October 26, 2024 7:53 pm
Greetings and salutations, everyone; yes, once again it is I, Mani the purebred border collie, filling in for the guy I live with, and here today to sort of bring you up to date in what’s been happening here. You may remember me from such posts as “Still Dry”, among so many, many others.
Here I am in a characteristic pose.
The guy I live with drained the birdbath, cleaned it, and filled it with new water right after he saw me looking at it.
He’s been rescuing yellowjackets who go for a drink and then can’t get out of the water. I guess they don’t know how to swim.
But he’s also tired of having yellowjackets in the garden.
We had a bit of rain last weekend, about two millimeters, which is our total for this month so far, but the guy I live with said that two millimeters didn’t even put us in the top five driest Octobers for Denver. October can be a very dry month here. More rain would be nice. Even snow would be nice.
Not a whole lot has been happening here, except for watering.
He says the lack of rain is depressing, and would like it to rain every day for a month, even if everyone else in the city thought that was depressing.
The weather has been very nice in any case, though I hear we’re supposed to get near record high temperatures either tomorrow or the next day.
Still, there are crocuses. These are all Crocus speciosus, including the white one.
And there are some snowdrops. There are autumn-flowering snowdrops just like there are autumn-flowering crocuses, cyclamen, and narcissus.
So things aren’t totally horrible.
I think that’s all I have for today. I’ll leave you with a picture of me, making sure the hose stays put. Someone has to do it.
Until next time, then.
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Received a lot more rain that we did last week. I think we may have received 12 drops. Everything is do dry and crunchy. While the temps are mild, moisture sure would be nice. Even snow at this point-and that just proves how desperate we are for something wet.
By Tails Around the Ranch on October 26, 2024 at 8:11 pm
The guy I live with says snow would be okay, though if it’s a lot (unlikely) there will be broken branches, as usual.
Southern Colorado got a whole lot more rain, but that storm petered out as it got to Denver.
By paridevita on October 26, 2024 at 9:55 pm
Thank you for the update, Mani! It’s good to hear from you all.
It has been very dry here in North Texas, too. No rain on us all month. That may change later this week. We shall see.
Still, we got a double handful of small cherry tomatoes today. So that’s good.
Tell the guy you live with “hello” from Texas and God bless!
By H.J. Hill on October 26, 2024 at 8:13 pm
It’s pretty dry here despite the two millimeters.
Squirrels have been dropping half-eaten tomatoes in our yard, which the guy I live with says is “beyond weird”. He didn’t know squirrels liked tomatoes. We don’t know where they’re coming from.
By paridevita on October 26, 2024 at 9:57 pm
Our rain has not started yet either, but this is normal for our climate. It would be nice to not need to irrigate so much, but the weather is too pleasant now to complain. Your region does not get much more rain than our climate (a bit farther inland), but I suspect that it can actually be a bit more arid for longer. I mean that, although our weather also lacks humidity, such are weather (with such minimal humidity) does not last as long, so does not desiccate vegetation quite as much. That is just a guess of course.
By tonytomeo on October 27, 2024 at 10:16 am
The guy I live with said to imagine what it would be like without winter rain in California. The growing season there, for native plants anyway, isn’t summer, but here it is. So if we get no rain in summer that’s no rain in the growing season.
By paridevita on October 27, 2024 at 12:49 pm
No Crocus speciosus in our garden. But, we did have two C. sativus bloom, about 10 less than the previous two years and just in time for the rain to splay them flat. I suppose the rodents got the other 10 despite my best efforts to plant them among sharp basalt gravel. The other flowers of Cyclamen hederifolium and various Zauschneria/Epilobium make up for it. Oh, and a record-breaking crop of Zanthoxylum simulans fruit. So, as you say, not totally horrible.
By Jerry on October 27, 2024 at 12:19 pm
That’s why the guy I live with started planting expensive crocus corms in pond baskets.Easier than making baskets out of hardware cloth.
You may have seen the guy I live with’s comment on Facebook about not eating fresh Sichuan peppercorns, unless you want your whole head to be numb for hours. They sell them in jars at the Asian market here, but I think only as flavoring, not to eat out of the jar.
By paridevita on October 27, 2024 at 12:55 pm
Thanks for the pond basket tip. Tempting to throw in some Sichuan peppercorns to burn their little mouths. I quite enjoyed nibbling on a few fresh off the bush, but I bet they won’t.
By Jerry on October 28, 2024 at 8:50 pm
The guy I live with says it’s important to make sure the pond baskets are all mesh at the bottom, to avoid the possibility of a perched water table.
Even the regular gallon nursery pots that the guy I live with grew snowdrops in got perched water tables in some of the pots, with the result that the bulbs rotted.
It’s a gravitational thing. Every pot has a perched water table, all the same height regardless of the size of the pot.
So you want all mesh.
Green Sichuan peppercorns come from Zanthoxylum armatum, milder flavor but more numbing effect.
By paridevita on October 28, 2024 at 9:42 pm
“not eating fresh Sichuan peppercorns, unless you want your whole head to be numb for hours” We planted both a Szechuan and a Sansho peppercorn seedling 6 or so years ago. Both are required for pollination here. The Sansho gave me it’s first few fruits this year and we sampled one fresh from the shrub last week. Big mistake.
By markemazer on October 27, 2024 at 3:49 pm
The guy I live with said “Unless you need to have a cavity filled”.
There was some sansho pepper here in a jar, years ago, but I guess it got stale, the way things do.
By paridevita on October 27, 2024 at 10:21 pm
“sansho pepper here in a jar” We bought a case of high quality (Wheaton) wide mouth glass bottles with ground glass stoppers from a lab supply company many many years ago for storing spices. They are absurdly expensive to buy these days. Almost completely airtight.
By markemazer on October 28, 2024 at 9:24 am
The guy I live with uses hermetic jars.
By paridevita on October 28, 2024 at 6:04 pm
Eat a jarred fresh Sichuan peppercorn? This posting should be named Crazy Miserable Gardener. Really. You are the sane one, you are, Mani. Except possibly your appetite for yellowjackets. I’m convinced you are needed in the garden to protect those lovely blooms. And hoses, of course.
By readingcaliforniagarden on October 27, 2024 at 9:55 pm
Yellowjackets are pretty tasty, if you haven’t tried them. The guy I live with lectures me pretty sternly, but I still like them.
They have kind of a kick to them, as they say.
The guy I live with watched the Hong Kong episode of “I’ll Have What Phil’s Having” and at one restaurant there was a big dish (to be shared) of seafood and tons of green Sichuan peppercorns, and there was an American guy who lived in China who told Phil definitely not to eat the green peppercorns unless he wanted his whole head to be numb for hours.
The guy I live with ground some fancy special Sichuan peppercorns and sprinkled them on something, I forget what, and he was taken aback at how assertive the ground peppercorns were, so of course he’s going to keep doing this.
By paridevita on October 27, 2024 at 10:17 pm
We’ve lost track of Phil. Where do you and the brave and fearless doggo watch him?
By readingcaliforniagarden on October 27, 2024 at 10:37 pm
The guy I live with purchased the series, so it’s just on our TV. There’s another series, Somebody Feed Phil, but the guy I live with hasn’t watched that.
He was only interested in the Tokyo, Hong Kong, and Los Angeles episodes.
The guy I live with says you can watch it for free on Pluto TV.
By paridevita on October 27, 2024 at 11:21 pm
Thank you, Mani! Going to check this Pluto out…
By readingcaliforniagarden on October 28, 2024 at 9:28 pm
The guy I live with says Pluto is okay, but he never figured out a way to watch a video he stopped watching without having to start all over again. Same thing with Tubi.
Still, it’s free.
There are some annoyances. Like he goes to watch something on a free channel and it turns out that the one thing he wanted to watch required a premium subscription.
The guy I live with watches TV to hear human voices, since we have so few visitors these days. His wife did the same thing when she was here, alone with two purebred border collies.
But he doesn’t sit glued to the TV; it’s just on, all day from my morning walk until we go to bed around midnight. So he often has to watch things over and over to get what’s going on.
By paridevita on October 28, 2024 at 9:50 pm
I misinterpreted what you meant originally by green Sichuan peppercorns. Now that I know it is a different species (and not an nonripe fruit) with more numbing power, I will keep a look out for that at Hong Phat. Sounds extraordinary!
By Jerry on October 29, 2024 at 9:11 pm
The guy I live with said he probably miscommunicated. Or, as a character in John Hawkes’ The Blood Oranges said, “I can give you clarity, but not understanding.” Or was it the other way around?
I didn’t read that; I’m not much of a reader and prefer the TV.
The green peppercorns come in a jar, and the assumption is that this is the actual green peppercorn, which is used for flavoring and not eating. Chinese cuisine is often subtle, and almost always elegant.
The guy I live with says to look for some fermented tofu, while you’re at it. The jar says “fermented beancurd”.
By paridevita on October 29, 2024 at 9:44 pm