Tyler Miller

The cleft graft made it through the winter and was looking good up until a couple weeks ago. Now it has mostly turned yellow. The yellow actually started on the root stock branch well below the graft. Most of the rest of the tree is green, but a few leaves here and there on that tree and the other trees nearby have also turned yellow. The smaller branches on the trunk seem to be doing particularly poorly, but there are occasional yellow leaves all over.

Some other plants from a diverse variety of species also have yellowing leaves. It has been a pretty hot and dry few weeks. I'm guessing that this is dehydration, so I'm going to start watering the tree. What do you guys think?



(Looks like I'm going to have to take my previous pictures off of photobucket and re-host them somewhere else.)

Good to know, thanks!

That's good to hear! Thanks for the replies.

I grafted a few apple trees earlier this summer. The ones that seem to have taken are all blossoming. That's never happened to me before. Should I be concerned?

I figure I should pinch off the blossoms to make sure that they concentrate on growing and not on producing fruit. I'm hoping that this isn't some last gasp attempt at procreating before they die.

I'm really hoping some of these make it. A lady down the road let me cut off some scionwood off of her apple tree which I used for these grafts. Then she discovered that her tree had been girdled by voles. I'm hoping that I'll be able to give her something of her old tree that she can plant again.

Dipping the shirts in water is a good idea. I've tried that before when mountain biking, but I ended up rubbing my nipples raw. Maybe if I just soaked the back? Also, gardening is usually a less vigorous activity.

I often soak a rag and wrap it around my neck. The back of my neck is usually where I get burnt.

I got a little bit of sunburn on the back of my neck this year. Obviously I failed the test, but I hope I'm still considered functional enough to take care of myself with limited supervision.

I need to get a wider brimmed straw hat, and I need one that has a cord to keep it from blowing off the top of my head. Too bad my noggin is so big that hardly any hats fit me. Somewhat unrelated, I've found that long sleeved light-colored shirts are nice for working in the sun, but they draw bugs like crazy. Dark color don't attract as many insects, but they sure are hotter.

Just wanted to share this: A few grafts I made last year didn't take. I left the pots with the rootstock crabapples sitting on a high shelf on under my grandmother's canopy. We take the canopy off for the winter, but I forgot to move the pots. They sat a few feet off the ground all winter with no protection, and this summer they were still doing fine. It definitely got colder than -30*F but I don't think it ever got to -40*F. Those crabapples sure are tough!

Jocelyn Campbell wrote:When the visitors left, they left the cardboard box of dead baby birds, outside, next to our office door.

What?!

With many acres here, and lots of places to return the poor things to nature (whether as an easy treat for another critter or the soil), why, oh why did they leave the poor dead things for us to do something with?

Somehow, I can't imagine being a guest somewhere and leaving dead animals for them to deal with at the end of my stay.

Maybe they were secretly shapeshifting cat people?


Thanks for the amusing stories. My brother has had good luck with getting people to volunteer. My mom rents a couple cabins, and my brother has a big garden and an outdoor kitchen next to them. Many of the renters see the garden and him working and come out to help.

I accidentally left some hostas in small pots up on a shelf inside an unheated greenhouse last winter, and they survived. That's pretty dang tough!

At least a few of my groundnuts came back.

I messed up the Siberian Ginseng. I got it to germinate, but then I got too busy and I think I must have buried the germinated seeds too deep. None broke the surface of my tray.

For some reason I thought my Maximillian Sunflower didn't make it, but as I was walking by where I planted them in my overgrown test plot I thought "there's something strange about those fireweed shoots" haha.

Roberto pokachinni wrote:I have peeled the outer layer of the tips to expose just the soft inner morsel.  Usually spiny layers can be removed easily from my experience.

Thanks for the tip, I'll have to try it.