New Stuff at Work ...'Roses in the Round' Progress....

One day there will be a rose trial garden at the research center........
After a few months of no activity, today a crew was working on the irrigation system.......
The beds will consist of 3 complete circles with cut through pathways......
I like to code things so to me this is "Roses in the Round"....
The garden will be planted and maintained by a local nursery.....
It should me a nice teaching aid and tour site.....
I do not grow roses at home since they require too much input.....
These should enjoyable without the hassel.........I like easy these days.......

Bones......now.....then.....now.....

Now:
Then:

Now:

Plant background provided by plantdaddy............

Hurricane Irene Clouds...........

It is breezy and cloudy today thanks to hurricane Irene.
It is 250 miles east of us but we are seeing some effects.
There is a nice breeze to keep the gnats out of your face and great clouds to admire.
I do not like hurricaness (just in case you wondered) but their clouds are really amazing.
Below are a couple of cloud photos I took a work 15 minutes ago.
It is impressive that a storm can have this effect and still be so far away.

There sits our generator. Hopefully it will not be needed this time. Unfortunately there are 6 more hurricane packed weeks to go this year. Time will tell.

Visited a New Nursery Today..........

Went to a nursery that I had not been to before. The owners produce only Pothos and Dieffenbachia and they do a really nice job. The plants looked clean, healthy and had great foliar color. They also had the biggest great dane that I have seen - easily 150 lbs... Thank goodness I get along with dogs......
The photos here were taken this morning as I toured the nursery. Nice plants....!!!!!

These growers are going to trial grow a couple of my new pothos varieties...

At least I know that my babies are in the hands of people who know what they are doing.

My Paulownia tomentosa (Princess or Empress tree)..........

I picked up a small tree last March from a friend in north Florida and planted it out in our field a month later....
It was 18 inches high and weak stemmed...so I shook the trunk daily to stimulate strength and now it is 7 feet tall with a 1.5 inch diameter trunk......btw....stem shaking to increase tensile strength really works.......especially with my tomatoes.....

Anyway, when I was a kid they used to advertise this tree as the worlds fastest growing tree....(on the back of Parade magazine)......I used to stare at the photo in a state of awe.........now, a few decades later, I stare at it live everyday when I water it.........This is my kind of plant - it responds to care and grows fast.....I am shooting for 20 feet of growth in 2 years........
Hey we all need goals.........and besides, down here we need SHADE..........FAST.........

Adenium bouquet for Friday..............

Here are some adenium babies that I get to look at every day......ahhhhhhhhhh.....
Sure beats looking at the world news headlines...........

Organic Gardening Talk............

Mosaic Mom and I attended a talk last night dealing with orgainic gardening......
It was very good and we gained a lot of new ideas.....
Below are a few photos from where we were for the talk........
I am going to plant my seeds this week for the fall garden..........now I can get a 2 week head start instead of wating until labor day......That was worth the price of admission right there...........

It was a good night that will pay off for many years.........

Flat Grafting Adenium........that is what is new for me.....

I learned this unusual grafting method on the adenium forum......start with a plant that has a nice caudex like the one below.....
Wack off the tops...........
Then place a 0naked stem piece with 2-3 buds (scion) on top of the freshly cut base......the diameter of the scion does not have to match the base diameter......it can be 1/2 the diameter and still work fine.....the sizes will equalize after a year or so.......cover with plastic that serves to hold the scion to the bottom stem.....wait 3 weeks. uncover it and in another 3 weeks what you get is below.........

Now this will be new adenium that has both a nice caudex and good flowers......go get the rest of the details at the "adenium forum"........actually it is the "adenium and pachypodium forum".....some good stuff there.......

This could be a really good teaching tool for a grafting class..........imho.....

Bones is advancing rapidly.............

Trees are no longer a barrier.........birds and squirrels beware........too late for the lizards..........

So far he has had no trouble getting down.........

Crape Myrtles......Reaching for the Sky.............

Some of the crape myrtles at work have been revitalized and are flowering well......
Their colors look neat against the blue sky and white clouds.....

I just wish there were more clouds and less blue sky..........HOT blue sky I should add.......

OMG its Crape Myrtle Time Again.....

Time to pollinate a few crape myrtle flowers....
It has been a few years since the last ones so why bother you might ask...
Good question....the answer.....because they are there, I can do it and as we say "this time for sure" its gonna be good.....

Happy Birthday Squeak............

Happy Birthday Helen..........enjoy and be safe out there today............

At home you had a birthday visitor this morning......
He started in the trees (below) and worked his way closer..........must have been looking for cake.....
Here he is checking out 'Bones'........

That didn't work so now he is checking out the pool............

I got this closeup just as he turned is head the other way..........almost had the facial shot..........

Anyway just another day at home..........but different.........

Have a great day Squeak.............I love Ya..........

May you have a h-OWL-ing good time..............daD

My Weekend of Big and Small Repairs................

First it was the big mower belt.....(bottom photo).
No problem, big parts easy to figure out.......
Started strong but wilted fast as it was 105 in the Z- shop......

It went well until a large spring (size of a corn cob) fell out from somewhere............impossible to reattach........
Had to cut out a "door" in the steel housing to fix spring.........then used big hammer "coax" it into place.....it controlled the self adjusting idler pulley.....then had to use "come along" to stretch the pulley spring to get bet attached........
This happened over the course of a day and a half due to frustration and HEAT...........
But, I finished and the mower worked fine........mowed for 3 hours.....did the "A" job.......butt too sore to sit rest of weekend..........

After resting, I felt cocky so decided to fix pressure washer............i.e. redo the carburator.........never done this before.....
See the parts below (this morning).......HELP.....I have learned to take lots of photos as you go so maybe I can get things back together.....This could get interesting.........All these tiny tiny parts...........

Mower deck with housing removed to show worn belt........I was smart enough to take photos before removing the old belt.....
Much easier to work with BIG parts.............more painful though............

I do love my digital camera and the machine diagrams on the internet...............