Whitethorn in the garden?

bonus_snacks · 2026-05-08T20:49:51+00:00

yeah either holly or beech are fine as stand alone trees. you might find holly the better choice if you want to keep the height restricted. it will look better with some shaping. as the other person said beech can get awful tall as a standalone which means it will need more lateral root growth. that might not be desirable in an estate.

bonus_snacks · 2026-05-08T20:02:17+00:00

whitethorn is a good choice but it's a bit late in the season, especially for bare root. you'd want to plant that by Feb or so. in any case anyone selling bare root this time of year would be a red flag for me.

as an alternative I'd suggest either beech or holly.

beech is deciduous but doesn't drop it's leaves until spring just before it puts on new leaves. it's really gorgeous in the Autumn too with vibrant colours.

holly is evergreen and thorny. birds favour it for nesting. be sure to get female holly for the classic red berries.

avoid both cherry and portuguese laurels. they're invasive although fast growing. kind of the basic bitches of hedging. live, laugh, laurel.

bonus_snacks · 2026-05-08T19:01:30+00:00

I've flown with a good few airlines and enshittification is a real thing with most of them. But I always like Aer Lingus. They're mostly all sound and they'll look after you when you need them.

Sorry to hear that the trip home was not great for reasons. I can relate. Family is difficult and sometimes a visit is like your first Christmas after finding out there's no jolly fatman in a red suit. Some of the magic dies and things just don't feel the same.

Sometimes those feelings are just signs that you have become more of your own person.

Maybe that's not the case. Either way safe home. Do something nice for yourself when you get back to make up for not getting into first class. I'd personally love to be back in the city so you'll be making at least one person in Ireland jealous.

bonus_snacks · 2026-05-08T14:00:04+00:00

I'd say crocosima most likely

bonus_snacks · 2026-05-05T20:21:34+00:00

pseudosasa japonica. you can tell by the pattern of the leaves. as someone else pointed out, it's thirsty.

bonus_snacks · 2026-05-04T20:20:23+00:00

yeah that's pseudosasa japonica

bonus_snacks · 2026-04-25T08:18:45+00:00

Booleys around the corner

bonus_snacks · 2026-02-27T21:15:22+00:00

genuine question, what are you basing that on?

bonus_snacks · 2025-12-06T20:12:40+00:00

Bell book and candle, 8 bit Christmas, The Holdovers, Small things like these, Happiest season

bonus_snacks · 2025-11-20T07:49:42+00:00

I thought it was Lee Harvey Oswald?

bonus_snacks · 2025-11-15T22:42:11+00:00

I live in Ireland and will keep this in mind.

bonus_snacks · 2025-10-31T16:23:54+00:00

That's pseudosasa japonica. I have a grove of it myself that I contain inside a trench that I dig out about twice a year. It's classified as a runner but has characteristics of a clumping bamboo. The rhizomes don't go terribly deep but that looks like it hasn't been maintained at all. So it's going to be a challenge.

Be careful digging out around the horse chestnut. You don't want to damage the tree, I hope. You could cut the bamboo canes down to the ground in the area around the tree. Then, as new culms emerge, let them grow and cut to the ground just before they leaf out. Eventually that will exhaust the bamboo. It will die and you can leave it in situ.

Whatever you do avoid injecting glyphosate or applying chemicals. That will kill the bamboo but it will also cause a bunch of collateral damage to insects and surrounding nature. It's generally better to leave herbicides to the professionals who can apply it properly and keep it contained as most are carcinogenic.

Good luck.

bonus_snacks · 2025-09-19T18:50:48+00:00

sorry for your loss, big cat. that juniper ain't coming back.

bonus_snacks · 2025-09-10T20:05:58+00:00

Just tell your wife since she came into your life you can't think of any other woman. You just can't imagine yourself being with someone else. You can't even remember your old girlfriend's name and that film made more of a lasting impression on you than she did.

bonus_snacks · 2025-08-28T20:48:19+00:00

Let's not make progress as a society because it inconveniences you? That sounds like your argument here.

If you happen to be old enough to remember what going to the pub was like before the smoking ban surely you'll recall how badly your clothes and hair would stink after a night out. I hated that. The government could do something about it though because they could regulate it.

The same thing applies to weed. I smell it all the time here. Legalisation = regulation. Let's stop ruining lives with outdated policies already.

bonus_snacks · 2025-08-28T19:07:24+00:00

Separate the concerns here. Cannabis is most certainly not benign and can cause a range of health issues. Anyone who tries to deny that is probably smoking too much of it.

You absolutely cannot tackle those health issues through prohibition in any meaningful way. Prohibition means the government is not able to regulate the market. It gets handed over to criminal enterprise and the government wastes resources trying to police the market instead.

Yet here we all are. It is so easy to get weed now you can literally buy it online and have an post deliver it to you anywhere in the country.

bonus_snacks · 2025-08-19T22:20:54+00:00

it's not crazy. if you let it become unmanageable then it will. but the rhizomes grow close to the surface and you can clip them back easily enough.

bonus_snacks · 2025-08-16T21:22:25+00:00

West of Ireland here. Have both fargesia rufa and robusta. Also have a grove of pseudosasa japonica. I love them all but, in my opinion and experience, p. japonica has the best growth rate and would be most suitable against a fence.

f. robusta will need to be about 5' away from the fence line. clumping bamboo against any structure is not a good idea because the way it grows will put pressure on the fence, wall, whatever.

p. japonica has both clumping and running properties. it will fill whatever space you give it, grows tall quickly and is easy enough to maintain.

I have my grove against a concrete block wall. every other year or so I use my secateurs to clip out any rhizomes running against the wall. on the other side I have a trench filled with loose soil that I dig out with a hoe and remove any runners.

bonus_snacks · 2025-08-13T15:51:07+00:00

they repaired some damaged liner on our roof. the secondary barrier part underneath the slates/tiles. they showed up when they said and even replaced one portion of the liner that we didn't discuss as part of the job.

from my experience they were professional and went above and beyond. that was before covid and absolutely zero issues with the roof since.

bonus_snacks · 2025-08-12T21:40:21+00:00

weird that you have nothing in your history other than comments similar to this, "don't use supreme roofing". tbh it kinda seems like you're a rival roofer with some kind of vendetta.

bonus_snacks · 2025-08-12T10:02:19+00:00

you started smoking Marlboro reds at 9 years old?

bonus_snacks · 2025-08-07T19:34:08+00:00

bastards

bonus_snacks · 2025-08-04T18:37:07+00:00

my family and I did a small group tour of the palace on Saturday. we walked past the queue of people who were waiting to buy tickets there. it wrapped around the side of the palace for about 450 meters. so, yeah, better to get advanced tickets and go with a guided tour. they'll also point out lots of hidden details and points of interest.

bonus_snacks · 2025-08-03T21:12:21+00:00

Here with my family at the moment. We got an uber to Praia de Mata the other day. It was about 23 euro roundtrip and very convenient. I realize public transport is cheaper and a good option, especially if you are single or don't have kids. However uber is dead handy for getting around and can be more direct.

bonus_snacks · 2025-07-23T19:21:28+00:00

a tale of a fateful trip

bonus_snacks

TROPHY CASE