03:01 PM

Comments

(Jump to bottom of comments)

1 Here

Posted by: You Really Don't Want to Know at May 31, 2025 02:04 PM (uqyLy)

2 And nooded.

Posted by: You Really Don't Want to Know at May 31, 2025 02:05 PM (uqyLy)

3 yAy! New thread!

Nothing to report on with our gardening but I will say that the compost is doing well and judging from our camera in the front yard, the deer are enjoying the buffet we've provided.

Posted by: NR Pax at May 31, 2025 02:05 PM (7xrfc)

4 Harvested my first tomato the other day, a "Matt's Wild Cherry". Also picked 3 lbs of cucumbers last week. The peppers have finally started blooming.

Posted by: gingeroni at May 31, 2025 02:08 PM (86qGP)

5 I guess the theme of that first statue is “Blow it out your…(whatever that is) !!!”

Posted by: Tom Servo at May 31, 2025 02:09 PM (i5oKA)

6 I don't want to sound judgmental but those are some butt ugly statues.

Posted by: Dr. Claw at May 31, 2025 02:10 PM (3wi/L)

7 I always like a goiter on the neck of my female gnome.

Posted by: MkY at May 31, 2025 02:12 PM (cPGH3)

8 I planted some petunias in flower boxes.
Does that count?

Posted by: Quarter Twenty at May 31, 2025 02:13 PM (dg+HA)

9 Late spring her in KCMo. Too cool to see anything really take off. Have had all the asparagus we can take. Don't know any way to preserve them. Relatives getting largesse.
We have a bunny in our garden. Most our protection is centered on deer. She hops through the hog fence, under the electric fence. We're debating letting her eat. 1st in 15 years.
We have loads of bunny predators.

Posted by: MkY at May 31, 2025 02:15 PM (cPGH3)

10 Visited the gardens at Blenheim Palace this week. Very nice. Highly recommended.

Posted by: Ana Navarro at May 31, 2025 02:19 PM (6bqCp)

11 Posted by: Open Blogger at 03:01 PM

Time musheen?

Posted by: Commissar of plenty and festive little hats at May 31, 2025 02:20 PM (6eQus)

12 Not really a gardening question, but a potted-plant question. I have a couple of plants—herbs, jalapeños, and a bird of paradise—that I always have trouble with when I go on longer trips.

What I’ve been doing is set them outside on the back porch, and have a water timer set to regularly turn on a sprinkler, and put them in the path of the sprinkler.

The main problem with the timer is that the plastic tends to degrade, so they don’t last over two years (I bring them in in the winter so they don’t freeze.) I’ve been using an expensive solution; I’m about to start just buying really cheap timers so they cost less when they fail. But is there a better solution?

(A week or less, and I just bring them inside out of the heat, water them as well as I can, and water them as soon as I return home.)

Posted by: Stephen Price Blair at May 31, 2025 02:23 PM (EXyHK)

13 From Boise area: Might not be able to post next week.

An early heat wave this past week - today will top out near 100 F, then highs will drop to more normal 80's. Lots of weeding this week, to prepare for final planting-out (and keep weeds down before summer vacation season). 4 final tomato starts went into cloth pots. Poblanos and bell pepper are planted out in raised beds, as well as basil, parsley, thyme, cilantro. All that's left is pickling cucumbers, cantaloupes, 1 squash, and marigolds - a job for tomorrow when it's cooler.

Potato bags have had more compost added. Bearded irises under the redbud got dug out - some went to the new stone bed for contrast with the new deep purples, the rest added to a raised bed being converted to a cutting flower area. That area already has chamomile and larkspur - I'm considering adding borage.

Harvesting lettuce, spinach, strawberries.

Posted by: Pat* at May 31, 2025 02:24 PM (W27gv)

14 Typical spring weekend, work the beds, cut and edge grass, since it is a good day went and power washed 100' of stone retaining wall - i don't care for mold patina.

I need to pull some of the sawgrass out of the shoreline before the root ball makes it impossible later.

Posted by: Unknown Drip Under Pressure at May 31, 2025 02:25 PM (a4flb)

15 11 Posted by: Open Blogger at 03:01 PM

Time musheen?

Posted by: Commissar of plenty and festive little hats at May 31, 2025 02:20 PM
***
It was cloudy when I checked the sundial in the garden.

Posted by: TRex at May 31, 2025 02:27 PM (Eaoic)

16 Headed out to the farm to do some work after two weeks of rain and now warm temperatures.

Does anyone need some ticks for their garden or to feed their chickens?

If so, I am pretty sure I will be able to ship you 50# sacks of the evil, little, blood suckers.

Posted by: Pillage Idiot at May 31, 2025 02:30 PM (HlyYF)

17 asparagus Don't know any way to preserve them.

They pickle well!

Posted by: AZ deplorable moron at May 31, 2025 02:33 PM (mXzF7)

18 Pickled asparagus is really good. I got some of the best looking asparagus crowns I've ever seen from Renee's Garden. I planted what I could , but I've been dealing with shingles for a month. They weren't buried deep enough. I was finally able to move potting soil back to fill the containers and get the empty one ready for the last of the plants. We did get rain, so I didn't have to struggle with that but I need to finish transplanting.

Posted by: Notsothoreau at May 31, 2025 02:39 PM (AcTAo)

19 Herbs are doing well, couple flowers on Anaheim peppers and no power all day. No idea why, outside on deck reading book.

Posted by: Skip at May 31, 2025 02:41 PM (aAQnS)

20 Water timers - the Gardena mechanical water timers used to be the best, I had a couple that lasted for several years. But I’m not sure the currently produced ones are as durable as they once year.
One complaint I had; when I could tell that there was a leak because a seal had gone out in the body of the timer, it was absolutely impossible to dismantle them without breaking the housing. It pissed me off because it would have been so easy to have designed them to be repairable.

Posted by: Tom Servo at May 31, 2025 02:44 PM (i5oKA)

21 I guess the theme of that first statue is “Blow it out your…(whatever that is) !!!”
Posted by: Tom Servo

Who let you take pictures on my estate?!?

Posted by: Pete Bootygig at May 31, 2025 02:45 PM (DgGvY)

22 16 Headed out to the farm to do some work after two weeks of rain and now warm temperatures.

Does anyone need some ticks for their garden or to feed their chickens?

If so, I am pretty sure I will be able to ship you 50# sacks of the evil, little, blood suckers.
Posted by: Pillage Idiot at May 31, 2025 02:30 PM (HlyYF)

yikes

Posted by: m at May 31, 2025 02:47 PM (CQE5S)

23 While not as famous, I always enjoyed the Schwetzingen Garden just outside of Heidelberg, Germany, and have been there many times. It’s attached to a large mansion, basically, and was often used by the nobility for entertaining, as I understand. The garden is huge, with a variety of statues, orchards, a grotto, and a weird little Ottoman influenced entertaining area.

Aerial photo for scale (castle/mansion to the lower right)
https://tinyurl.com/4x9hu6u9

Other random images (there are tons of great pictures out there, because the place has so many different themed areas)

https://tinyurl.com/4rxpnudy
https://tinyurl.com/5xe8h7bk
https://tinyurl.com/y7azxcsu
https://tinyurl.com/y3zypmv7
https://tinyurl.com/5t572awc
https://tinyurl.com/49hn7tzz

Posted by: Military Moron at May 31, 2025 02:49 PM (ycI94)

24 TRex is doing a thread on garden statuary, and didn't include one like this?

https://is.gd/rxOfCt

I have a neighbor with a similar statue in her flower garden, among a few other "non-traditional" garden gnome pieces.

Posted by: mikeski at May 31, 2025 02:50 PM (DgGvY)

25 It pissed me off because it would have been so easy to have designed them to be repairable.

Posted by: Tom Servo at May 31, 2025 02:44 PM

I was shocked and angry to learn about designed obsolescence in my high school economics class.

I was a naive and trusting young lad back then!

Posted by: Pillage Idiot at May 31, 2025 02:50 PM (HlyYF)

26 16
'If so, I am pretty sure I will be able to ship you 50# sacks of the evil, little, blood suckers.'

I have all I need, thank you.

Posted by: Dr. Claw at May 31, 2025 02:51 PM (3wi/L)

27 TRex, Thanks for filling in and hoping KT is home soon and doing well.

Posted by: JTB at May 31, 2025 02:58 PM (yTvNw)

28 I am pro garden statuary. Had a Pan playing the pan pipes in my rose garden years ago, and a Green Man on the wall adjoining. Don't know if it brought any pagan energy to the plants, but I dug the pastoral vibe.

Posted by: All Hail Eris, She-Wolf of the 'Ettes 'Ettes at May 31, 2025 03:01 PM (Axt+y)

29 It pissed me off because it would have been so easy to have designed them to be repairable.

Yeah, it seems to me it would require little to both (a) make the male hose attachment more durable, or (b) make it more easily replaced. That’s the part that tends to go bad, because it’s made of plastic instead of metal, like my garden hoses are.

Posted by: Stephen Price Blair at May 31, 2025 03:01 PM (EXyHK)

30 Have a sleeping fawn garden statue, 75 years old?

Posted by: Commissar of plenty and festive little hats at May 31, 2025 03:02 PM (tzyLO)

31 Pickled asparagus?
Well, timber me shivers.
We've converted many to pickled okra, so I guess this is worth a go.
As an aside, I bought pickled garlic at the grocery on the discount shelf. Sadly, it didn't taste like garlic much.

Posted by: MkY at May 31, 2025 03:02 PM (cPGH3)

32 Top pic: is that why unicorns went extinct? The males couldn't tell the difference between female unicorns and rocks?

Posted by: mikeski at May 31, 2025 03:06 PM (DgGvY)

33 28 ... "Had a Pan playing the pan pipes in my rose garden years ago, and a Green Man on the wall adjoining. Don't know if it brought any pagan energy to the plants, but I dug the pastoral vibe."

I like the phrase 'pastoral vibe'. Sounds like something to inculcate throughout life.

Posted by: JTB at May 31, 2025 03:07 PM (yTvNw)

34 24 TRex is doing a thread on garden statuary, and didn't include one like this? https://is.gd/rxOfCt

I have a neighbor with a similar statue in her flower garden, among a few other "non-traditional" garden gnome pieces.

Posted by: mikeski at May 31, 2025 02:50 PM
***
Oh my. Never seen that before! Will keep the gnome theme in mind for a future if needed.

Posted by: TRex at May 31, 2025 03:12 PM (Eaoic)

35 I like succulents with so many weird shapes. Got a burro's-tail and Christmas cactus that aren't aging well. Gonna try propagating them from leaf cuttings which is supposed to be easy to do. If you hear botanical wailing in the Mid-Atlantic region it probably means the propagation didn't work.

Posted by: JTB at May 31, 2025 03:15 PM (yTvNw)

36 Join me as I Google: why are my habanero plants all frickin' yellow and stuff?

Hmm. It might be a magnesium deficiency. I have magnesium pills, if that helps.

All my other plants are doing great. I have jalapenos, cherry tomatoes and pole tomatoes (for drying) and two San Marzano plants for stewing/canning. Plus three containers of basil.

Posted by: Bombadil at May 31, 2025 03:19 PM (MX0bI)

37 We've converted many to pickled okra, so I guess this is worth a go.
As an aside, I bought pickled garlic at the grocery on the discount shelf. Sadly, it didn't taste like garlic much.
Posted by: MkY at May 31, 2025 03:02 PM (cPGH3

I put in radishes in the winter as a cover crop, and some of them make enough radish for my wife to use for kimchi - the leaves also work as a green. In the late spring they get woody and the tops bolt, so I leave them alone to put out pods, which I pick, trim the spike off, and pickle in a boiled mix of vinegar, molasses, currant leaves and (this time) mint leaves. I have put garlic in too.

They taste like capers, and are a nice addition to a tomato and pasta dish

Posted by: Kindltot at May 31, 2025 03:22 PM (D7oie)

38 I’m going to Home Depot tomorrow to buy some border stones to replace the thin slate that the builder used to line around the various plant and tree beds in my yard.

Now the post has me on the hunt for a good yard statue.

Posted by: polynikes at May 31, 2025 03:24 PM (VofaG)

39 Hmm. It might be a magnesium deficiency. I have magnesium pills, if that helps.

Posted by: Bombadil

We used to put a tabl spoon of Epson salt in a gal of water for each rose. The leaves were the greenest you ever saw.
Each Chlorophyl molecule has an atom of magnesium ... Epson salt provides it to the plat.

Posted by: AZ deplorable moron at May 31, 2025 03:27 PM (mXzF7)

40 There is an app now that you take a photo of your sick plant and it tells you what to do to cure it.

Posted by: polynikes at May 31, 2025 03:28 PM (VofaG)

41 Have a garden goddess in my father's memorial rose garden. I live in SW Idaho (thank you, God) and hid her on the back deck until I planted the roses as she can't seem to keep her dress up. Have to consider the neighbors' sensibilities after all.

Posted by: clc at May 31, 2025 03:29 PM (vy+jm)

42 We have a retailer that makes garden statues nearby. Mostly Asian themes like the gate lions.
But I like the whimsical ones featured.

Posted by: gourmand du jour at May 31, 2025 03:30 PM (RMKGH)

43 (taps foot) Can I talk to a manager?
- pet thread Karen

Posted by: Commissar of plenty and festive little hats at May 31, 2025 03:33 PM (XLHdq)

44 (taps foot) Can I talk to a manager?
- pet thread Karen
Posted by: Commissar of plenty and festive little hats at May 31, 2025 03:33 PM (XLHdq)

Sure. Simba! Simba! There's a Karen here who want's to yell at you!

(ROAR! Out steps a hungry lion...)

Posted by: Hour of the Wolf at May 31, 2025 03:37 PM (VNX3d)

45 Asparagus soup is divine!

Onions, chicken stock 1/2 and 1/2, purée the asparagus.

Outstanding!

Posted by: Derak at May 31, 2025 03:37 PM (CCs4X)

46 PUSSY CAT

Posted by: Commissar of plenty and festive little hats at May 31, 2025 03:40 PM (vj8Ic)

47 I have photos of those last two statues from Salzburg from when I visited there many years ago. They're very interesting!

Posted by: Moonbeam at May 31, 2025 03:41 PM (x5/Ql)

48

Any thoughts on a small grotto or shrine for a statue of Mary or a saint?

Posted by: My Pimp Shot My Dealer at May 31, 2025 03:43 PM (GPsMB)

49 Thanks, T Rex! Just walked in from my hospital release. DH skedaddled out of the pickup area to avoid flying rocks from om an incoming helicopter. Proper landscaping?

Posted by: KT at May 31, 2025 03:45 PM (xekrU)

50 Get out of the ghetto and into the grotto.

Posted by: Commissar of plenty and festive little hats at May 31, 2025 03:46 PM (1bQDa)

51 incoming helicopter.

Gosh KT, they don't fly unless it's critical.

Posted by: Commissar of plenty and festive little hats at May 31, 2025 03:48 PM (1bQDa)

52 Any thoughts on a small grotto or shrine for a statue of Mary or a saint?
Posted by: My Pimp Shot My Dealer

A shrub behind the statue is what we use for St Francis

Posted by: AZ deplorable moron at May 31, 2025 03:49 PM (mXzF7)

53 Still pretty strung out from my super migraine featuring a few missing words.

Posted by: KT at May 31, 2025 03:49 PM (xekrU)

54 Thanks, T Rex! Just walked in from my hospital release. DH skedaddled out of the pickup area to avoid flying rocks from om an incoming helicopter. Proper landscaping?
Posted by: KT

Welcome back KT and congrats on your escape!

Posted by: AZ deplorable moron at May 31, 2025 03:50 PM (mXzF7)

55 Still pretty strung out from my super migraine featuring a few missing words.
Posted by: KT

Just skip the 4 letter words!, Well not 'grow' of course!

Posted by: AZ deplorable moron at May 31, 2025 03:52 PM (mXzF7)

56 Glad to hear you are out of the hospital, KT.

Posted by: scampydog at May 31, 2025 03:55 PM (4DIus)

57
Any thoughts on a small grotto or shrine for a statue of Mary or a saint?
Posted by: My Pimp Shot My Dealer

A shrub behind the statue is what we use for St Francis
Posted by: AZ deplorable moron

Out in the country they use vertical bath tubs.

Posted by: Bertram Cabot, Jr. at May 31, 2025 03:55 PM (63Dwl)

58 I'd love to have a running water feature in the garden, but it seems like too much trouble. We have birdbaths.

On eBay this week, I picked up some "jewelry" for the garden close to the back porch, where I like to hang out - titanium crystal clusters. They look nice amidst the thyme and rocks.

Posted by: Miley, okravangelist at May 31, 2025 03:57 PM (w6EFb)

59 Each Chlorophyl molecule has an atom of magnesium ... Epson salt provides it to the plant

Posted by: AZ deplorable moron

Electrolytes are what plants crave! I'll try it. I'm pretty confident it'll work, the other suggestions don't seem likely. Thanks fella!

Posted by: Bombadil at May 31, 2025 03:59 PM (MX0bI)

60 Thanks, T Rex! Just walked in from my hospital release.

Posted by: KT at May 31, 2025 03:45 PM (xekrU)

Awesome news, KT! Hope you're feeling tiptop soon. We've missed you.

Thank you for stepping in, TRex!

Posted by: Miley, okravangelist at May 31, 2025 04:00 PM (w6EFb)

61 Pet nood!

Posted by: AZ deplorable moron at May 31, 2025 04:06 PM (mXzF7)

62 Awesome news, KT! Hope you're feeling tiptop soon. We've missed you.

Thank you for stepping in, TRex!

Ditto from me, KT!

We’ve been praying for your recovery.

Posted by: kallisto at May 31, 2025 04:07 PM (lze0y)

63 Join me as I Google: why are my habanero plants all frickin' yellow and stuff?

Hmm. It might be a magnesium deficiency. I have magnesium pills, if that helps.

Posted by: Bombadil at May 31, 2025 03:19 PM (MX0bI)

I highly recommend putting any garden questions to Grok, which is amazing for utilitarian information. Like, "do (x) seeds need cold stratification?"

Posted by: Miley, okravangelist at May 31, 2025 04:11 PM (w6EFb)

64 49 Thanks, T Rex! Just walked in from my hospital release. DH skedaddled out of the pickup area to avoid flying rocks from om an incoming helicopter. Proper landscaping?
Posted by: KT at May 31, 2025 03:45 PM (xekrU)

I'm happy you're home KT and I pray you are feeling better.

Posted by: CaliGirl at June 01, 2025 11:39 AM (xHmR4)

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