Confessions, still and again, part umpty-ump

Okay, that previous thread had about 225 posts so here's a new one.

Came from here:
http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/t/1016832/

This message was edited Aug 19, 2009 4:06 PM

I confess, I'm a bit disappointed no one in the Bug ID forum has identified my friend.

http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/t/1028829/



This message was edited Aug 19, 2009 4:08 PM

Here's his picture:

"It's a grasshopper", isn't good enough?

Two Striped Grasshopper, Melanoplus bivittatus?
google image search then follow links

lisabees, lololol! Well, I thought so til my friend looked at the picture and thought it was a moth! Heck, most of us think of grasshoppers as green, til we really look at them, so then I figured there must be "kinds" of grasshoppers, like.

Denver Jude, thank you most kindly, for the clue. I will pursue.

Okay, but in the bug thread he got named Gordon.

Gordon is a good name for a grasshopper. Maybe grasshoppers are like daisies -- very difficult to identify specifically.

Seeing this, I think I can identify it as Catfood. At least that's why my cats think when one gets in the house.

in re: pruning roses in the fall

Answer: it depends
I know that isn't very helpful, but the determining factors include type of rose, climate, location, how long the rose has been in the ground, predicted winter weather, etc.

In fall I only do the cleanup that is necessary to remove diseased or weak growth, and then only after the roses have gone dormant. Cutting a rose stem before dormancy will actually encourage more growth, and new growth in the fall is especially susceptible to damage and disease.

Early march is when I do the pruning necessary for really maintaining a rose based on location, age, type, etc. I also apply granular organic fertilizer at that time. It is very hard to predict what spring will be like here in denver, but as a general rule we will have 2-3 heavy snows between march and may. March is also a good time to retie any climbers, or clean out non-blooming canes in once-blooming varieties.

I would be happy to give demonstrations to anyone who is interested in November or March.

I would love the demo, but doubt I will get there in November or March, darn it!

Gordon Catfood it is! LOL!

if i can remember to take pictures, perhaps I will post a demo as a thread

I would enjoy that! This is a good time to employ your DH.

Hi, Greenjay. Thanks. I am removing dead branches. We often have late freezes here so I'm thinking March or early April for real cut backs. My roses are not dormant yet, though, so am not doing much. Even so, they bit me a couple of times just to let me know how they felt about the whole thing. Many roses around town are going in to a bloom period now. I hope we get some rain soon.

My roses are blooming! Well, two out of three bushes.

Already pajarito! Nice.

I confess that this is a non-gardeining Saturday. I am off with the kitlets to ride rollercoasters and such.

I confess I am attending a tai chi workshop this weekend and probably won't be on-line much.

I am dividing iris and making care packages for friends who want them. I am way late doing this little job.

I took a class on front range soils at the DBG. I just got back.
And it's _hot_ outside!

Sounds like an interesting class. I guess I need to get behind the Santa Fe Botanic Garden in hope that we will have such classes here some day.

I confess I will be crushed if you didn't miss me while I was travelin and tourin and checkin out the PNW and the US NW Rockies. Snagged some fabby rocks from Montana. No pics sigh from the the Canadian big rocks cuz walls of rain were happenin. Still not enough to put the fires out sigh. Had to apologize to Idahoans bout that when travelin through cuz they are in total smoke (oops)

Of course we missed you, Dahlia!

Lots of Canadian smoke here too.T hankfully the wind this afternoon blew a lot of it away. It cooled down a little too, Wed. Thurs. and Friday, very hot 94 here but 104 degrees just 30 miles south of here. Sure wish we would get some rain.

I do hope to get some fall greens seeds in the ground tomorrow, Mostly lettuce, and maybe some radishes.

the fellow who works for me and I did some summer pruning of large shrubs on Friday. The way
WE, do that is, I carry long bamboo stick and touch the limbs i want removed, and he does the sawing and cutting. Now I have a nice supply of shreds to spread from the limbs that were removed, mostly Elderberry, crabapple.

Donna

O yes Donna you are directly in the smoke path for sure sigh. Hope hasn't been too brutal this summer.

Woke up this morning to clear blue skies, a little smoke haze around the edges. Temp 51 degrees, and some wind. We have had a lot of dry heat and only a little rain a week ago.

I was going to take a picture of my two roses, but batteries are dead have to wait until they are recharged.

Donna

Sounds like the start of a nice day rutholive. Hope you are enjoying it.

Glad to have you back on the forum.

Nice to hear from you, Rutholive! We are finally looking like rain could be possible. It is cloudy and cooler. I confess that taking care of two gardens and being at a workshop all week end has kept me plenty busy!

I confess that it is raining outside.

Rain! Oh joy! We have had some here, but at the moment, it isn't raining. More supposed to come, however. I can't wait. I divided and replanted iris today and would love to have it rain the new plants in.

Welcome back, DahliaNut!!! Of course you were missed! Glad you saw my dahlia pic on the other thread... I am totally loving the dahlias. Will plant many more next year!

Rain here and more on the way tomorrow! Sadly, our roof is leaking in the kitchen. D.H. put a tarp over it and a pot under it to catch drips but we are definitely looking at a repair job when it dries out. I've been wondering when the roof would actually leak because we've anticipated getting a new one sometime in the near future. Maybe nearer than we thought! I think there is some kind of tax break for energy saving stuff now, so it may be time to check out solar panels.

I confess I am glad Dahlianut is back to bring some sensibleness and quiet self-discipline and boring postings back to this place, LOLOLOL

I further confess I am WAY ENVIOUS of rain, anywhere. And hope you are enjoying every single drop, DWiD.

Kylaluaz, I most certainly agree with you, and am particularly envious of rain anywhere. There is a serious lightning caused fire to the south west of here and the hwy 20 over the Loup Loup pass is closed to traffic as firefighters are working on both sides. So from this area to go to the coast one has to go south to one of the other two passes, making it a longer trip.

I have just had a very busy summer, and since I move so much slower now at my age, it takes me much longer to accomplish much!!!!!! Not much time for computer. I doubt I'll ever get ahead of the weeds. And I have a lot of mulching that needs to be done as I pull weeds.

Sun is up so I must get out to the irrigating and weeding.

Donna

Uh oh, roybird. That sounds expensive.
But rain in Santa Fe and Albuquerque sounds very nice.

That does sound expensive. At least you were thinking it was about time, roybird, so its not such a surprise.

Thanks, Dave. Yeah, it's still a shock to have the future be here now! But, if we just go one step at a time I think we'll be able to adjust to whatever needs to be done. I am seriously sad to think that I may lose all my roses in the front to the construction, not to mention the apricot trees. But, I don't know yet to what extent things will be torn up. I don't want to anticipate too much until we have more information. Meanwhile, if anyone has any roofing advice, I'd like to hear about it. ( Though I might not follow it! ) There are some tax credits out there for using some sort of energy efficient materials that we are finding out about. And, it would be nice to cut our energy use. This is edited because I forgot to say it is a pitched roof. I would start a new thread for it, too, so as not to mess up this one.

This message was edited Aug 24, 2009 11:34 AM

roofing advice: sell the holes in roof to pay for hole-free new roof?

that advice is the kind you can safely categorize as hole-in-the-head.....

Roybird, sorry, I had missed the comment about your leaking roof in my happiness about rain... I do think not anticipating much til you know more is best, too.

May it be a graceful repair season for you!

Thanks, Kyla.