I have two kinds of hot peppers growing indoors, rescued from my deck at the end of the year: matchbox and black hungarian. As the light has returned and I've increased their water they've started blooming. I did a very impromptu cross-pollination between them yesterday, no anther removal, and will try emasculating some flowers and doing a proper ( Read more... )

400 accessions and counting. Started Sweet Baby Jade tomato seeds. Should start my non-annuum peppers but I need to look up which ones need how many individuals to pollinate.

So last year I lost a packet of seed I really wanted to plant. It was a problem.

This year I'm cataloguing all my seeds in a spreadsheet-- not carrying them over from previous years when I bought them but doing a full inventory. Then I'm putting them in a cabinet. They don't go in the cabinet until they're catalogued. Theoretically they don't come ( Read more... )

It's been hovering at freezing for a couple days now. These warming periods aren't unusual here, I have one just a little warmer recorded in 2019 for instance. This one, though, isn't really dipping above freezing nor below. It's hovering.

The snow gives up dense white fog. Meanwhile the top layer of snow softens, it's juicy when stepped upon but ( Read more... )

Today was warm enough to get the snowblower working. One of the issues was that its oil was only good down to -20C, so when I tried to start it at -30C it was basically sludge. There was also a lack of fuel stabilizer and old oil, but I had to run it for a bit to get the oil to pick up all the little metal bits since I hadn't changed the-- well, ( Read more... )

Still -30C out. This weather is just not breaking, it's going on and on and on. I'm still bucketing water from the house for the animals because the outside tap is extra not working. Apparently you can get aneurysms in your fingers from bucketing too much, so I'm being careful to wear gloves etc. So far everyone seems ok: one piglet with a bit of ( Read more... )

This was an excellent holiday. It had the things I love over the holidays: cooking, passive entertainment, a slower pace, special foods, family, pretty lights, regrouping for the future, some time outside. Someone even sent me a secret surprise gift (!) though that shook me a little. I took over a whole week off, and I managed that feeling of being ( Read more... )

I've been making cleaning progress on my home. I've been making it mine in a way I had not before: instead of letting the inside just be function, I've been making it fit me. This means that, well, Threshold has always felt like the inside of the dryad tree that was my first MU* building project long back. It's all wood inside, it's tall and arched ( Read more... )

I've planted two tomato seeds: fat frog and moment, both micros. I believe I'll also plant a sweet cheriette from one of my saved seeds.

I've sprayed for mealybugs and I'm contemplating what I'll replace my broken grow-light with; it has the old florescent tubes, should I replace it with an LED? It's right behind the couch so I want it to look nice ( Read more... )

Bubbles for bubble tea are cooking on the stove. Behind me the aerogarden that I bought to function as a humidifier/sofaside lamp is casting its light. A cat is playing with a jingly cat toy beside me. The dishwasher is humming along, taking my kitchen towards tidiness. A gloom-grey sky is dimming from bright moonlight to daylight outside. I have ( Read more... )