Your Backup Hobby

I started an indoor window garden in my one decent window a few months ago. I've got two Japanese strawberry plants growing which should be fun as they're known to be huge. And a chocolate Mint plant, because I like the smell and bugs/vermin don't. They're on shelves so can probably fit one other plant at some point but I'm focusing on these for now. Have had aphids, gnats, mildew, etc on the mint already. The strawberries are hardy AF though. All organic.

Rough year for root vegetables. Radishes are small and might have freaked out and grown thick skin after a hot weekend. I’m probably just going to pull the carrots and beets next week because they’re doing nothing. May as well give green beans and zucchini a shot in their beds.

On the positive side we’re looking at our first substantial strawberry harvest. Raspberries and cabbage are also looking great.

I've had non-stop Gnat problems with all of my indoor plants. Have tried the following;

Bunch of yellow stickies. Gnats still there.
Drying out until plant dies anyways. Gnats still there.
Watering only from the bottom. Gnats still there.
Fuckton of Hydrogen Peroxide in water. Gnats still there.
Mosquito Bits in water. Gnats still there.
Potato slices to attract larva from plant. Gnats still there.
Separating plants from each other. Gnats still there.
Edit: Peppermint Spray to deter the adults. Gnats still there.

They already killed most of my plants and I'm finally ready to let the strawberries die too. Although I'm tempted to buy some liquid cancer and pour it on them first just to know they're finally fucking dead.

Gnats? I used to have a fruit fly problem in my kitchen. Then one day, I noticed that I didn't have a fruit fly problem anymore, and I had a spider web between a couple of houseplants in my kitchen. There was a spider sitting in the middle of the web and I decided to let him stay. During the winter months, I captured the occasional small moth and tossed it into the web to feed "Boris." After going to work for a cricket farm, I occasionally brought him a tiny cricket during the winter months. Boris even made a little bedroom for himself in one corner of the web, a cave of heavy webbing where he liked to be during the winter months. It was open on one side so he could lunge out quickly if something landed in his web.

Boris stayed with me for over three years, then decided to leave. First he set up a small web in door leading from the kitchen to my driveway. Then he moved down the steps and into a window well. Then Minnesota winter arrived and I never saw him again. After that, I occasionally would capture a spider in my house and drop them on Boris' old web, in hopes that they would stay. One finally did so last fall, but I didn't keep up as well with the crickets, so he moved elsewhere in the house sometime in February. I still don't have a fruit fly problem anymore, and have left Boris' old web in place.

The yellow sticky traps are far more effective for adult Gnats than a spider would be. They aren't like Fruit Flies which you may get a couple dozen of. Gnats breed in the hundreds. But more importantly their larvae feed off the roots underneath the soil and that's the real problem. You have to kill every adult and every larvae at the same time. But what kills one won't kill the other.

About a week after my last update the rabbits got under the fence and had themselves a feast. Tips were nibbled off the zucchini and cucumber spouts and heads of cabbage were bitten in half. I was ready to go Farmer McGregor on the next lagomorph that crossed my path and spike the body to warn off the others.

That did not come to pass, but I continued watering those boxes. The raspberries and tomatoes were looking alright. If I was already in the garden with the hose, why not spend the five extra minutes on the rest. If nothing else, they could be a sacrifice to any returning rabbits and protect what remains. Turns out my garden was heartier than I expected. Salsa and pasta sauce with garden-fresh, sun-warmed tomatoes are a treat, and I'm running out of mason jars with all the zucchini and cucumber I'm pickling. Might even manage a quart or two of sauerkraut because the cabbage decided to top the half-heads with three smaller ones.

Best harvest yet.

Some ground squirrels chewed up my car's airbag wiring and I had very similar feelings.

When I first moved into my house, I reviewed the home inspection report for things that I needed to address before winter. One was my vent pipe collars needed replacing. My plumbing pipes include ventilation to the roof in two spots, to avoid buildup of methane gas, and the squirrels had chewed up the lead (!) vent pipe collars that prevent water or snow from leaking down the edges of the pipes. My replacement collars are stainless steel, which apparently doesn't appeal to the squirrels. In addition, I started putting out birdseed and cracked corn every day for the local birds and squirrels, and have kept that up for over a decade so far. I suppose that it's like paying protection money to the local mob, but my cats enjoy watching the birds and squirrels.

I've been working on a third video game for about 6 weeks now. Progress is slow as this is my first go with Unity. If I was being optimistic, I'd say I am 1% done. :0

I saved a mint plant! I wasn't properly flushing the soil before, but mainly the strawberry planters have those pockets which create nooks/crannies, so I'll have to stick with round pots next time for them.

I’ve hit 300 transactions in my guitar flipping business, and I’m about done. Selling off my last two..one inventory guitar (Mexican made Fender Telecaster) and a supremely epic Music Man Stingray. My last $3,000 in gear. Kind of think I’ll keep going but I’m going to spend much of this refilling the savings account that’s been slowly bleeding as I round the corner on 18 months divorced.

Gary Sax wrote: Some ground squirrels chewed up my car's airbag wiring and I had very similar feelings.

A few years ago chipmunks did about $1200 worth of damage to my family's cars. They ate the wiring to my daughter's car's fuel injection, the wiring to my wife's car's cooling fan, and my car's drive-by-wire transmission control wiring. They're on my shit list.

Had mice chew up the intake hose on my Subaru turbocharger years back. Those little bastards cost me $1500.

Apparently my new hobby is entertaining BGG marketplace purchase offers from BGG wargamers that are incapable of using PayPal.

Part of the reason that I put out food for the local wildlife is that I would rather have them eating birdseed and cracked corn than chewing on things like car parts or the vent pipe collars on my roof. One of my neighbors apparently disagrees, because I recently found a very flattened squirrel road kill in the center of my backyard. I live on a big corner lot, and that part of my yard is too far from the street for random roadkill to bounce all the way back there, making a detour around my garage. It happened sometime during an hour between my walking the cat around the yard and then returning to water the lawn.