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Post by Retread-Retired-Cameron on Apr 25, 2020 12:41:11 GMT
I'm the "fool" of the family after all.I could never understand why people think because a person hasn't a string of letters after his name he's not clever. Some of my friends never had the opportunity to go to unuversities but they are very intelligent. In fact some of the members of my writing group were not given the opportunity of further education but they have had books, articles and poems published. They are very clever. Sphinx-Cameron it's a shame your birth family see you as the "fool". I know your wife and cildren don't, nor do people who interact with you. Far too often people prefer to measure the intelligence and / or worth of individuals via money and possessions accrued rather than by what the people in question are able to accomplish. In many ways it's a false paradigm due to the fact that many capable individuals [as you pointed out] didn't have the same opportunities.
At any rate I get to dig a hole to plant an olive tree for my six-year-old daughter in a few minutes. She saw something about Earth Day and wanted to plant a tree, so I get to haul out the shovel and a heavy wrecking bar [to pound through the rock] while praying I don't need to use the engineer's hammer and chisels to finish it off. I'm afraid the child is functioning on a higher level, which makes it harder to keep up since we have a lot of small trees to do similar holes for.
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Post by BlueAndGold on Apr 25, 2020 12:48:33 GMT
Arbor Day24 April this year. If you dig fast you can catch up!
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Post by Retread-Retired-Cameron on Apr 25, 2020 13:49:27 GMT
Arbor Day24 April this year. If you dig fast you can catch up! Trust me, with a few inches of topsoil and many inches of rock, digging won't be fast.
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Post by benziger on Apr 25, 2020 19:26:39 GMT
We already have some trees, but in the last years the sun burned so hot in summer, so I wanted to plant some high bushes on the south side (in contrast to trees, 60cm border distance is enough here, otherwise 3m): Inspired by you we made seedlings of our elder today. My son will water it every day and in a year's time it will be planted out.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 26, 2020 6:06:11 GMT
Goodluck with your seedlings Benziger. You are a good teacher for your son.
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Post by Retread-Retired-Cameron on Apr 26, 2020 9:53:45 GMT
Looks like I get to do the tree today, as putting together a new bed frame killed a lot of time yesterday.
The joys of pounding a hole into rock should be better today.
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Post by ronmiller on Apr 26, 2020 16:35:37 GMT
Since we moved here we've planted ten trees...with, hopefully, at least half a dozen more to come later this year.
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Post by Retread-Retired-Cameron on Apr 26, 2020 20:27:01 GMT
It do be planted.
The hole is around 18 inches deep.
Most of the rock from the hole as I didn't screen the dirt. Thankfully soft limestone rather than the harder limestone you need power tools or explosives to penetrate.
And the olive tree waiting for water. I mixed sand and "garden soil" [mostly organic schtuff] with the native dirt to aid moisture retention and drainage while the tree establishes itself. The organic blend is for retention while the sand is for drainage since we get maybe two feet of rain a year but when we have a rare frog strangler, we can get six inches of rain in a day.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 27, 2020 15:06:42 GMT
And the olive tree waiting for water. I mixed sand and "garden soil" [mostly organic schtuff] with the native dirt to aid moisture retention and drainage while the tree establishes itself. The organic blend is for retention while the sand is for drainage since we get maybe two feet of rain a year but when we have a rare frog strangler, we can get six inches of rain in a day.
You have "green fingers" Sphinx-Cameron that's why I copy your quotes in green.
PS is the term "green fingers" an english expression? It means natural ability in growing plants.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 27, 2020 15:08:30 GMT
My husband has green fingers. He kept an orchid we were given for years, but now he is worried as it seems to be dying.
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Post by Retread-Retired-Cameron on Apr 27, 2020 15:19:20 GMT
And the olive tree waiting for water. I mixed sand and "garden soil" [mostly organic schtuff] with the native dirt to aid moisture retention and drainage while the tree establishes itself. The organic blend is for retention while the sand is for drainage since we get maybe two feet of rain a year but when we have a rare frog strangler, we can get six inches of rain in a day.You have "green fingers" Sphinx-Cameron that's why I copy your quotes in green. PS is the term "green fingers" an english expression? It means natural ability in growing plants. Aye, tis English while here it's a "green thumb" meaning the same thing.
Next year I can get a gas-powered hammer drill with a chisel attachment in order to make holes in the harder limestone, as we have a few dozen trees as will need spots before long.
And some other varieties will take their places in the pots. A never ending cycle..
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Post by Retread-Retired-Cameron on Apr 27, 2020 15:20:19 GMT
My husband has green fingers. He kept an orchid we were given for years, but now he is worried as it seems to be dying. Ah, ask him when he last gave the orchid a larger container and fresh growing media.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 28, 2020 6:04:34 GMT
Thanks Sphinx-Cameron. I don't think he needs a larger container, it's in a very large plant pot, but he is going to give it fresh growing media. We have both become very fond of this orchid.
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Post by And Kevin 2024 on Apr 28, 2020 13:35:26 GMT
One problem with trees is that they grow. Daft thing to say I know. But I have a large garden and planted a few trees when I moved in. I have been here around 30 years and some of the trees I planted eventually had to go. It's shockingly amazing how fast and tall leylandi grow for example. I planted 8 of those. 3 remain. Next door also had 5 of them. They were tiny when I moved in. much later the roots up, er, rooted my fence and the roots of one was too close to the house. There was also what became a massive horsechestnut tree. So big it was like an eclipse, and flowers and the lawn refused to grow in its gigantic shadow. It had to go. Also, what started as four small cherry trees got so large they too had to eventually go, not least because the birds ate the fruit which turned their crap in to a purple dye. Currently I watch in horror as a silver birch and a willow, which are now twice the height of my house and skinny as they grew competing for light, bend in high winds like fishing poles. Moral of the story? Only buy bushes!
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Post by benziger on Apr 28, 2020 13:49:33 GMT
Most people forget that plants grow.
- So they plant too much when they move in and then they have to cut, dig, etc.
- Or they plan and the garden only slowly becomes what they thought it would be in the beginning.
Moral of the story: If you can plan and be patient, you don't have to cut down trees.
(A tree has a life expectancy of 100-1000 years, depending on the species).
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