Painted Rocks, Powdery Mildew and Cannabis Flowering
Ellen and C.L. start this episode out by discussing painted rocks. Are you painting them this summer? Are your kids painting on rocks? Do you love finding a rock with a message on it when you go to the beach or woods, or do you hate this practice? Next we talk about powdery mildew: what it is and when to treat or ignore. We end by answering a question about bringing cannabis into bud.
:30 Just For Fun: Painted rocks…love them or hate them?
4:11 Eat/Drink/Grow: Powdery Mildew
18:52 Love Letters and Questions: Cannabis flowering.
Some plants get mildew on their foliage as well as the flowers. This is a summer phlox that’s ready to be either dead-headed and stripped of leaves (if it’s a Volcano Phlox it will come back beautifully with clean foliage and new flowers) or cut to the ground. Either way the garden will look better and you won’t leave the spores there to spread.
The plant on the right side of the photo is an auto-flowering type, in bud in July when this photo was taken. The plant on the left is a regular Cannabis that will start to come into flower toward the end of August or into September when there are equal hours of daylight and darkness. Another plant that’s triggered into flowering by increasing hours of darkness is the blue morning glory vine. Many people wonder why their morning glory isn’t flowering earlier in the summer, and hours of daylight is the reason.
At one point C.L. got so fed up with finding rocks painted with messages that she made this graphic about it. “What really annoyed me was that the rocks were billed as being ‘kindness rocks’ but they were often filled with judgy or finger shaking comments. Even ‘Be Kind’ could be taken as a scolding command. Or is it just me?” Ellen and C.L. discuss how painting rocks for your own yard and garden is fine, and a fun project for kids or as a way to mark plants or remember people. Operative words: “your own yard and garden.”