first frost

Last night. I had just planted out more of my new plants during the day- slender mountain mint, sedum and New England aster on the larger sunny sideyard. (Probably the last will get eaten by the deer, though I'm taking the chance. These plants much bigger than the ones I tried setting out before, if that makes any difference). They'd been in the mini greenhouse until now, I still have the bergamot and American beautyberry in there. Undecided where to put them. Have a full week of sun and warmer nights up ahead, so I can take my time. I planted the elephant's foot out on the easement, near where there's yellow salvia, ferns and solomon's seal under a maple. 

Brought some of the plants into the basement window for the night: all the geraniums. They're looking better since the temperatures dropped this past week. I think because it killed off some of the insects that were plaguing them.

The citronella is still one of my favorites. 

Lime scented one is upstairs

next to the stevia. Which surprised me by sprouting tiny new leaves at base of some stems.

My one echeveria 

It's still quite small for the pot size

Doing quite poorly is my cuban oregano. Leaves are all small, tons have dropped from the lower stems. Not sure why, though I suspect insects again. Planning to clip all this back and restart in another pot.

I did a drastic thing to our big schefflera in the dining room window. Cut all the leggy tall stems, and replanted in the pot. I did one first about two weeks ago, dipped the end in rooting hormone, and watched to see if the leaves would die and fall off, or if it would recover and sprout new growth. It appears to be doing the latter! So I went ahead and pruned, replanted all the other tall stems:

Window feels very exposed now, to say the least.

on lean water

Another new tactic this year- I am trying to use only meltwater from snow and ice outside, or collected rainwater, for my succulents and tender plants. Some of them really don't like tapwater. Like the spider plant. I think it's the flouride content. Others- the succulents- do poorly with the rich nitrate content in the aquarium wastewater I use. Most of them seem to be doing better now! 

My blue-green "ponytail" plant- I trimmed and replanted in the same pot most of the trailing stems, and it looks much nicer now. Wow, how it's grown.

Zygo (thanksgiving) cactus is still small, but has doubled in size again:

Still don't know the actual name of this pale green one in the crassula family. It frequently had leaves that withered and dropped, before I started using the meltwater.

Surprise! I still have a remnant of the echeveria- two small plantlets- I keep them very dry now. The one in red pot sharing space with some babies of the blue-green 'ponytail' which fell there of their own accord.

Madagascar palm the only one that doesn't look happy yet. Too much draft? Not enough warmth? (it's near a door so there's some draft). Not sure. I might give up on this one soon.

Other plants that I usually give lean water now too, or mixed with just a small portion of tankwater: creeping charlies, sansevieria, peace lilly- which has grown a lot!

and now even has new baby shoots emerging-

and my spider plants- no more burned leaf tips! This pot has several offspring from

my original plain spider plant- still vigorous and with new baby offshoots growing all the time

thanksgiving cactus cuttings and more!

I was at my grandmother's house this weekend. She has one of those Schlumbergera cacti and when I visited it was in gorgeous bloom- all pink. The color I have been looking for. (I had one that bloomed white but I gave it to a friend months ago, because I don't really care for white flowers). Grandma kindly gave me a few pieces to bring home and start my own.

Tucked into the soil. I'm delighted to see how this one will grow!

Related plant news: weeks ago I brought home a leaf pinched off my friend's echeveria to try and restart one for myself. After I gave her an echeveria started from the saved pieces of my wedding arrangement three years ago, mine all died, bah. Of the two leaf pieces I brought home, one shriveled. But this one is growing roots! (I know because I tugged it up to see).

Kalanchoe babies are bigger- need to give the biggest one its own pot soon. Grandma had a larger one with thick central stem- I hope I can keep mine that healthy, still not sure why they always falter on me once they reach a certain size.

 Here's the little blue-green ones- grown quite a bit. Need to find the name.

I've had this one triangular succulent leaf stuck in the dirt for a long time- couldn't locate the original post on it unfortunately. It never grew any, so I don't usually make note of it, but it hasn't died either, so I kept just watering it intermittently.

Then last week I had to dump it out of the pot because ants had taken up housekeeping. Found somewhat to my surprise it actually has roots. Decided to give it a better chance- maybe all this time it's had enough nutrients to grow roots, but not quite enough to grow new foliage?

I refreshed the soil, with crushed eggshells for drainage, and moved it to a slightly brighter location. Let's see what it does.

a new one

I was at someone's house picking up a bike for my kid- and admired a plant in their front yard. It spreads- she warned me- so she was happy to let me dig out a clump of it from the corner where it was going over the edging. I brought it home on a too-warm day- there were no cool, cloudy ones anytime soon (this was several weeks ago- still catching up to myself here)- and did the best I could for its chances.

I brought it home in a bucket with several inches of water, misted it with water, and put a soaked towel over it, all to try and hold in some humidity. Planted it in the front by the peony. It looks nothing so nice as this now- has severely wilted.

It had a great big long taproot, but she said it grows so vigorously, I thought I could take cuttings. I did that right away- thinking a severe trim would also help the main plant (having less foliage for the roots to support while it recovers).

I put some of those in a jar of water-

still near all these other guys indoors (kalanchoe, echeveria leaves, cuban oregano, aloe vera)

and the rest stuck into a pot of soil.

These in the pot outside have done the best- for the first few days I kept it heavily watered and moved constantly to stay in the shade (here near peppers, coleus 'kiwi fern' and boston fern)

It has a lovely palest blue-green color.

Very soft, fragile foliage. I think it might be the plant my mother called dusty miller- except hers was white. I think this is the variant called 'silver lace'. If the potted cuttings root well, I can separate them out in fall to have a dozen new plants.

succulents old and young

I have moved the younger kalanchoe up into larger pots, in groupings of five. They are quickly catching up in size to the parent plant (left here, solo in its pot).

It doesn't look like any of my echeveria in the ground outside will come back. Happily, I gave one of those plants to a friend last year and she still has the pot in her windowseat. I asked to break a few leaves off so I could try to restart some again.

pest control

I think I have saved my oldest jade plant from cold shock and insects.

Some of the leaves still look shriveled with pockmarks, but they have quit falling off at a touch, and lots of tiny new leaves are growing now. So I really hope it's going to make it.

Pepper plants in the same corner have been suffering too. It's always a risk I take, bringing plants in that have been outside all summer. Saw that these had little bugs and sticky residue and yellowed marks tiny pinholes all over the older leaves. Now I think it's also what afflicted my jade: looks like aphids.

I took action. Noticed that most of the aphids were on emerging buds and flowers. So I just cut those all off. Wiped off nearly every single leaf- top and underside- with a bleach wipe, and then again with wet paper towel and then took the plant to the sink, tipped it sideways, drenched in dishsoap water and rinsed off again with spray nozzle. I did this with all four pepper plants. Carefully checked the nearby dracanea, parlor palm, schefflera (which has since moved into my bedroom), geranium, stevia and other plants. Nobody else seems to have got aphids, so I spaced out the peppers a bit more and am keeping a close eye on them.

Since this treatment I removed a few more flowers from the oldest pepper (the ancho) where a few individual aphids appeared. Otherwise the bugs seem beat- it's been a week now and I haven't seen any more. Older, afflicted leaves are yellowing and dropping off the peppers, but new ones look fresh and nice dark green.

The 'mother' echeveria, however, remained outside because it still looks bug-ridden. I never brought it in again. Had sprayed it twice with neem oil, no good. If that one in a pot and the crowd of offspring planted around the mailbox spot don't survive the winter, that's it for my echeveria. At least I know where I can purchase more now to replace them, but it won't be the same as having ones I grew from my wedding arrangement...

echeveria and others

Echeveria got the neem oil treatment, too. It recovered better.

I separated out all the younger plants. This central one with the flowering stalk (I think of it as the 'mother plant') is the only one I saved indoors as safekeeping, in case the others don't make it overwintering outside.

Here it is regrown after I potted it up again alone, with its naked stalk buried again:

The young ones outside in the mailbox spot now. They've been there over two months, and are still doing fine! (Also in this picture: pink coleus, sunpatiens, dianthus and flowering purslane).

Others that I had put there in spring did a second and third round of flowering.

Pink crowns all.

loosing battle

I might loose my big jade plant. It was so nice just a few months ago:

Then I noticed tiny little bugs and sticky white residue.

I sprayed it twice with neem oil- the echeveria got this treatment also. Outside, because the smell is awful.

The bugs came back. I noticed they were only on new, smaller leaves on the top of the plant so I gave it a trim, and sprayed again for good measure.

The bugs came back.

I put the plant outside at night. There is a smaller piece of it growing in another pot, which had this infestation first- I think early summer I first saw it. That one I put outside, to keep it away from the other plants. I was going to throw it out, but just forgot about it. It was still outside when the temperatures started dropping at night. Then I noticed the pests on it were gone. I wondered if the cold had killed them.

So I put my big jade outside, too. That night it got a lot colder than I expected. I think I may have killed my plant. Its leaves are flattened and pock-marked now. When I brought it in and tried to rinse the dead insects off with spray in the sink, leaves started dropping off just from the plant getting bumped. In dismay I trimmed it further, cutting back to what seem healthier leaves nearer the base of the plant.

But it continues to drop foliage. I'm afraid it might be done for. It's also really off-center in the pot. I thought of knocking it out of the pot, giving it fresh soil with plenty of drainage, and replacing it more centered. However at the rate it is dropping leaves, the shock of being repotted might be too much. I'm not sure what else to do for it.

It's not much consolation that the younger, smaller jade seems to be doing fine. Also has a nice shape with thicker trunk and lower stems, but it will take a long time to reach the same size.