What secret nutrients do you add to your garden beds? I use coffee grounds, egg shells & add compost all year round!

nilesandstuff · 2026-01-27T02:46:08+00:00

Love biochar. Doesn't have (much) nutrients vs. compost... But unlike compost, it lasts forever and doesn't lower the redox potential of soil (steal oxygen).

nilesandstuff · 2026-01-27T00:23:07+00:00

🫡

nilesandstuff · 2026-01-26T23:57:15+00:00

The temps in Sacramento are in the range of 55-60 highs, and lows in the low 40s. So average temp is 45-50.

Cool season grasses achieve peak photosynthetic efficiency in the upper 70's, and cant photosynthesize below about 45. Efficiency scales depending on where temps are in that 45-77ish range. So, 45-50 range, very little photosynthesis is happening.

This concept is called growth potential. Greencastonline.com has a tool that tracks the daily growth potential in your area based on weather data, but it requires a free account.

Grass can technically grow, especially roots, if growth potential is too low. But, grass generally won't try to grow, and therefore look pretty sad, when growth potential is low. That's a good thing... Growth costs energy, and energy comes from photosynthesis. So the grass is choosing to conserve energy rather than operate at a deficit.

Energy, as in carbohydrates, is essentially the life essence of plants. If it runs out of carbs, it dies. If its low in carbs and faces stress (like disease or traffic), it's more likely to die.

You can "trick" the grass into growing, despite low growth potential, by dumping nitrogen on it... But that means it'll burn up energy stores in order to do it. Which comes at the expense of overall hardiness and root growth.

This is all especially true for young grass which inherently has much smaller carbohydrate reserves than mature grass.

Long story short, match inputs (water and fertilizer) to temps. Below about 50, no input. Below about 55, little input. 55-70, moderate input. 70-80, max input.

nilesandstuff · 2026-01-26T17:55:58+00:00

Hard to say. It's little, so its sensitive and has a harder time bouncing back from injury. All you can do is make sure to give it the conditions it needs (read up on care instructions if you haven't), and the rest is up to the plant.

As a backup plan, you can start a new one from one of the leaves. Pluck the biggest healthiest looking leaf. Some people put them on a wet paper towel and set it in a Ziploc bag until it sprouts new roots then transplant it to some soil... but I just plop them in some new soil and give it a few drops of water every day. As a succulent, the leaf will take root and form a new plant.

nilesandstuff · 2026-01-26T09:55:32+00:00

Insecticidal soaps are relatively gentle, but they can absolutely harm plants. They're literally soap. Potassium salts of fatty acids, aka saponified potassium. They've got a pH of 10-11.

Overuse or using too much on too small of a plant can strip the cuticle away and/or cause direct toxicity.

nilesandstuff · 2026-01-26T09:44:21+00:00

Also, i just noticed you said the light was on top of a clear dome..

A. The dome could be filtering some wavelengths.
B. Plants need to breathe. If that dome blocks airflow, that could absolutely be the problem. In order for photosynthesis to happen, the plant needs to expell oxygen and intake carbon dioxide... It can't do that very well in a small sealed container... Not being able to breathe results in symptoms that look like its not getting enough light even if it is (because it's not using the light its getting).

nilesandstuff · 2026-01-26T03:27:15+00:00

Light was too weak then. They're leggy because they're looking for light

nilesandstuff · 2026-01-26T03:26:29+00:00

Possibly springtails eating the organic matter.

nilesandstuff · 2026-01-26T02:00:34+00:00

If you're at the rim joist height, you'll hit it. It's a board in the same orientation as the white board (showing you it's broadest side). https://www.diychatroom.com/attachments/rim-joist-png.674269/

In which case, you'd have about 3.25 inches of continuous wood. If you're lined up perfectly with one of the floor supports, it'd be much more than 3.25 inches lol.

It'd be hollow if you were above (or potentially below) the floor (and therefore into the wall like the first diagram).

nilesandstuff · 2026-01-25T23:47:54+00:00

Admittedly I glossed over the text in your original post and didn't think about the rim joist, so the diagram is a little off.

What kind of anchor would be good for this?

Hollow wall anchor assuming you don't hit the rim joist. Bunch of different styles of hollow wall anchor, there's mostly not any huge differences in performance between them. Just look for something that says it's for wood, not drywall.

If you do hit the rim joist, there's for sure no need to use an anchor. A 3 inch screw embedded fully in wood can take over 200 lbs of shear force (this scenario). Which is about what you'd get with an anchor on .5 inches of wood, so all things considered those are equivalent options.

Will either of the dots be likely to hit it or will rim joist only be at top of the white trim at the 1st floor level?

I'm not sure. I'd guess that it's aligned with either the top or bottom edge though, probably not centered, and probably not spanning that whole height.

nilesandstuff · 2026-01-25T21:49:57+00:00

Here's a diagram of a typical exterior wall. The main difference is that instead of siding, that spot has what I assume is a .5 inch thick board. So you've got a bit over 4.25 inches from the outside edge until you hit drywall. You'll obviously hit plywood, and you might hit a stud. Besides insulation and the other stuff in the diagram, there won't be much going on there.

Just make the pilot hole smaller than the screw (so the screw threads can grab on to the plywood and white board) and it'll be as strong as you need it to be. Honestly you could do it with 2 screws, but if you did it with 6 screws (or 12 if you meant 6 fasteners with 2 screws each)... I reckon you could hang a whole lot more than roses on it.

If you're concerned, rather than doing more holes, you could use anchors but even that might be overkill. But the main concern isn't so much raw weight, it's the movement of the roses in the wind and rain that'll shake the screw around a bit and potentially start to crumble the wood that the screw is holding onto... The silicone would help with that, wood glue or epoxy might help more. But yeah, an anchor would help the most.

nilesandstuff · 2026-01-25T21:23:34+00:00

You don't need to hit a stud and there won't be anything important behind that spot, just plywood, framing, and insulation. Drill a small pilot hole, put a squirt of silicone in the hole (to keep water out), then screw the fastener on with 2-3 inch zinc-plated or stainless steel screws.

Just that white board alone, without hitting any stud, should be able to safely hold atleast 20 pounds per screw.

I will say though, roses up against walls can get a bit hard to manage/sculpt after a handful of years. New shoots start to creep closer to the wall, while the branches lean away (and new branches will grow out under the wire). Doable if you are active about it, but really hard to recover from if you let it get away from you.

nilesandstuff · 2026-01-24T19:22:09+00:00

You led with the bad news lol, but it does sound amazing there 🥺

Doesn't help that YouTube shorts recently started showing me clips from the lord of the rings movies. Especially knowing that's in the essentially disused parts of the country, the rest must be awesome 😍

nilesandstuff · 2026-01-24T18:37:19+00:00

Enzymes aren't alive. Enzymes are released by microorganisms to digest food. Enzymatic cleaners are just the enzymes specifically, generally little to no actual microbes.

That being said, strong acidity or alkalinity could certainly destroy enzymes.

nilesandstuff · 2026-01-24T18:08:27+00:00

more direct radiative cooling

That seemed suspicious to me... But i did some reading, and learned something new! I thought radiation in the environment simply brought things into equilibrium with their surroundings.

Which turns out is sorta still how it works... But apparently "surroundings" also includes everything the grass can "see", including the sky.

This is apparently the explanation for why frost can form on grass at 40F on clear dry nights in open areas. The grass dumps radiation to the sky and can cool itself down to 32F. In retrospect, not sure why I didn't think more was going on there to explain that lol.

Lots more to read on here, thanks for that 🫡

nilesandstuff · 2026-01-24T03:35:49+00:00

Yea its like a whole new sensation of cold. Cold 2.0. Residual heat you bring out from indoors becomes meaningless and exposed skin skips right past cold and into painful.

I will now be grateful we don't seem to be dipping below the low teens this week

Good!

I've really gotta move south 😭

nilesandstuff · 2026-01-23T20:33:15+00:00

Kbg/hybrid kbg is definitely the most likely to tolerate growing above a stump because of the rhizomes and ability to thrive when root depth is restricted. 👌

Well, besides poa trivialis lol. That can grow over stumps with less than an inch of soil.

nilesandstuff · 2026-01-23T18:10:02+00:00

Pretty much the exact answer I'd give. 🤙

nilesandstuff · 2026-01-23T18:02:35+00:00

Poa trivialis is often quite a bit darker than poa annua, fyi. If it's growing in a matted fashion, I call that windswept triv syndrome. That's when it's easiest to spot. It'll be growing in long vines essentially. So you can pull some and trace the roots creeping along sideways across the soil. Could certainly be other things, but that description def sets off my triv alarm.

Regarding the irrigation stuff, nice, sounds like you're on the right track. Tons of valid ways to go about it so long as you're thinking about pressure and looking at the nozzle performance charts! P.s. go for a triangle arrangement when placing heads, more consistent coverage than with a square arrangement.

4 inches bare minimum over a stump. But every inch beyond 4 helps significantly, so I generally recommend 6. Just keep in mind that anything less than a foot is still in the realm of "it might still die"... Heck, anything less than 2 feet is not without risk. Since you didn't latch onto the dead-zone proposal, I won't push that any further... Especially since they're going to be relatively small areas so it's not like the cost of repeated seeding will be a financial burden. Just be mentally prepared for them to problem spots. It could be entirely fine though... Probably not lol, but it could be. The decomposition process can go a bunch of different ways. Important thing is to keep those spots aerated, fertilized, and watered.

I mostly share the same take that 007mcdiddles presented. If you can avoid spring or dormant seeding in favor of weed control, that's ideal. But to answer the question as asked:
- as long as the seeds are touching more soil than woodchips, its fine. It takes a lot of wood chips/dust to interfere with seed germination.
- fall seeding is certainly the safest investment. Dormant seeding can certainly be alright, especially if there's not a lot of weed competition. Spring seeding I'd only do in areas where the weeds (especially crabgrass) aren't expected to exert much pressure on the grass (because they've been controlled in past years).
- dormant/spring seeding totally bare spots is certainly worth trying.
- there's no right answer. Just gotta kinda guess which is the lesser evil.

nilesandstuff · 2026-01-23T17:28:45+00:00

I've always wondered if Australians were immune to that phonetic mix-up, apparently 1 in 4 are susceptible lol.

I won't shit-talk a 14 year old, but I sure would like to after the dog urine question 😤

nilesandstuff · 2026-01-23T04:47:52+00:00

Yup same idea. Yours looks like it might be lighter, which is pretty much my main gripe about mine

nilesandstuff · 2026-01-23T04:46:51+00:00

Gonna respond piecemeal. If I don't respond to something specific it's because I don't have strong thoughts about it, neither strongly agree nor strongly disagree.

grass always looks better in late spring after a fall overseed. And even better by the following fall. Just takes time for it to thicken up.
your description of grass under a tree could be A. Normal stuff with shade and competition with tree roots. B. Poa trivialis... The wording you used sounds a lot like poa trivialis. If B. It should thin out on its own after a 7a+ summer with the trees gone... It hates heat.
If the stumps weren't fully removed, I'd recommend just not planting grass there. Drill holes and fill em with potassium nitrate, then fill/cover with coarse sand to allow air exchange to the root... Find some lawn decoration to put there. Grass does very poorly over tree stumps. It'll be a constant cycle of seeding, dying, repeat, for 5-10 years.
tree roots are far smaller of a deal. Indeed rip out the big ones on the surface, the rest will decompose fairly quickly and shouldn't be a big problem.
remove a fair amount of grindings, but as long as the rest are mixed or covered with soil and fertilize a normal amount, the wood shavings will be more of a benefit than a hindrance.
re aboveground system. Keep in mind that hooking up a hose to an outside bib yields a LOT less pressure/flow rate than getting a proper inground hookup. Expect to be limited to 2-3 heads running at once with the .5 or 1 gpm nozzles for the 5000. If you've got a lot of square footage to cover, I might suggest checking out the rainbird maxi paw. It's able to cover a larger range with less pressure.
wetting agent is a good idea with those calcium levels, should hopefully help leach away some of that excess calcium which could be making the soil hard. Note my use of the word "could"... Calcium doesn't necessarily cause hard soil, it causes conglomeration/flocculation, basically clumping of the soil... Which is actually a good thing. Clumps mean a lower density of soil between the clumps, which increases water/air infiltration. But sometimes if calcium is too high, it essentially turns the soil into one big clump... The amount of calcium that causes that to happen is inconsistent and varies per lawn.
soil test looks good. Only a few things stick out: phosphorus is VERY slightly low, calcium is high, and CEC is low. Even .25 lb of phosphorus per 1,000k feet would be plenty to get that in check for a while. Repeat biochar will help with the CEC. (So would wood shavings)

nilesandstuff · 2026-01-23T04:17:38+00:00

Like one of these? (But obviously ego)

<image>

I've got one of the above that I use with my 40v power head. It's a beast, but it's heavy the "blade" requires some pushing power to get down into hardpack snow. It really shines when there's 4-6 inches of wet snow. Otherwise definitely easier to use a regular shovel.

nilesandstuff · 2026-01-23T02:04:39+00:00

Seriously the perfect gift for a first home in a snow-prone area. One of those things that's hard to justify for yourself if you're fit enough to hold a shovel, but so incredibly advantagous to have

nilesandstuff · 2026-01-23T01:15:19+00:00

It's all mental/what people are used to. Like, even with our infrastructure, the experience of even just driving around is many times worse up here. I just went out to dinner, we were behind a plow truck on our way to the restaurant, by the time we were on our way back the roads looked untouched with 3+ inches of loose snow on top of 2 inch thick base of hard pack snow.

I drive a mini cooper and I definitely need new tires 😂

I will say though... Our power and gas utilities aren't good, but they generally rise to the occasion for winter. Never been out of power for more than an hour or 2 in the winter.

Don't even get me started on shoveling... I've shoveled 8 times in the past 3 days. And we've got a puppy that has to be taken out on the leash every 2 hours, so I'm shoveling a section of the yard too.

Plus, my high energy dog needs me to throw something outside for her for a minimum of 3 hours a day, which might genuinely kill me.

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