Plants! Request for help
I... do not have a plants icon. I wonder if I should get one. [0]
Today I mowed the lawn --- all of it, which took maybe an hour and a half --- and tended to some plants in the back. Sadly, it looks like the housesitter who did an excellent job tending to the cats and gecko... forgot about the plants. The herbs are all dead, the plant from ab3nd is dead, and two of the three berry bushes are more brown than green. There's still some green left, though, and I'd like to save them if I can. The thing is: I have no idea how. Basically all I know about plants is that they are evil and how photosynthesis works. Is it best to trim away the dead stuff? Do you pluck off dead leaves, or let them fall naturally? If I do trim away dead stuff, do I cut into the green, or above the green, or? Is there a book I should buy?
I'm mostly OK with gardening being a "try again next year" project but if I can keep these bushes alive I won't have to buy new ones next year and that would be a big plus. (And there are a couple of bushes in the front that I think might have been berry bushes and I jut didn't know!) Any help is appreciated.
[0] If you are not saying "Holy crap" right now, perhaps because you're a new friend, I have a serious phobia of plants. Super maladaptive, right? When I was three or four I would not walk on grass, even with shoes on, even with a blanket on the grass. When I was around twelve there was this bizarre incident where my parents wanted me to trim a weed and I was sufficiently scared of the weed that I chose to sit in my bedroom all day without food rather than touch it. Eventually, really confused, they relented and dealt with the weed themselves. This has always made me sad because my hippie-woo-foxy side is super into undergrowth and shade and forest and those places would feel comfortable if they didn't trigger the phobia. I've gotten much better about this over the years, a big chunk from dating people like Stephen and Cassandra who are serious plant people but also just from saying "Goddamnit I do not want to be terrified of plants" and working on it. I once spent an hour staring down a poinsettia and almost touching it. In retrospect this is utterly ridiculous; at the time it was totally serious.
This entry was originally posted at http://rax.dreamwidth.org/42251.html.
Today I mowed the lawn --- all of it, which took maybe an hour and a half --- and tended to some plants in the back. Sadly, it looks like the housesitter who did an excellent job tending to the cats and gecko... forgot about the plants. The herbs are all dead, the plant from ab3nd is dead, and two of the three berry bushes are more brown than green. There's still some green left, though, and I'd like to save them if I can. The thing is: I have no idea how. Basically all I know about plants is that they are evil and how photosynthesis works. Is it best to trim away the dead stuff? Do you pluck off dead leaves, or let them fall naturally? If I do trim away dead stuff, do I cut into the green, or above the green, or? Is there a book I should buy?
I'm mostly OK with gardening being a "try again next year" project but if I can keep these bushes alive I won't have to buy new ones next year and that would be a big plus. (And there are a couple of bushes in the front that I think might have been berry bushes and I jut didn't know!) Any help is appreciated.
[0] If you are not saying "Holy crap" right now, perhaps because you're a new friend, I have a serious phobia of plants. Super maladaptive, right? When I was three or four I would not walk on grass, even with shoes on, even with a blanket on the grass. When I was around twelve there was this bizarre incident where my parents wanted me to trim a weed and I was sufficiently scared of the weed that I chose to sit in my bedroom all day without food rather than touch it. Eventually, really confused, they relented and dealt with the weed themselves. This has always made me sad because my hippie-woo-foxy side is super into undergrowth and shade and forest and those places would feel comfortable if they didn't trigger the phobia. I've gotten much better about this over the years, a big chunk from dating people like Stephen and Cassandra who are serious plant people but also just from saying "Goddamnit I do not want to be terrified of plants" and working on it. I once spent an hour staring down a poinsettia and almost touching it. In retrospect this is utterly ridiculous; at the time it was totally serious.
This entry was originally posted at http://rax.dreamwidth.org/42251.html.