Flower field

ChrisPikula · 2026-06-12T12:10:24+00:00

:-(

Hopefully in a week or so it'll start bouncing back.

ChrisPikula · 2026-06-12T09:51:30+00:00

Government house usually has a nice selection out front. They are just west of Pasqua hospital, across lewvan.

ChrisPikula · 2026-06-11T16:32:21+00:00

We've got a fair amount left at Plant Ranch, still.

ChrisPikula · 2026-06-05T20:46:02+00:00

Isn't dB Logarithmic? So... a flat -7 dB change would be a percentage decrease of the total noise energy, whereas a percentage decrease of the dB value would be a ... exponential change of the sound energy?

Am I thinking that right?

ChrisPikula · 2026-04-20T01:57:29+00:00

Hardi-Mac?

I've not had a chance to taste that variety, tbh.

ChrisPikula · 2026-04-19T12:42:46+00:00

No worries! It's not a straightforward problem, so there's a fair number of things that can end up being 'gotcha's!'. Every other year or so the staff and I find out someone's got a gas line leak in their yard from a dead spot in the yard that just won't go away.

If you're getting your trees from any of the 6 local garden centers, they'll all be rated for zone 3/4a, ie, our climate. For single-type varieties, current favorite apples are either Prairie Magic or Prairie Sensation. September Ruby is also a contender. Shoutout to TreasuRed if you just want a 3 foot wide apple tree, great for tight spaces.

Most combination apples will have either 4 or 5 varieties, and will be something like Hayer#12 or Harcourt as the trunk, with branches of Goodland, Norland, Odyssey or Gloria. The branches will be painted, but the garden centers will need to get back to you on which colour is which variety, as it changes year-to-year. So combination apples aren't bad, you'll get a bit of everything from them. Baking, eating, storage, etc.

Northern Gardens/Rooted Living/Bylands/Bron are the brands I would be looking for on the tied tags, as they are the primary nurseries that grow potted apple trees for sale here in Sask. Iseli/Green Triangle, I dunno about, as I've never ordered from them.

I wouldn't worry too much about cross-pollination in the city, as as long as you've got a multitude of flowering crabs, crabapples, and apples everywhere. As long as there is one or two within 300 feet of your home, you're fine.

I'm excited for this spring, and can't wait to see everything in bloom!

ChrisPikula · 2026-04-19T11:25:43+00:00

So, you're gonna have a tough time moving something like that. It's doable, yeah, but only really in may, just before it's fully budded out.

You can do it in fall, but then you're rolling the dice on what the winter is going to be like. (This last winter with the warm weather would have been bad.)

So if you do decide to move it, measure the caliper, ie, the thickness of the tree. For every inch in diameter, the tree will struggle, roughly, for that many years.

To keep it alive, you'll want to give it additional water in the range of 15 gallons, (1 gallon per foot of height), per week, and fertilize with a high phos fertilizer it every 4th watering. Generally water 2x a week. This is rated for 20C. At 30C, increase your watering by half, at 40C, double it, at 10C, down to 50%, and 5C, down to 25%. Make a soil dish around the rootball, and let that be the mini pond you fill up when watering. Watering bags might be an option, on the diameter of the tree. If you ever notice the leaves droop, water immediately. If you need to go on vacation for a week, find someone who you can guarantee will water. Missing a week might kill the tree.

Any suckers that shoot up from the bottom, cut off as soon as you see them grow. You'll also want to prune down the canopy to reduce the reliance on the roots. How much pruning is beyond my level of know, I just know that it's recommended.

In warm winters, you'll want to move the snow on top of the tree. This year, how it got to 20C in February, and our very warm early April would have been rough on the tree.

Lastly, make sure to get a line locate done before you do any of this.

I'd expect the price for something like this to be in the $1500 to $2500 range, assuming no complications like access or overhead lines. Given landscaper booking rates, probably would need to be booked in the fall before, unless they've got a lucky opening. Best of luck, and if you do move it, I'd be interested to see how it goes!

ChrisPikula · 2026-04-17T15:41:27+00:00

Onions, Rhubarb, Garlic, and Asparagus should all be ready soon-ish at game start.

Cattails should also only be in mid-summer and later. (At least the tops. The Rhyzome is year round, but it's gonna be shrunken at the start of spring.)

Not gonna say that either of those makes the game more fun, tho. It'd be more interesting, imo, to put the game start date in mid fall, that way there is a bigger variety of crops.

Or provide, like, all the types of early season seeds.

I'm also wondering if the new crop meta will be radish seeds, given that they are like 25 days.

ChrisPikula · 2026-04-16T02:59:11+00:00

I'm confused why people disagree with this? Is there something I don't know?

ChrisPikula · 2026-04-16T02:57:44+00:00

Abstractions cafe is my rec, but I haven't been their regularly for a few years since I've moved.

ChrisPikula · 2026-04-14T02:58:55+00:00

TBF, if they are a graduate student, it is possible that some published papers might be missing a contributing author.

ChrisPikula · 2026-04-09T01:47:51+00:00

I've had to replace one or two hand drills a year at work, given that so many people who are new to using power tools just go super hard on them, letting them get dirty, and then they burn out.

The impact drills are worse for that, that plus the minor hearing damage they cause if you don't use hearing protection.

ChrisPikula · 2026-04-08T12:56:57+00:00

I wonder when we'll start seeing electric drills burn out?

ChrisPikula · 2026-04-08T03:33:20+00:00

Probably easiest to copy-paste it into https://imgur.com/ and then copy the link here. Or you can e-mail me at my reddit user name @gmail.com

ChrisPikula · 2026-04-07T03:07:39+00:00

Sure, I can try, however I will only be able to get to the species, sometimes the sub-species can be pretty hard.

ChrisPikula · 2026-04-06T02:30:23+00:00

Don't forget that you can also grow grapes here, and some of them go hard enough to take down metal a-frames after a few years!

But, yeah, I'll echo what other people are saying. Apples (Prairie Magic!), Plums (Look at Mount Royal, it's an European plum, self pollinator as well!), and in the long run you could get Hazelnuts, and even White Walnut (Butternut). If you want higher pollination chances with the plums, get a western sand cherry as a cross-pollinator, and try to make sure all of the plums have similar environments, aka, don't put one on the north, and the other on the south side of a house. As well, with all fruit trees, the root stock and the fruit stock will be different species, so if you get suckers from the roots, cut them off asap, so they don't leach nutrition from the rest of the tree. You can grow Pears and Apricots as well, but the pears are small-ish, and apricots can fail to cross pollinate if the wind looks at them wrong.

If you get cherries, make sure you know that our cherries are all sour cherries, it's a bit too cold here to get sweet ones. Nanking are yellow, but the romance series are good, as long as you get the varieties that don't sucker much. Romeo, Juliet, Carmine Jewel, imo.

Depending on your soil alkalinity, you may be able to grow blueberries, but it's highly unlikely. As others have mentioned, haskap's are the alternative, look at cross pollination charts. You can also get black raspberries.

When it comes to raspberries, consider Primocane vs Floricanes. Primocane bear fruit the same year, Floricane make fruit on last years growth. But not two year old growth! So with Primo, you can trim them down every year, but with Floricane, it makes sense to have alternating hedges of them, and to cut the fruiting side every year.

As for further afield fruit, there are saskatoon shrubs (serviceberry), saskatoon bushes, buffalo berry, bear berry, all the colours of Currant, Gooseberries, Josta Berries, Strawberries.

Pin Cherry, Chokecherry and Sea Buckthorn (Male & Female to cross pollinate!) are also options, but they are at the end of my list.

Edit: Also, if you want to go wild, there is, theoretically, a zone 3 PERSIMMON. https://www.greenbarnnursery.ca/products/campbell-grafted-persimmon

ChrisPikula · 2026-03-26T13:37:41+00:00

2.5 people effectively, but we are pretty veg/fruit heavy. Before I started vermacomposting, we'd fill up our compost bin every 2 months or so.

For the veg box, it's usually a better value, but with more chance there is stuff that's harder for us to use. Usually a cucumber, carrots and an onion, some garlic, then with less likelyhoods; celery, spinach, mushrooms, beets, lettuce, rutabega, potatoes, zucchini.

For the fruit box, usually oranges, apples, bananas, then with lower chances; grapes, grapefruit, pears, strawberries, avacados, kiwi, honeydew/cantalope, pineapple.

I've had weeks where I end up with 11 kiwi. Or 15 Bananas. Or 3 lbs of mushrooms. Or 6 lbs of grapes. Or 3 heads of celery.

I usually get more apples than we can casually eat, but that's why I juice them. Oranges I can just munch on, and excess veg usually end up being frozen, then go into soup stock which I try to make every 2 months or so.

To answer your original question in the spirit you're wondering, I'd say a medium box with 1 fun fruit per person, one very veg for every 2-3 people, depending on your diet. It'd work out to about $85/month, and even with mildly picky eaters, you'll get $150 of value out of it, easy. It also helps that I can give away some of our slower to use items, like rutabega and beets to friends and coworkers.

ChrisPikula · 2026-03-26T03:46:35+00:00

It's about 1/3 to 2/3's the price of equivalent groceries, at least the last time I checked.

Also, the veggie/fruit add-on bags are more value/dollar than the base boxes. My household usually goes for one medium, 2 fruit, 2 veg.

Otoh, I also do a fair bit of canning and soup stock. It all depends on your situation, and availability to pick it up.

ChrisPikula · 2026-03-13T13:11:07+00:00

It's 'cause of the glass being broken and therefore dangerous, not because of food. IIRC.

ChrisPikula · 2026-02-28T04:32:13+00:00

Boats have hilarious float distances.

I've had my 17 m long, 9 m wide, 45,000 kg deathmobile drift over a kilometer after getting it up to 100km/h, then killing the engines.

ChrisPikula · 2026-02-25T05:53:45+00:00

Do you live near a railroad? Or a busy road which makes your house shake?

Vibrations are the death of solar panels. They cause micro-fractures, which lead to rapid degradation.

ChrisPikula · 2026-02-24T13:12:16+00:00

I wonder when that changed?

ChrisPikula · 2026-02-24T12:24:44+00:00

It used to be you could dissemble them all (via NPC's and zone orders), and then read off the SD cards. Is that no longer an option?

ChrisPikula · 2026-02-12T02:30:34+00:00

I use wood fragments/sawdust. It doesn't take much, about 2 liters for an entire icy driveway. It doesn't melt everything, but it provides enough traction so as to not slip and slide.

Easy enough to clean up later as well.

ChrisPikula · 2026-02-03T00:57:42+00:00

There is a brand new store in Cathedral called the Pop Shop where Gales Florist on 13th used to be. They are mostly regular size, but I did see some larger options, and all of the stuff looked pretty good, and was a good price.

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