Good luck with the dendrobium, I rescued one, but benign neglect for 2+ years hasn't gotten me any blooms.

Cucumbers are also a good dryness indicator. They routinely wilt a bit in the afternoon, but if I water them "some" and they don't recover fast, the entire garden gets more.

I gave the entire garden a deep watering this afternoon. And the meadow garden and the hummingbird garden. Everything needs a deep watering and it isn't even August yet. We better get some rain.

All the dryness indicators are off the charts here. We got half an inch of rain in May and the last time we had real rain ("deep watering" by mother nature) was in February.

I gave my aloe trees their biweekly (every two weeks) watering this morning. Which on a good day is 2-3 liters per established plant and 10 liters per recent installation. I have no idea whether any of that would be considered deep watering but it keeps the succulents alive. I would imagine they could take a whole summer with no water but it would not be pretty.

With respect to garden anxiety, I'm going to downgrade my condition (related to bugs in my Dudleyas) to reasonable forboding. I have tossed five plants and an equal number are under treatment. There is a message for me in the scale and reproducibility of the failure in that particular experiment.

Also, it's interesting to consider the weather-related anxiety, such as it is. We have a predictable summer drought every single year, as a climatic feature of the region. So there's no anxiety to be had about that drought, really, because it's going to happen. The question is more how long it will continue (3-6 months). And really, as far as most plants in the garden are concerned, that's an endurance test no matter what.

Going outside to even look at my garden makes me garden/plant anxious. It only takes about a minute before I get attacked by skeeters.

Varmints do! I especially hate voles since they go after a plant's roots.

tx_flower_child said:Going outside to even look at my garden makes me garden/plant anxious. It only takes about a minute before I get attacked by skeeters.

Two things for me.....

1. Keeping the little bit of St Augustine grass alive. Right now I'm battling sod web worms.

2. Tackling the Virginia bottonweed. A weed so obnoxious that it isn't fazed by Round-Up.

New answer: waiting for the next NARR and having enough acorns to buy tickets.

When to uncover the roses in spring, waiting to see how many corn seeds pop out of the ground and how far away to dig from a potato plant to not spike slice any.

Brinybay said:Varmints do! I especially hate voles since they go after a plant's roots.

I praise and reward my cats when they catch voles or moles or mice.

LynneHTx said:Two things for me.....

1. Keeping the little bit of St Augustine grass alive. Right now I'm battling sod web worms.

2. Tackling the Virginia bottonweed. A weed so obnoxious that it isn't fazed by Round-Up.

Can you show a picture of it?

I had to google buttonweed myself, never aware of it here.

GenXNEGeorgia said:

Consumer Rorts has a good article on the best mosquito reppellents. I chose eucalyptus oil but it smells kinna strong. I think I want a 20% Deet instead.

Seeing commercials for a class-action lawsuit for people who have gotten sick from using RU makes me anxious. I'm glad I've not used it.

The plant Lynn mentioned:
Virginia Buttonweed (Diodia virginiana)

I've not had any problem with those being hard to pull up.

AHA! So that's what that weed is. I'll see your buttonweed raise you nutgrass, horsetail rush, and chamberbitter.