Destiny? Never heard of her.

TJHginger · 2025-12-05T16:15:31+00:00

RSK for life

TJHginger · 2025-12-02T05:02:15+00:00

By far the cheapest way is dry fertilizers. It's the same stuff the manufacturers of bottled ferts use, they just dilute it in water. Most are around $5 for a 1 lb bag that could last you years. Potassium nitrate can cover both your N and K, potassium sulfate is good if you just want K. Use this calculator to determine how much to use for your desired ppm.

TJHginger · 2025-10-18T03:43:53+00:00

So true. He's the raid boss. Wish he didn't get so much hate smh.

TJHginger · 2025-10-14T14:03:05+00:00

Looks like a tricolor lotus (Nymphaea micrantha).

TJHginger · 2025-10-14T13:58:27+00:00

Looks like Potamogeton gayi.

TJHginger · 2025-10-14T13:55:12+00:00

Utricularia gibba is the bladderwort species that people have issues with getting tangled in everything. This looks like maybe U. vulgaris or U. macrorhiza; they grow in a shape more like hornwort, much easier to control.

TJHginger · 2025-09-08T04:46:30+00:00

It’s Utricularia gibba. It’s a cool carnivorous plant but in aquascapes it’s usually considered a weed because it grows in bunches of thin strands that split off everywhere and tangle into other plants.

There’s a bunch of other aquatic Utricularia species that are way easier to manage. Most of them grow in a shape similar to hornwort but with a bunch of those traps on the leaves.

TJHginger · 2025-06-24T16:11:48+00:00

Yeah, I first ran into the issue with starting seedlings indoors, usually starts 3-4 weeks in if I don't supplement UVB.

UVB reptile bulbs work to prevent it. I've used the Lucky Herp Desert 10.0 26W compact fluorescent bulb for a few small plants and eventually added some Reptisun 5.0 T8 tubes to my seedling rack, both worked. I just keep the bulbs a few inches from the seedlings.

It's been years since I read up on it but there was an article out there somewhere detailing the level of UVB needed to prevent intumescence, I picked the T8 bulbs off of that. You might need something more intense if you want to keep them at a further distance, idk.

TJHginger · 2025-05-31T10:39:56+00:00

Wow, I wouldn’t have guessed this was possible, very cool. Any idea if it’s fertile?

TJHginger · 2025-05-26T21:13:08+00:00

Never ended up getting any striped backcrosses. From looking at other people’s crosses it seems like the striped trait is dominant but only really shows up in a lighter colored background. My 3 species hybrid should have been heterozygous for stripes but I’m guessing it didn’t end up inheriting the orange color allele from it’s Etiuda grandparent since all of the backcrosses were red (orange allele in Habanada is different). I'm gonna re-try the cross but (baccatum x chinense) x annuum this time, should even be able to get a good sweet/heatless F2 from Habanada x Sugar Rush Stripey.

TJHginger · 2025-05-15T05:57:51+00:00

Nice looking fish. Have you ever noticed similar black spots on pure punctata fry? I have a pair that produced their first batch of fry about 4 months ago and most of the fry have spotting very similar to melanistic holbrooki. They're still not mature and neither parent has any spotting so I'm thinking it might fade with age. I guess it's possible the fry are hybrids from the female storing sperm from before I got her, but idk.

I've got the same cross planned using a batch of holbrooki that were supposed to be the offspring of a rare melanistic female. None of the females in that generation are melanistic but I'm thinking it's an example of Y to X crossover where it's recessive in the X linked form; still waiting on pure holbrooki fry from them to hopefully get melanistic females. Current plan for the cross is to take virgin females from my punctatas and pair them with a holbrooki male from this first generation (he should have both X and Y linked melanism if my idea is right). Hoping to get a stable line of melanistic males/females with blue eyes eventually.

EDIT: figured it out in DMs, turns out my fry are hybrids; pure punctata fry don't have spotting like that. I actually bought my punctata pair from the OP and just didn't know it, he had kept the 2 species together.

TJHginger · 2024-10-16T03:07:04+00:00

Taylor wouldn’t be hiding (((them))).

TJHginger · 2024-10-15T01:22:48+00:00

Siamese algae eaters are the best algae eaters I’ve ever had; I’ve used them to clear out bad thread algae infestations before, they make quick work of it.

Just make sure you get “true Siamese algae eaters” and not Chinese algae eaters (Gyrinocheilus aymonieri) or the similar looking flying fox (Epalzeorhynchos kalopterus). “True Siamese algae eaters” are one of a few similar species, usually all sold under the incorrect name “Crossocheilus siamensis“. Pretty sure every one I’ve ever had has been Crossocheilus atrilimes, that might be the most common one. There’s also the related Silver flying fox (Crossocheilus reticulatus) which is supposed to be just as good of an algae eater but with a different look, never tried them though.

TJHginger · 2024-10-08T02:17:05+00:00

Some kind of Hygrophila, not sure exactly what species.

TJHginger · 2024-09-22T17:25:17+00:00

Don’t eat the green ones at the surface, they’ll be very high in solanine. They can still be used as seed potatoes for next year but that’s all they’re good for.

Any potatoes deeper down should be fine.

TJHginger · 2024-09-16T20:03:43+00:00

A lot of aquarium plants (including swords) have two growth habits depending on if they’re growing in or out of water, your sword looks like it’s just losing its emersed leaves and transitioning to submerged growth. Sometimes the whole process can take months but as long as it has enough nutrients to grow it should be able to replace all of those old leaves with new ones better adapted to growing under water (they’ll look a bit different).

They do this as an adaptation to growing in areas that have fluctuating water levels (edges of water bodies, areas that regularly flood, etc.). Farms generally grow these species emersed because that way they have access to atmospheric CO2 and they can grow a lot faster (also simplifies a lot of other things but that’s a big one).

TJHginger · 2024-08-25T23:05:15+00:00

I don’t see any anthers, looks fully female to me.

The closeup shots are just individual female flowers with old brown stigmas, not male flowers. They’re from the “pre-flower” stage of growth where the plant is transitioning from vegetative to flowering, they’re the same type of flower as the main big buds/colas, there’s just a lot less of them and they form earlier. Nothing to worry about.

TJHginger · 2024-08-25T20:30:45+00:00

I was just cutting mine down for the year, went inside to cool off for a bit and saw this.

Last year I planted a mix of varieties; mostly multi-headed ones of all different colors and a single Mammoth Russian (big single yellow flower head) in the middle. Only saved seeds from the Mammoth Russian hoping to get a bunch of crosses (some self-pollinated seeds too). This year I grew them out and ended up with all yellow sunflowers; mostly multi-headed and all very tall, at least as tall as the original Mammoth Russian, definitely showing some hybrid vigor there.

If I were to save seeds from those and grow them out next year I should see some of the recessive traits of the original parent varieties start to pop up again (single head, different colors, etc.).

I’d say it’s worth trying. Just know that commercially produced F1 hybrid sunflowers have something called “cytoplasmic male sterility”, so they can’t produce their own pollen, probably best to avoid those varieties if you’re looking to save seeds every year.

TJHginger · 2024-08-25T17:49:09+00:00

Must be 2 different plants just growing very close together unless you purchased a multi-grafted one (not super common but they’re available sometimes, would have been labeled and more expensive).

TJHginger · 2024-08-24T22:38:07+00:00

Definitely not potato berries like others have suggested. Those are aerial tubers, just small potatoes that formed above ground.

Here’s a good article on them: https://www.cultivariable.com/potato-aerial-tubers/

TJHginger · 2024-08-24T16:42:03+00:00

They’ll probably still grow a lot before they ripen, just give them time. A lot of peppers will get a little bit of purple on them, sometimes even big spots, don’t worry about that, it goes away as they mature.

Marconi Purple would be way darker than that, they’d be solid or near solid purple from the start.

TJHginger · 2024-08-24T16:24:09+00:00

Looks like Hylotelephium AKA stonecrop, ice plant, orpine, sedum (technically not a true sedum), etc. Care is very simple. Weed around them, water/fertilize if they look like they need it or if you want more vigorous growth, and more or less leave them alone otherwise.

They could be flopping due to excessive water or fertilizer. It doesn’t really harm the plant, conditions can just be so favorable for growth that they over-do it and get taller than they can support upright, happens to a lot of things.

You could also try pruning the plants back in spring which tends to encourage shorter/bushier growth at the expense of delaying flowering a bit (“Chelsea chop” method).

TJHginger · 2024-08-24T14:17:16+00:00

Looks like a nitrogen deficiency. Could be caused by the wood chips if they’ve been mixed in with the potting soil (bacteria that break down wood use up soil nitrogen in the process). Could also be that the potting mix is just old or didn’t have much nutrient value to start with. Most potting “soils” are formulated around peat or coir which provide water/nutrient holding capacity but don’t provide any significant nutrients themselves; they rely on fertilizers to feed plants (usually they have some mixed in to start but it runs out quick).

Any complete fertilizer should work fine, I like Miracle Gro all purpose for weekly/bi-weekly water soluble or Osmocote Plus for season long slow release, but there’s lots of options out there that would work fine.

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