My First Baby Step

Okay, this is the first time I've tried to really apply what I've learned from this website. It's a little, tiny experiment, but it's all I can do at the moment (November in Michigan.) I'll keep you all posted on future developments.

Nice. The compost should provide some good nutrition going forward and the wood should break down and provide humic content as well as a sponge effect. The only potential concern is the wood drawing some nitrogen out of the surrounding soil until it breaks down more, but it's not that much wood so you should not have a huge problem with it. Awesome first step considering your present limitations.

The first thing I noticed this morning is water retention. After repotting, I gave the little guy a big drink of water. Before mixing with the compost, the soil in this pot wouldn't hold water for long, and it would never be wet, only damp - beyond that, any water added would come out the bottom. This morning, the soil is still wet - in fact, too wet for an aloe. After this watering, I'm going to have to completely rework my maintenance schedule on this plant; otherwise I'll drown the poor thing.

It's looking very promising at this point.

We moved, and in the course of shifting around in the back of the van, the aloe got flipped over and crushed by its own pot. It's on the mend, but I won't be posting pictures for a while. It ain't pretty, folks.

After a big setback, it's bouncing back strong.