Messages

Good to hear from you, gg.

I wondered about Oso.  I felt terrible about Oso.  I couldn't find an obit though....  I had this mental picture of how the phone call was going to go.  "Hey, Anabella (not her real name), is Jason (also not his real name) around?"  "Yeah? That's what I heard, but I could find the obit.  Erm, I mean, my condolances."

People who play with computers tend not to be so good with people.

Did you try looking inside the mushroom?  Often they fall freely from the gills / pores.

-G-

Yes sir, Mr Dendro.  We understood your coded message.

G out!

Zero tolerance, jargon for "thought is bad".  Zero tolerance in schools, because we can't trust educators to tell the difference between a threat and a toy.  Zero tolerance in DUI laws, because we can't trust law enforcement to know if someone at .08 (.06?) BAC is impaired or not.  Zero tolerance, because we can't trust our judges to know how to apply the law.

I agree with you.  Soybeans are a rather uncommon crop here.  We've got a few fields that have them every year, but the nitrogen fixing crops are usually alfalfa, trefoil, clover, and buckwheat, more or less in that order.

Crop rotation around here typically starts with corn, then after that oats are often the second year.  A legume-hay crop like clover or alfalfa is after that, though sometimes they go straight from corn to the legume hay.

How long the field is left in alfalfa varies, but usually 1-3 years.  Then it is either back corn, or there is a period of grass-hay, often a timothy mix, or a timothy-clover mix.  I suspect, but do not know, that the farmers who run a shorter alfalfa rotation probably favor the clover in the grass mix.

We've got a lot of small dairy and beef farms, and a smaller number of pig and sheep farms.  I'm not aware of anyone in the area that still operates a for-profit horse breeding operation.

I think the technical answer is no, it is not legal to sell the plants in the US, as only seeds are permissible.  There is a century long tradition of not arresting people growing poppies as landscaping / ornament however.

More to the point, P. somniferum is notorious for (among other things) being absolutely horrible to transplant.  That being the case the limiting factor in selling live plants is probably how well they can be kept alive.

-G-

Mmmmmm.  Brugmansia.  I miss mine.

I have one left.  It is sitting above me, in a 1 gallon pot.  The only one to survive the Great Freeze.  Soon I'll have to take it out into the yard and plant it, see if it has some bloom power left in it.  It is a candida-heavy hybrid, bought it at Bob Smoley's back in the day.  It was labelled very simply "orange".  Turns out it is not an orange flower producer, but instead the very bland colored cream-ish flowers produce a scent that scream orange.  More the color orange, in scent form than anything citrus-y.  Yup, I sure do hope it has some bloom in it this year.

Yesterday I spent a fair bit of time on the road.  An hour+ south of me the catalpas are starting to come into flower.  Much closer to home I saw an orange azalea that was still in full flower.

Are you certain that it was beans knifed into the ground this spring?

Sometimes here in order to achieve a similar goal the farmers will plant a "under crop" so that the field only needs disturbed once for several years farming.  Typically here it is something fast like oats coupled with something slower like an alfalfa or trefoil underneath.  By the time the oats are harvested in late summer or early fall, the legume hay should be just growing up through the oats.

I'm relatively certain that wouldn't be the case with soybeans and corn, but many of the legumes look similar to me when they are sprouting.

I'm curious as to what techniques they are using out there as opposed to around here.

Farmers around here that make silage from their corn will sometimes seed a legume hay as an under  crop, but if they aren't making silage, most of them prefer to plow the corn stalks into the ground.

-G-

Sounds delicious!

That is one goal oriented squirrel.  I wonder if he needs a job in IT...?

There is one lilac bush along the drive home that _still_ had full blooms, weeks after the rest of them are done.  I'm starting to wonder if it isn't a 10' tall plastic plant....

Took a drive through some different roads today.  Corn is going in some fields, 2-3" sprouts in others.  I guess I gotta plant my veggies or scrap the project this year.

Wild (feral?) Viburnums in flower around here, by the way.  No clue which species.

-G-

I've got a line of chickens here trembling in fear....

With the large number of acquisitions Halliburton makes, I again find it difficult to believe in conspiracy.  Sooner or later they are bound to make a timely move.  An even larger number of acquisitions don't pan out, are dissolved and merged into other departments, and we just never give them a second thought.

I suspect that they are available in the pet trade there.  However the herp pet trade typically has a rather unpleasant view of those who are interested in the B alvarius's venom chemistry.  I suspect that you won't find them for sale unless you are sufficiently immersed in the herp culture community that they would trust one of their 'children' to you.

If you can care for B. marinus you will likely be able to speak about toad care fluently enough that you might find some leads.  Bear in mind that keeping amphibians alive and well in captivity is somewhat more complex than keeping a dog content and happy.  Those who have taken the time to be able to import and breed captive amphibians are understandably interested in making sure their animals are well cared for after they find new homes.

I also suspect that when excess B. alvarius are dumped into the pet trade, they are deliberately mislabeled so as to not end up purchased and skinned by some drug addled nit.

-G-

Never been to Mexico.

I would argue that the political unrest in Mexico started well before a single generation ago.