On fertilizer

[altivo]

Today I fertilized the apple trees. Earth-shaking news, I know. But there's a long story behind it. A common way to fertilize fruit trees is by using fertilizer that has been compressed into heavy stakes that you pound into the ground near them. This releases into the soil slowly and provides extra nutrients for many months.

Anyway, we'd been planning to do this for several years, witness the fact that I found two full boxes (15 stakes each) among the garden supplies. I remember last year that one of those boxes sat in the barn all summer, awaiting "installation." The problem was that I waited too long in the spring and the ground was too hard to pound the stakes into without breaking them.

So today was the day. All 15 stakes in one box have been deployed, 3 per tree since the tree trunks are now about 3 inches thick.

Someone not too far from here has some very unhappy cows. They've been mooing and bellowing for a couple of hours now. I suspect that a feeding time has been missed. From the sound, I really hope they don't break out and come stampeding over in this direction.

Tess came running to me even before I got to the gate this evening. I saw her look up as I was approaching, and really didn't expect that she would take off at full gallop to get to the gate before I did. Yesterday I attributed her eagerness to flies and mosquitoes. Today, though, I had sprayed her well with fly repellent before she went out, and the bugs didn't seem to be pestering her so much.

Another kind of fertilizer: zombies, vampires, and werewolves, Oh my! There seems to be very little new science fiction coming out, if you believe Science Fiction Book Club. Their montly selection booklet is chock full of vampires and zombies. Sorry, but retelling Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice using zombie characters isn't going to do much of anything for me. I suspect, though, that putting the zombies through a chipper-shredder would make decent if smelly mulch.

Comments

[herefox.livejournal.com]

Actually, though I haven't read it, it's apparently Pride and Prejudice going on while there's also a zombie apocolypse going on in the background. I'm....tempted to pick it up, honestly, but I'm easily amused sometimes.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

The zombie and vampire stories just seem so pointless to me that I can't understand this huge craze for them. It's not so much that I object to their existence as that they are pushing more complex writing out of the bookstore and publishing arena.

Using classic novels as a basis is just a cheap shot to avoid real writing, I'd say, just as Hollywood remaking some classic movie for the third or fourth time shows an utter lack of creativity. ;p

[flamekist.livejournal.com]

Today I fertilized the apple trees.

Oh dear...my mind is certainly in the gutter today judging by the image in my head after reading that bit...

Wouldn't spreading a thin layer of horse manure around the trees also work as fertilizer? Anytime it rains the nutrients would seep down into the ground for the trees to use. And with it being a thin layer you wouldn't have a heat buildup that would otherwise damage the trees.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Aged manure (two years old or more) is good rich mulch for almost anything, yes. We do use it, and it could probably be used on the apple trees if I was confident of what I was doing. Fruit trees are subject to so many fungi, viruses, and other risks, though, that I hadn't even considered using manure on them directly.

We planted sweet corn in soil enriched with horse manure a few years ago. You never saw such a crop of blight, rust, and smut as emerged from that. The spoiled ears smelled worse than an open septic tank. We've since become a lot more cautious about using the manure directly.

[cetasdolphin.livejournal.com]

"I'd say, just as Hollywood remaking some classic movie for the third or fourth time shows an utter lack of creativity. ;p"

Using this as a basis I would say this is part of the problem with what has coming out lately in terms of Science Fiction or Fantasy. No one has any creativity to come out with anything original or if they do it is being buried by what the publishers are determining what is 'hot' based on trends.

The only reason I bet you the reason you are seeing so many 'gothic' fantasy (vampires, werewolves, undead) as of late is because of the whole Twilight book series and movie that came out of it. It is the same thing that occurred when Harry Potter first came out on the scene you had writers coming out of the woodwork with any retelling of stories so long as it involved magic, wizards or dragons.

It probably also doesn't help that recently a book based off that of a video game made it to the top 25 in the New York Times Bestseller list. That book being "Arthas: Rise of the Lich King" which is nothing more than the novelization of both Blizzard's Warcraft 3 and Warcraft 3: The Frozen Throne computer games.

I don't really browse the adult sections of Science Fiction or Fantasy in bookstores these days as generally many of the books there being sold are part of established universes: ie Warhammer, Magic the Gathering, Warcraft, Dungeons and Dragons, etc. Those authors that aren't in such just seem to be republishing books or series that came out years before. I am actually finding some good reading in the supposed Youth section for Science Fiction and Fantasy. Have seen quite a few different book series based off Western mythology lately.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

I agree with you almost entirely, except that the great increase in vampire stuff started well before Stephenie Meyer. Anne Rice was the beginning in my opinion, with her whole string of best-sellers that dates back to the late 1980s. The great surge, though, coincides with the television series "Buffy." That was utter crap in my opinion, but extremely popular, so...

Yes, publishers print what is selling heavily, and what they choose to print also influences what sells. It's a vicious circle that takes a long time to break up.

In a library full of great literature, most people head for the video racks or the latest "best sellers" and the contents of both are just so heavily influenced by commercialism rather than quality that it's really depressing.

[cetasdolphin.livejournal.com]

I haven't even stepped foot into my local library here (only due to the issue of county borderlines) so I haven't seen lately what they have been putting out. Only been browsing bookstores and it does seem they are only feeding the commercialism, I will admit I did buy that Arthas book as my last purchase but that was due to interest seeing as I do play World of Warcraft. Otherwise I rather read books by the likes of Piers Anthony, David Brin, Mercedes Lackey, Harry Turtledove, Eric Flint and numerous others but it seems they aren't writing much anymore and bookstores are just filling in with the things that I mentioned earlier. That or trying to dominate other fields given that my local Barnes and Nobles only used to have 2 or 3 shelves in the Science Fiction section dedicated to comics or manga, now they have 2 or 3 rows dedicated to such. Along with them selling various music and DVDs. The local Waldenbooks used to be a small store in the mall, upgraded to that of a one taking up three stores, and is now back to one and looking rather disheavlied more and more every time I browse there. I am almost beginning to think I should just start shopping online for books.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Lackey, Turtledove, and Flint are still cranking stuff out, but the only work by any of the three that I've read in the past couple of years was Lackey's Foundation. That one was decent but needs what will probably be two more volumes to conclude the story. Larry Niven is still going strong (not that I've ever been a big fan, but many are.)

Brin and Anthony have been quiet, I think. There are new emerging authors who look promising, but you're entirely correct when you suggest that the booksellers are not featuring their work. Le Guin and Kurtz, two of my long time favorites, also seem to be pretty much in retirement. McCaffrey has handed the wand over to her son, who frankly doesn't seem as good.

Online shopping can be more fruitful than the chain bookstores. Independent bookstores are often best of all, though. I haven't been happy with Amazon's customer service and fulfillment for several years now, but their web site is indeed a good resource for identifying things you might want to read. Your library is also worth checking. It may be an excellent resource, depending on the interests and dedication of the local staff.

[cetasdolphin.livejournal.com]

I knew Anthony was getting to be rather old to the point I keep wanting to expect his death annoucement being posted online somewhere. I also wasn't really impressed with his last few books as he seems stubbornly attached to his Xanth series that when fans requested he bring back his Apprentice Adapt characters he put them in one or two chapters of his last Xanth book. Even his Mode series was a bit of relief from that (if not only because it had a talking horse in it).

Brin I also knew wasn't writing much if anything instead taking on his role of a futurist (and being predominately displayed in the History Channel's Life After People series). Granted I didn't read his last novel he did of Kiln People though I have it. I much prefer his Foundation series.

The others I admit I just lost track of due to the bookstores not displaying them. I only got lucky when I managed to pick up Turtledove's new series of the United States of Atlantis, which I first read as two novellas in my father's Analog magazine.

As for the local library situation, I would go if not for the fact I have to pay a 30 dollar or so membership fee to even use it because my house is mere inches from the county line that they consider it to be in the neighboring county. I have to travel 30 minutes to the city to be able to use the 'right' library with no expense as it were, rather than use the one that is 5 minutes from my house.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Every state has a different set of laws regarding libraries. Some are a lot better than others, but it sounds as if yours is one of the shaky ones. (Illinois, where I live, is probably worse than yours.)

If you have a library card for your "official" library, they won't let you use it at the one in the next county? Most places, even here in backward Illinois, do allow that. What they won't do is issue you a card from the library that is "out of district" unless you pay. Even then, $30 is fairly cheap.

In Illinois, there are unserved areas. These are places where residents pay no library tax. People who live in those areas must pay to obtain library service if they want it, and the fee is equal to the average real estate tax paid to library service by a district home owner. In our case, that fee is $140 a year. Yes, it could be worse. We are bound by state law and cannot make exceptions or reduce that fee. The single fee does get library cards for all members of the household, but is really steep for anyone who lives alone.

The taxes are high too. I'm lucky. Even though I own a five acre "farm" with a house and two barns, my library tax is still less than $100 a year. And because I have a card from my local library, I can use any other library in the state.

[cabcat.livejournal.com]

I thought you fertilised it personally...well what with you being a horse and all ;)

Hmm I don't suggest you read a few classics that Spike Milligan added his touch too ;)