Nature and Gardening

[Image description: a snow covered trail peeks through between the snowy branches of pine trees]

The rest of the album is here

I just wanted to share this channel with you.

[Image description: a forearm tattoo of New Jersey Tea, Ceanothus americanus, taken from one of the earliest surveys of North American plants]

If your answer is "no, but I'm interested", maybe your favorite plant is in here

[Image description: nearly a dozen small birds forage among the stalks of Monarda didyma]

We had hundreds of birds visiting our gardens after a recent snow storm, with each small social group foraging among different clusters of plants and occasionally squabbling over them. It was so noticeable that a neighbor had to stop driving past and tell us how crazy it was, and how few birds were stopping at her house even with a bird feeder out. And she wasn't the only one to remark about it.

One thing each of these neighbors have in common is that they've each cut back their gardens in the fall and removed the stems, stalks, and seed heads, while we wait until we begin seeing new growth from the bases of plants to cut back old growth. We don't remove those bits and bobs from the space but rather lay them down in the same vicinity and let them decompose during the season, after whatever insect life they've harbored has emerged.

Winter interest in gardens helps to provide enjoyment for the gardener, and can help to defray social tensions between "clean reset" gardeners and those who leave everything standing like we do. More than that, though, it provides habitat for insects that support so many other creatures and provides protection for overwintering birds in a way that a bird feeder out in the open cannot.

Happy New Year, everyone!

The post link will take you to an interactive tool that will help you look up threatened and endangered species in your county (US based, but please link similar tools for your countries or regions!). Let's make an impact this year by:

• Finding a species to sponsor in our area from the linked tool or those linked in the comments

• Researching their critical food or habitat sources that we can each help to provide - for some bird species this may involve finding the specialist food sources for the caterpillars the fledglings depend on

• Planting or growing those resources, or mindfully managing our spaces to provide for those needs in the case of long grasses, plant stalks during the dormant season, or nesting spaces; leaving brush piles, leaving seed heads on plants, and letting those wildlife snags keep providing habitat.

• Letting them eat all our hard work! Host species for specialist insects create ripples of opportunity for the species that rely on those insects, whether as prey, as pollinators, or as detritovores keeping decaying plant matter from overwhelming growing plants. Caterpillars are the main source of nutrition for many species of nesting birds, and can often be the only sources of compounds like anthocyanins which makes their colorful plumage possible. Moths from those caterpillars are staple food sources for many other animals as well.

No effort we make is too small to count. Happy planting and gardening, everyone, and happy New Year.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.crimedad.work/post/45350

cross-posted from: https://pixelfed.crimedad.work/p/crimedad/645807689399767182

An ivy leaf peeking up through some mushrooms on a tree stump.

#fungi #ivy #mushtodon

@crosspost@lemmy.crimedad.work

Malachite butterfly, Siproeta stelenes

Canonical youtube link here

Hey folks, hope you don't mind me sharing this. We had some pretty good results from this and it felt like a good way to reuse some nursery pots that the supplier wouldn't take back. I'd recommend this to anyone who's looking to propagate their plants via stool layering.

For those who aren't familiar, stool layering is a method of plant propagation which uses a plant's own potential to form roots along buried portions of its stem. After a period spent forming the roots, the material used to bury the stems can be gently removed, revealing the sections which can now be transplanted as rooted cuttings. Not every plant appreciates this treatment, though, so it's worth checking for compatibility before attempting it.

Some of the families and individuals that have done well for us include Ribes (currant family), Sambucus (elderberry family), Lonicera ceruleae (haskap), and Lyceum barbarum (Goji).

syac: we cut the bottoms from nursery pots to hold the substrate in the stool mound. Splitting required less soil disturbance than the uncontained control group.

Hey there everybody

For folks who are unfamiliar with us, we're a small scale plant nursery that follows permaculture and regenerative agriculture principles. We've used tons of wood chips over the years and we're getting ready to receive more over today and tomorrow. What would you like to know?

Piped Link Here

Andrew Millison is in Senegal speaking with farmers participating in a multi-year agroforestry program.

Some choice quotes from the article:

[S]pent leaves that flutter to the ground aren’t a waste product. They are rich in carbon and play an essential role for the tree and the ecology it supports.

The leaves act as a physical barrier for soil, keeping it and its many microbes insulated, and also for the tree roots, as the wet mats of autumn leaves shelter the fragile top layer from the drying winds.

Many, many things live in these dead leaf layers: caterpillars of moths and butterflies, their chrysalises, beetles, centipedes, springtails, woodlice and spiders … and doesn’t the blackbird know it, rustling through the leaves?

No one loves wet autumn leaves more than earthworms, though. Sensing one of their favourite things, they start to work on incorporating them into the soil. Earthworms line their homes with autumn leaves, using them for bedding and then, because they are good housekeepers, they eat them as they break down.

Leave the leaves be: they are not a mess, a waste or a hindrance – they are life and vital with it.

At least I think it is, apologies for my inexperience if it is not.

cross-posted from: https://pixelfed.crimedad.work/p/crimedad/629659507875065191

Robert Smith-ass Bambi

#deer #backyard #warondeer

@crosspost@lemmy.crimedad.work

cross-posted from: https://jorts.horse/users/fathermcgruder/statuses/111347778405708067

POV: You're a webcam in a bird feeder that has become yet another casualty in the deer war.

This is what I get, of course, for putting the feeder in a spot that was convenient to refill. The deer have fed from it before without knocking it over, so I suspect that the buck that has been visiting my yard recently is the perpetrator. His stupid antlers probably got hooked onto the feeder or the shepherd's hook and that was that.

#bird #killthedeer #pov

@crosspost