Luccus

I need to install an OS for someone whose first impulse upon seeing a screen is to touch it, because they are young and their first assumption is a touchscreen.

They know their way around Windows and Windows is probably tought to them at school, so Windows might actually be the smart move… but I fucking hate it.

Is ZorinOS or similar polished enough that I can leave it to someone whose tech literacy is centered around Roblox, TikTok and evading parental locks? I don't want to normalize the Windows-bullshit. But I don't want their first Linux-experience to be frustrating.

Last year I managed to fertilize a single flower on my cherimoya tree, which is a bit difficult as the flowers are female in the morning and turn male in the evening. This year I will hopefully be able to have the tree in a south-facing window. So I'm hoping for proper fruiting next year.

Also, strangely enough, cherimoyas seem to do well in an indoor environment and don't seem to have any pest issues at all.

About two years ago I read up on chitin as a possible pest control/deterrent as I was always struggling with mealybugs and thrips, especially in spring, and buying IPMs was getting quite expensive.

I had the most problems with my banana tree (thrips) and my kumquats (mealy bugs). But since I added insect frass (in my case sheddings and droppings from zophobas) in the fall two years ago, this problem disappeared almost miraculously. Since then I have added a small handful every spring and haven't seen a single thrip or mite on any of my plants.

Sooo… idk, it definitely gets a "worked for me".

The plants are: a cherimoya, kumquats, figs, a banana, two monsteras, and a bunch of pitahayas (although the cuttings are only 1 year old and haven't found a permanent home yet), hoyas and a small pineapple.

Looking forward to hear everyones experiences with this!

I finally managed to pollinate my cherimoya!

For the uninitiated: Pollinating cherimoyas is a bit tricky, because their flowers only bloom for a single day. During this time, they are initially female and can absorb pollen, but only turn male in the evening to harvest pollen from.

To pollinate them successfully, you have to sacrifice at least one flower, take its pollen and hope that the next flower opens before the pollen is no longer viable.

They also develop large velvety leaves:

TLDR: Citrus keeps turning black and oozing resin. But I can't find the problem. I thought it must be root rot, but they look perfectly healthy:

Long version: Because my first and second citrus trees fell victim to root rot, I started using a very airy substrate made of pine bark, perlite and some humus/worm castings in a 5:1:1 ratio for all my plants (figs, pineapple, cherimoya, monstera, etc.) with little adjustment. You may recognize this as 'aroid mix'. But it works surprisingly well in my indoor space with a west-facing window and terracotta planters (and my tendency to overwater).

But I can't wrap my head around citrus.

It always starts with rapid growth, followed by very suddenly dropping and crisping leaves, black stems and finally death.

I thought I must be root rot again, which I need to mind during winter. But today, when I dumped my fifth (!) tree, I found only perfectly healthy roots and nice smelling substrate.

I think it must be a pathogen… but what? I am at a loss. I keep killing my citrus trees and I don't know why. :'(

EDIT: replaced "5:1:1 mix" with "5:1:1 ratio" for clearification.

One of my smaller monstera pots keeps growing these little mushrooms and I'm wondering what exactly they are.

They come after every watering and dry off pretty quickly in about half a day or so.

EDIT: They are 'fairy inkcaps'. Thanks to [email protected]!