Done with the work-work and now am going to spend the afternoon venting my authoritarian impulses on the yard. I figure politicians don’t listen to me, you all don’t listen to me, my friends and family don’t listen to me, my animals, whose continued existence relies upon my generosity and good will, don’t listen to me and actually actively defy me at every opportunity, so all I have left is my yard, and I am going to go impose my will on it for the better part of the afternoon.
Not to mention I am now heavily armed with this implement of destuction
How awesome is that! You won’t even hear the dandelions scream, it will be that quick.
rob!
And here I thought this was going to be a post about John McCain.
John Cole
@rob!: I said greatest, not biggest.
And besides, the biggest tool ever has to be the lead singer from Creed.
dmsilev
And you expect your yard to listen to you? Excuse me while I go make a bowl of popcorn; this is going to be very amusing.
dms
licensed to kill time
It’s The Silence of the Dandelions.
Comrade Mary
For the love of God, John, can you at least get us video? Audio, even?
EDIT: Aha! So you’ll be Fisking the lawn. That is so 2002, but hey, a little nostalgia never hurt anyone.
Sentient Puddle
Let me know how that thing works out. My yard has grown a bit…unkempt, and I need to take care of it as well.
Fax Paladin
“We have the Garden Weasel, AND WE’RE PREPARED TO USE IT!”
JGabriel
That sounds like a lot of Dandelion Salad. I haven’t had it in about 20 years, but I remember it being pretty good, both the greens and the stems.
.
LanceThruster
No wonder you abandoned your Republican bona fides. Quick without any screaming just would not satisfy. I have no doubt in my mind that many well placed goppers have Iraq and Gitmo torture porn videos(in the name of national security of course). This is just a progression from the Ed “Bring me the sickest porn you can find and put it on the govt’s dime!” Meese commission ‘research.
canuckistani
I want to hear the dandelions scream. I hate them.
Chyron HR
Gosh, I don’t know how to tell you this, but… that’s not exactly a, um… a gardening utensil. I mean, it’s great that you’ve found an alternate use for it, but that’s not… why the folks at the store think you bought that. And could you take the picture down before the IT department here blocks your site?
Zifnab
Looks like the John Cole effect has been good to Fiskars. Have you considered doing any other endorsement deals?
Martin
Meh, mine is better. 9 year old daughter not only pulls the dandelions but can be trained to bring you a beer when she’s done. And for the price of a Webkinz, it’s cheaper than the Fiskars.
But, Fiskars makes the greatest axe ever. Their 28″ chopper is just awesome.
linus
fight the good fight, oh brave defender of our freedoms against the creeping encroachment of the communist dandelion hoardes! but don’t forget the sunscreen. the fascist/marxist sun gods hate us for our freedoms too.
beltane
Hope it works. I bought a hoe at Lowe’s a couple of weeks ago and the thing broke after ten minutes of use.
I dig up the dandelions and feed them to the chickens; they love it. This should allow me to receive health care, but I’m just not sure how.
asiangrrlMN
Yes, but does it come in rusty? I feel bad for the dandelions. I like them very much.
Origuy
I don’t have a yard, so no dandelion issue. Last time I had to deal with them was some volunteer work at Crissy Field in San Francisco. The NPS had an area of native dune plants that they were trying to keep native, so they needed people to get rid of the dandelions in the surrounding lawns. They had about 30 people digging dandelions. Didn’t have those fancy implements, though.
That looks like quite a weapon. Not rusty enough for AsiangrrlMN, though.
Edit: she beat me to it!
gwangung
Wait a year.
Nannergrrl
Oh Sweetie, I listen to you.
/pat
/pat
Martin
@gwangung: Fiskars? Probably not. I’ve got a few of their tools and no rust on any of them. Might need to go with a shittier brand.
freelancer
@AsiangrrlMN:
Woah. Shades of “Prince of Space” there.
B-kawk!
Dr. Squid
Feh. Took about a week to break mine.
And since that doesn’t uproot the whole thing with the roots that go about 1-2 feet down, say hey to your next dandelion patch for me.
Jules
If you just look at the Dandelions as flowers and not weeds then life is so much less stress full.
Plus once you cut the grass it all looks the same.
(but that is one scary looking yard tool)
freelancer
Sheesh, who the fuck broke Cole’s fee-fees? He’s obviously wearing his gardening emopants today.
Arclite
As John Cole mows down dandelions with his 30mm chain gun from his perch in the sky, Arclite is busy intercepting the video feed for posting on wikileaks. Hear John chuckle, “look, the lawn mower just ran over one of the dead flowers.” When the ants arrive to take away the dead flowers he mows them down too. The report is the ants had pupae with them, and they got hurt. “Well, that’s what you get for bringing pupae to a war zone,” is the reply.
See the whole video here: http://www.wikileaks.com/dandelion_massacre
mr. whipple
I tried to warn you to go with the poison, but noooooooo.
Good luck with your new never-ending, time sucking hobby.
comrade scott's agenda of rage
Or they’re in space.
Neddie jingo
And what is “destuction” when it’s at home? It certainly looks like you could “de-stuck” something with that vorpal blade….
licensed to kill time
That tool looks like it will come in handy when we have to man the barricades against the insane clown teabagger posse.
comrade scott's agenda of rage
Hmmmm, let’s see here, $35 for a weed puller vs $35,000 for a college edumacation posing as a weed puller.
Cole wins on this one hands down.
cleek
the first review on Amazon:
awesome :)
Violet
Those poor dandelions. Who did they ever hurt?
CynDee
Hi, John:
1. Gee, I thought we listened to you.
2. I like dandelions.
Phoebe
@Jules: Exactly. But I’m glad you’re not dumping chemicals on them.
jeffreyw
When you get caught up…
Tax Analyst
Methinks you are perhaps underestimating your enemy, sir.
I’ll take the “yard” and the “over” on “sore body parts” in this contest. I’ll be checking the box score over here tomorrow morning.
Aaron Baker
I like dandelions, too. I realize they’re not so pretty when they’re not in flower; but they do look great when they are. I guess I’ll never really be down with hardcore lawncare.
James in WA
And here I thought that this was going to be a post about Boehner, when I saw the title in my rss feed.
Tom Hilton
You will if you use the device from that Roald Dahl short story.
SadOldVet
It is not that we don’t listen to you John.
We laugh, pretend to agree, and then ignore you.
Have a great day; just get rid of the Steelers worship!
Speaking of the Steelers, it does not matter what Big Ben does, he will never make better than runner up in the MVR sports voting to Kobe Bryant. (MVR = Most Valuable Rapist)
freelancer
@licensed to kill time:
I’d like to see a Venn diagram of Juggalos and Teabaggers. It’s probably mostly purple.
WereBear
Well, this weekend I have an even more enjoyable implement to wield; I have invested in a single serving Smoothie Maker.
Single serving because, you know, we’re Democrats, and we’re not going to agree on contents.
And I bought it from Amazon with the link on John’s website!
I give and I give.
David in NY
John,
Really, keeping up a lawn is a total time and money sink. That’s all it is. And what do you get? Nothing, really. And is it good for the environment? Au contraire, if you want it to be green and 98% grass, etc. If you just sign a peace treaty with the dandelions and find ways not to mow much, it might not be so bad.
I don’t know the size of nature of the lawn area you’re talking about, but I suggest, to the extent possible, putting as much of it to other uses as you can. Perennial beds full of native plants, shrubs and trees (here’s why native) are no more labor intensive (probably less) than lawn and a lot better ecologically speaking. You’ve probably got to keep some of it under lawn-mower control to placate the neighborhood, but put as much as possible to other uses or in some kind of grass that doesn’t have to be mowed, or at least not often, and you’ll be doing better all around.
D
El Cid
You can hear the dandelions scream.
Cat Lady
Agreed.
RedKitten
@cleek: I know someone who writes very much like that person does.
Hmm…I wonder.
That tool DOES look like a nifty rig, though. We don’t have dandelions yet, but my MIL (who is my next door neighbour) has a ton of Himalayan Balsam on their property, and I keep seeing it popping up on ours. They’re pretty, but if you have one, you soon have a thousand. So I’ve been mercilessly yanking them out of the ground as soon as they appear.
licensed to kill time
@freelancer:
What would happen if a Teabagger Tantrum collided with a Gathering of the Juggalos?
Purple Rain? or Purple Haze, all in my brain?
Rosalita
“you all don’t listen to me”
Of course we do. Just in the last couple of days you’ve told us to Go Fuck Ourselves and that you were going to eliminate the dandelions that were sullying your perfect yard… what’s not listening?
Tsulagi
What, you’re not going to waterboard them first? Pussy.
Jihad of Dandelion
We will be retaliating with our dandelion WMDs in the area around Tikrit!
jeffreyw
Whut? That wasn’t there yesterday.
Jager
My supposedly well trained and mellow German Shepard could teach your pets a thing or two about not listening or being pushy. Last year when Mrs J had the flu, to protect myself from her germ spreading persona, I slept in the guest room. First night I invited the old doggie up on the bed, he curled up for an hour or so, got too hot and went downstairs to his spot in the den. About four in the morning he was back up nudging me for permission to get back up on the bed, I let him back up, same thing the next night. The third night he didn’t nudge, he barked! I had pretty much forgotten about his shitty behavior until last saturday, I was taking a nap and about an hour into it, he started barking in my ear. He is perfectly capable of getting on the bed himself (seen him do it, thousands of times) but he is convinced that he needs my permission and he doesn’t care how he gts it. I never thought of him as a Nazi, but he is!
Good luck with the dandelions, back in the 50’s, my old man used to use a plastic stick filled with poison and a long needle like spike on the end, worked. ( but at what cost?) It lasted a season until I broke swordfighting my nieghbor kid with it!
James in WA
@David in NY: Sadly, a lot of neighborhood HOA codes require lawns. The impact can be mitigated with a push-mower, hand-weeding (read: no poisons) like John is doing, and allowing it to go dormant when rain alone is not enough to keep it green, though.
Drew
Cole, ur doin it all rong. Just think of the dandelions as flowers and the problem is solved. Then have a beer while you admire the flowers in your lawn.
scav
Of course we listen, how else can we be 100% sure we’re behaving orthogonally to what you want us to?
Sisyphus’s twin brother was a gardener. One of the great lost Greek tragedies.
WereBear
@James in WA: Yes, I was part of a study group that was taken aback by how much waste, poison, and effort goes into something that happens quite naturally in a British Isles/Pacific Northwest kind of climate.
Part of it is that lawns are monocultures, as John is even now struggling to enforce.
Nature abhors a monoculture!
Alex S.
So if you waterboard dandelions, is it torture?
There was a time when I almost refused to do the work in the garden my parents gave me because I thought it wasn’t right to kill the weeds. At 27, I’m still not really over it.
Edit: Woops, sorry at Tsulagi who got there first.
Dave C
Whose crimes are the greatest?
a) John “Hitler to the dandelions” Cole
b) Sarah “Shooting wolves with machine guns from helicopters is awesome” Palin
We report. You decide.
jl
The poor deluded Cole.
Tunch requires no ‘opportunities’ to defy him.
Tax Analyst
@scav:
Yeah, Sisyphus was the one with boulder ambitions, wasn’t he?
David in NY
@James in WA:
Well, local conditions may alter the strategy, but John’s in West Virginia, right? And I agree that you probably need some lawn, also depending on local conditions (I’ve got more than I want because need to mow regularly to keep from being overrun with black locust trees). But I’m not aware of many places that restrict how big your tree, shrub and perennial borders and beds can be.
sherifffruitfly
If you were a real man, and not a dirty fucking hippie, you’d taze the dandelions. :P
David in NY
@WereBear:
Yes. Interesting that lawn was invented for places that are not like a lot of the US.
John Cole
I like it. At the end of the day, I like to sit on the porch with the dog while I am tired and admire my handiwork while drinking a beer. Plus after twenty years of lacrosse, soccer, and football, not to mention the army, my knees and shoulders are shot, and this gives me good low impact exercise. After the shoulder surgery, I can’t throw a ball or lift or anything. All I can do is walk, ride the 500 dollar towel rack, and do yardwork.
And I’m in the process of doing the beds around the bulk of the house. I needed to get them under control (hence the weeding and the mulch) before I could plant anything. I’m planting sunflowers all along the one side of the house, too.
And in a couple weeks, I’m going to plant two new shade trees in the front yard. But that is after I get some order with the yard, get the weeds under control, get everything mulched, and get some hanging plants going.
But the bottom line is I like it.
Karen
Fiskars makes really good scissors, I don’t know about gardening implements though. After John gets his lawn in shape, he could come visit the couple next door. His name is John too, but he doesn’t control his dandelions. They try to spread to my yard.
@Jager:
We have a 5 year old female. She’s beautiful. Her markings are perfect. (Picture a female Rin-Tin-Tin.) She’s STUPID. My husband went for looks when he found her as a rescue. She was never socialized, was tortured/abused & abandoned as a puppy. She has issues. She gets up in our bed & takes her 2/3s from the middle. Then she gets hot & leaves. When she comes back, she sticks her cold nose on 1 of us, to see if she can get back in the bed. Consistently the answer is no. Does she listen? Oh please. But she plays with the cat without hurting her & will scare off people who shouldn’t be here. She’s a sweet girl, for us.
RedKitten
Cue wingnut freak-out in 5…4…3….
licensed to kill time
@John Cole:
John, you should check out all the other colors sunflowers come in besides yellow. A neighbor used to plant different varieties every year, and the rusty red and deep orange ones were spectacular. The free bird seed factor at the end is a plus, too.
wmd
@Violet:
Not only that, he’s forgoing good greens (dandelions, the new arugula!) and exotic wine.
thejoz
John you have got to do a follow-up post after the massacre ends.
If that thing is as useful as I think it is, I am going to have to get me one. It looks absolutely, nay, deliciously devious for tearing up rogue weeds that have crossed the line.
David in NY
@John Cole:
I like “it,” too, if by “it” we mean growing stuff that’s nice to look at, which we seem to. I just think that lawn is well down the list of what’s worth growing, unless you’re serious about your croquet or something. But gardening is absolutely wonderful.
I seriously suggest you look at the book to which I linked above, Doug Tallamy’s, Bringing Nature Home.
And since I gather you’re a little new at doing it (were you not inquiring about how to transplant mint a few months ago, to the amusement of many), you might also look at the forums at http://www.gardenweb.com.
jl
@John Cole:
Cole thinks he needs a Domain to be Master Of.
His karma is heavy. We must strive to lead him to the light and lighten his burden.
For he will be sorely tested very soon, if Tunch finds out Cole advertised to the world that Tunch needs ‘opportunties’ in order to defy him.
Tunch don’t need no stinking ‘opportunities’ for defiance.
John plans to sit and rule happily over his little Domain, but he has defied the TunchForce.
Punchy
There is nothing better than hours of Les Claypool via Pandora on a Friday afternoon.
jl
Slightly off topic, but about another sort of sprouting noxious weed that needs to be rooted out.
More noxious than dandelions. At least dandelions make a nice salad, if they haven’t been sprayed with poison by officious intermeddling people.
Krugman goes all lefty commie Joseph Stiglitz and James K Galbraith, and says Obama should not say that necessary financial reform will be good for the country and also ‘good’ for Wall Street. Reform necessary for the good of the real economy may be bad for the size and profitability of the current Wall Street financial industry, and we should be willing to say so, as matter of truth, no only as good political strategy.
I recommend the article. Krugman mentions but provides no link to a recent study that provides evidence. I will try to find it. The theoretical and empirical evidence is more than just one paper, and too bad Krugman did not like to several articles or survey article.
I recommend the column
Don’t Cry for Wall Street
By PAUL KRUGMAN
NY Times, April 22, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/23/opinion/23krugman.html
International Monetary Fund… calls for a Financial Activity Tax — yes, FAT — levied on financial-industry profits and remuneration.
Such a tax, the fund argues, could “mitigate excessive risk-taking.” It could also “tend to reduce the size of the financial sector,” which the fund presents as a good thing.
Now, the I.M.F. proposal is actually quite mild. Nonetheless, if it moves toward reality, Wall Street will howl.
… we’ve been devoting far too large a share of our wealth, far too much of the nation’s talent, to the business of devising and peddling complex financial schemes — schemes that have a tendency to blow up the economy. Ending this state of affairs will hurt the financial industry. So?
Face
You could always waterboard the Dandys, but I’m guessing that may make them grow larger.
Bill H
Plant Gazanias. They are low maintenance, low water use, never need mowing, and they kill encroaching weeds by themselves. Of course, they look pretty much exactly like dandelions, but they are by definition not weeds.
comrade scott's agenda of rage
Clearly you’ve not been to West Virginia or other places that are heavy into an Appalachian State of Mind. Cole’s lucky if he’s not in a neighborhood that doesn’t have 3 appliances on the porch and/or scattered about the lawn of every yard not to mention the TransCamaro parked outside (Bonus points if said TransCamaro is up on blocks).
As a former WV resident and who’s family goes back in the state until around the time of dirt forming…and who currently lives in another Appalachia Is A State Of Mind place, I knoweth of what I speaketh.
This says it far better:
http://www.drbukk.com/gmhom/park.html
wrb
Get a sheep
Dork
Cole’s an anti-Weedite.
Da Bomb
@John Cole: Maybe we shall find the weapons of mass destructions hidden among the dandelions.
You know dandelions are terrorists and should be stopped.
James in WA
@John Cole:
Yeah. It’s pretty sweet to look out over a little corner of land that you’ve improved with your own hands, be it a garden or a lawn. Sunset with the animals playing and a beer in hand after a day working outside? Can’t be beat.
chopper
@wrb:
and then a lawnmower. zing!
scav
@Tax Analyst:
Yup, and Tantalus was the one with the drinking problem.
ETA: Well, actually, only if you consider rock gardens the boulder ambition.
burnspbesq
@cleek:
Yes, but there was supposed to be an Earth-shattering KABOOM!
Makewi
Having lived in your general neck of the woods and spent several seasons forcing my will on my own yard, I can tell you with great certainty that your yard will only act as if it is submissive. In reality it will be lulling you into a false sense of security, plotting ways to show you who is really boss.
Tax Analyst
@John Cole:
I guess that means all those well-meant suggestions were pretty pointless, eh?
But whatever, you didn’t ask for assistance or suggestions – you just stated that you were going to spend the afternoon tending after your yard. Many of the commenters foolishly assumed this would constitute a burden and with all good intent offered their acquired knowledge. People do that all the time with me, too, especially when I refer to things that I enjoy doing but others might consider a chore.
Anyway, unlike blog commenters here, the assorted plants, flowers, and weeds that you are dealing with give you no guff or lip and you find the work theraputic, so by all means, carry on (as if you needed my humble permission to do so…lol).
Dork
@chopper: I thought one purchased the other.
4tehlulz
Does it come with a wet suit?
David in NY
@Tax Analyst:
We all know a cry for help when we hear one, even if it’s dressed up in the guise of an announcement of the purchase of new weaponry.
Tax Analyst
@scav:
Those Greek Gods really didn’t care for “leakers” did they? Somebody should have hipped him that “What happens in the Underworld stays in the Underworld”. I guess “anonymous sourcing” must have begun sometime right after Tantalus said too much to too many non-immortals.
licensed to kill time
@Tax Analyst:
I have wondered, at times, what it must be like to be John Cole, tending this blog and listening to his noisy peanut gallery. I always picture the Raj Koothrapaali character on The Big Bang Theory when he’s carrying his laptop around with his parents in India nagging away at him. “Turn us this way! Ve cahn’t see! Don’t shut the lid!”
Sometimes we are the flowers. Sometimes we are the weeds.
BarbF
@John Cole:
Uh oh, in about six months there’ll be lots of screams about raking.
Just make sure you don’t get maple trees, they’re trash trees. The helicopter thingies, the sap, the millions of baby maple trees over the rest of your yard. The roots are near the top of the soil so it kills the grass. The list is endless.
jeffreyw
@licensed to kill time:
Yup
Tax Analyst
@David in NY:
@Tax Analyst:
Ah, me…sometimes I am just too much of a literalist in assessing the words of others.
stickler
That tool looks like it’s going to provide lots of good exercise. Yippee for our host.
But if he really wants to kill dandelions, he’s going to have to go with the herbicide. 2, 4-D to the rescue, man. Accept no substitutes.
SadOldVet
@licensed to kill time: I vote for Purple Haze! That was the street name for a version of LSD…way back in my prime time!
The Grand Panjandrum
The Silence of the Dandelions: The Tales of John Cole, One Beautiful, Murderous Bastard With No Fucking Life. Whatsoever. Also, Too.
gizmo
If we would have used that tool at GITMO, America would be a safer place today.
Wile E. Quixote
I was confused, the title of the post was “Greatest Tool Ever” but then, instead of a picture of say Jonah Goldberg, Mark Levin, Bobo Brooks, Chunky Bobo, K-Lo, Mark Stain or some other wingnut deserving of the title there’s a picture of some sort of yard and garden widget. Then I realized that I was thinking “Biggest Tool Ever” and my confusion was resolved.
Randy P
@David in NY:
Speaking of lawns in odd places, there’s a famous botanical garden near us, Longwood Gardens. Originally it was Pierre DuPont’s private playpen. The entire middle of the main greenhouse is filled with a pristine green lawn, with the flower beds around the borders.
I’d never seen a lawn in a greenhouse before I started going to this place.
As for me and lawns, I’ve never been much interested in lawn maintenance. I kind of like having one, but I don’t even like mowing it, and have reached the stage where it’s worth it to pay the neighborhood kid to do it so I don’t have to bother. I do kind of hate the look of dandelions in any stage, but the last time I bothered to fight them was when I was a kid and my mom was paying a penny per plant bounty (had to include a good chunk of the root).
licensed to kill time
@SadOldVet:
I believe that was also in Jimi’s brain when he wrote the song ;-)
We share the same prime time, SOV, and what times they were….as far as I can remember, that is!
Randy P
@BarbF: Growing up in New York State, I’ve always been kind of fond of maples. Those little seeds were an important part of autumn for me. (We didn’t tend to get a lot of pretty foliage, being in a climate that tended to get cold real fast, so the leaves would all just turn brown and drop off at once).
And if you have sugar maples, lots of patience and enough trees, you can tap it in winter and make syrup.
RedKitten
@BarbF: Just goes to show that one person’s trash really IS another person’s treasure. When we were clearing the land for our house, we discovered that the vast majority of our trees were spruces and poplars — nothing really special. But we had one beautiful birch right near the road, and one maple right in front of where we wanted the house to be.
We took every pain to ensure those two trees weren’t damaged during construction.
Sadly, we lost the birch during an ice storm. But that maple is still there. My husband proposed to me under it. I’ll never think of maples as a trash tree.
Tax Analyst
@licensed to kill time:
I thought about it once, but couldn’t hang long enough to complete the picture. I just never could put myself at the front on this food chain. The very impatient part of me can’t even imagine putting up with all of us, “us” being such a noisy, opinionated, often contrary group. Yet there must be a certain sense of long-term accomplishment and satisfaction in observing what has developed out of the small number of tiny “Balloon Juice” seeds he originally planted in the blogosphere. Dealing with all the details in getting this thing up-and-running must have been very time-consuming and probably quite frustrating at times, and site maintenance must surely be a burr in the butt more than occassionally.
Without being too much of a butt-kisser I’d like to say that I’m grateful that John started and stayed with this blog and I’d venture that most of his regular and semi-regular audience feel the same way.
And sometimes some of us are the dog turd that some lazy-assed neighbor’s pooch inconveniently launched upon our prized lawn in an unobserved and unprotected moment.
FlipYrWhig
@Tax Analyst:
Yet ironically, they were into golden showers.
David in NY
@Randy P:
Longwood is famous among those who follow gardens, I gather, but I do find the idea of a lawn in a greenhouse a bit odd.
Dave Trowbridge
Fiskars makes the greatest garden tools ever.
Including a garden spade and a garden fork sized for people over 5′ 6″.
With a lifetime guarantee, no less.
Litlebritdifrnt
@David in NY:
I am so with you on that one. I’ve been usurping more and more of my DH’s lawn for flower beds over the years. I usually wait until he is gone for a couple of days and install a new flower bed. There’s nothing he can do about it when he gets back HAH! Speaking of which that is my evil plan for this weekend seeing as he is gone being a clinician for a Jazz Festival.
There was a wonderful e-mail floating about years ago about St. Peter explaining to God what people do to make grass grow and then cutting it down. It was hilarious, I think I may go and try find it.
Jim, Once
Not to interrupt Cole’s maniacal glee over dandelion deaths – but my husband (botany and gardening instructor, Master Gardener) says those Uproot machines haven’t been used for twenty years now. In fact, just about the only way you can get one is to special order, since nobody keeps them in stock anymore. And Stickler is right – the only thing that really takes care of the dandies is 2, 4-D. Which I hate, because we have so many birds and assorted wildlife on our two acres. And yeah, like many of you, we do love looking over our estate at the end of a beautiful day.
David in NY
@BarbF:
@RedKitten:
Sugar maple trees are wonderful! We have many beautiful ones, and, if you’re mowing the lawn, a good mulching mower takes care of the leaves, and makes the mulch you need for those perennial beds I was talking about earlier.
The absolute best tree to plant in the Eastern US is an oak, however. Oaks support more species of animal than any other plant. Since we are quickly eradicating the natural environment by planting it with highways and suburbs, it is a really good thing to plant our roadsides and lawns with the kinds of trees and plant that support the insects, birds and animals there the vanishing forest used to.
twiffer
@BarbF: yeah, but maple have great fall color. and if you have enough sugar maples, you can make maple syrup!
pancakes for all! except for those who prefer waffles. you fuckers are out of luck.
Dork
Pancakes without syrup are mighty shitty, ya know.
licensed to kill time
@Tax Analyst:
(Irony alert) Mega-dittos!
I thank JC and FSM every day for this island of sanity in a world gone mad. Truly.
Comrade E.B. Misfit
@rob!: I thought it might be about Doug Feith or John Yoo.
Randy P
@twiffer: @David in NY:
I mentioned being not too far from Longwood Gardens. My last home was also near a famous (at least in the DC area) garden, Brookside. At the associated nature center, they have a winter tradition of tapping the maples in the nearby woods and making syrup the old fashioned way. And sometimes they’ll do red maple syrup.
If you ever get a chance to try red maple syrup, do so. The flavor is amazing.
kay
@David in NY:
I bought my house for the huge oak trees that surround it.
When I was signing the papers I was thinking “I’m really buying those huge trees”.
I want a ginkgo, now, but I don’t have room.
David in NY
Let me say that Norway maples should not be encouraged. No fall color, no sugar sap, such dense shade nothing grows under them, bigger seed load than other maples, invasive in the Northeastern sugar maple forests, alien so not as supportive of local insect and animal species, etc.
ADS
@cleek:
Did you read that reviewer’s other product review?
http://www.amazon.com/gp/cdp/member-reviews/A193WB8ZNLQI2P/ref=cm_pdp_rev_title_2?ie=UTF8&sort_by=MostRecentReview#R1QAGSCO3QQIJW
bemused
Oh dear. Imposing one’s will on one’s garden never ends well. Never let the yard sense that you think you are more powerful than it is. It is master & it will buck you until it knows that you are properly respectful & are ready to work with it.
David in NY
@kay:
“I want a ginkgo, now, but I don’t have room.”
I don’t want to get all ecologically correct here (especially since you’ve already got lots of good oaks), but I’ve been convinced by the argument in Doug Tallamy’s Bringing Nature Home that it’s important to plant native trees and shrubs to support the environments that we are destroying by paving and lawning them over.
And don’t ginkos drop stinking fruit that the old Chinese ladies in the Brooklyn Botanic Garden gather to make some dish that only old Chinese men eat? Or can you avoid that by getting only male trees? They don’t take a whole lot of room, because they grow, or can be trained to grow, almost vertically.
licensed to kill time
A ginkgo ate my baby.
kay
@David in NY:
The females drop the fruit. I’d buy a male.
I agree (generally) with “plant natives” (where I live is technically an ‘oak savannah’; that’s why they do so well here but I do covet certain trees.
Anyway, it doesn’t matter because I have all these big ‘ol oaks so I don’t have room for a ginkgo.
I’m thinking about giving one to my neighbor, so I can see it out my window.
Svensker
@Tax Analyst:
Oh, gawd. Heh. Grr. :)
Tom Hilton
@David in NY:
I’ll second the native-plant yard idea, but that probably still means getting rid of the dandelions, which are most likely an invasive species.
scav
We’re sorta an invasive species too, so let’s not get too purity-purity about it.
kid bitzer
you realize that jpg of the fiskar’s uproot is labeled:
“FUDandelions”
right?
this is just continuing the jon stewart theme, i suppose?
David in NY
@Tom Hilton:
I think you’re right, dandelions aren’t native. But I haven’t thought they were invasive in the really significant way — invading in a way that cuts down on species diversity. They pretty much stay in disturbed areas, lawns, meadows, waste areas, etc., where they are just rubbing elbows with other non-natives or natives that are pretty resilient. And they don’t seem to form a monoculture of their own, the way some other serious invasives (e.g., phragmites) do. So I get rid of them as part of my flower and vegetable gardening, but I am pretty casual about them in the lawn, and they never seem to be taking over an area. In short, I guess, I don’t think they look bad enough or have bad enough effects to spend a lot of time on, but if one is staring me in the eye, I’ll get it out.
You know what I really hate though — ground ivy, creeping Charlie, or whatever you call it. But life is just too short …
Dee Loralei
My dogs keep bringing fleas in from outside. Anyone know a good spray I can use on the lawn that will get rid of fleas, but not hurt dogs, cats, birds, butterflies and bees?
I’ve given them the kill pill, the monthly flea drops , dose them daily with benadryl, oatmeal spray and bactine spray to try to control their itching and scratching and I’m still finding fleas on them.
scav
@Tax Analyst:
and we’ve certainly got the Eris and Iris components as well, no? Funny how John is stricter with his garden than with whatever this local hanging garden of babbling-on is called.
Anne Laurie
@John Cole:
You may want to think about this some more, unless you enjoy raking leaves as much as you enjoy killing dandelions. You already have a porch, so it’s not like you need the shade personally.
At least pick something other than oak trees. Fallen oak leaves not only smother the grass/plants under them, they leach tannins into the soil, and they don’t compost for shite. It is not coincidental that the Viking chose the oak as their plant totem — oaks are robust destroyers of others’ property.
arguingwithsignposts
This has to be the bestest post ever. even the helicopters will be laughing … also … too.
Citizen_X
Shorter Cole: GET OFF MY LAWN!
twiffer
@Anne Laurie: not to mention how damn stubborn those leaves are. last to fall, sometimes they wait to be pushed out by new buds. then you have to rake in the fall.
other than that though, i like ’em.
twiffer
@Randy P: interesting. if i remember correctly, red maples prefer a wetter environ, so they might do better ’round DC. not as many of them here in CT; mostly sugars and silvers.
Anne Laurie
@RedKitten: Pikers. Canada’s own Lynn Johnston did this almost 20 years ago (I’d link to the ‘For Better or for Worse’ website but it seems to be down at the moment) when one of her long-term supporting characters came out of the closet as a teenager. Brought a male date to his high school prom, too! And, yeah, the freakout from the ‘fambly values’ supporters was fairly epic.
From another angle, as anyone who’s seen CHASING AMY will remember, Archie comics have always had a gay character in a prominent position — Jughead!
licensed to kill time
Doctor:
What is it he does now? Look how he rubs his hands.
Gentlewoman:
It is an accustom’d action with him, to seem thus
weeding his lawn. I have known him continue in this a quarter of
an hour.
Lord Cole:
Yet here’s a dandelion.
Doctor:
Hark, he speaks. I will set down what comes from him, to
satisfy my remembrance the more strongly.
Lord Cole:
Out, damned dandelion, out I say!
One, two; why, then ’tis time to do’t.
Hell is murky.
Fie, my lord, fie – a dandelion and afeared?
What need we fear who knows it, when none can call our pow’r to Fiskar?
Yet who would have thought the old lawn to have so much dandelion in him?
arguingwithsignposts
@Anne Laurie: hey, wait. jughead is gay?!
Seanly
I can’t get the hang of that device, but wife is great at it. Now if I could just get her to use it.
Anne Laurie
@Dee Loralei:
I know some small-dog owners in the buggier regions (southern Connecticut, Florida, Texas) who swear by diatomaceous earth as an outdoor flea-killer. The bad news is, you have to spread more after every rain; the good news is, even if your dog eats the stuff straight out of the bag, it’s not poisonous. It’s also supposed to be good against Japanese beetles and other plant-chewing garden pests (including, probably, caterpillars), but it doesn’t hurt bees.
WereBear
Here’s some of my own research and experiences with organic flea control.
Tom Hilton
@David in NY: I’m in California, so I don’t know anything about east coast flora–what’s invasive vs. merely exotic and all that. Here in SF, that Bermuda Buttercup (Oxalis pes-caprae) is the most ubiquitous and annoying thing around.
Since I started photographing California native wildflowers, I’ve gone sort of fundamentalist on non-native plants. Intolerant of me, I know, but it goes with the territory.
fcc
Fiskars tools can’t be beat, their splitting axes are the best splitting tools I’ve ever used.
anticontrarian
I listen, John. I listen.
Thadeus Horne
I know I’m late, but, Jesus, Cole, you’re starting to scare me. Innocent fucking dandelions? Get a grip!
BarbF
Sorry to all the maple tree lovers out there, but I stand firm! They are trash!
Origuy
@Tom Hilton: Oxalis, ptuu! I had that last year in my 16 square feet of garden. (I live in a townhouse.) The only thing to do is pull it out. The year before I put down a load of mulch and got mushrooms everywhere.
The worst non-native around here though is star thistle. Sharp little thorns, the stuff grows five feet high, and horses who eat it die in agony. At least it doesn’t grow in gardens, but the stuff is everywhere in the parks in the Bay Area.
Dee Loralei
@WereBear: Thanks, I left a message at your blog :-)
And Annie Laurie thanks, I’ll look into that as well!