Recent submissions

Comment · 2 months ago
"the Default Country" is a good one. I'll have to start using that.
Comment · 3 months ago
The giant arum is another example of beetle pollinated flowers. It smells of manure so attracts manure-loving beetles.

With more traditional pollinators, I've always found that a fascinating example of bee pollination that does not involve the plant taking advantage of the insect drinking its nectar is Ophrys Apifera, which has a distinct bee-shape silhouette and relies on the mating instincts of male bees in order to pollinate.

Comment · 3 months ago
If it becomes a problem I would imagine that most victim plants will evolve certain defence mechanisms. For example, some insects will simply chew through flowers to reach the nectar stores - so I think in such cases a flower would just evolve a tougher skin, or secrete something that deters insects from doing that.
Comment · 3 months ago
Whilst I think that criticism of such heavy-handed decision making is valid, I can't help but feel this blog post is littered with unhelpful and snide culture war remarks, and a smug attitude that this is the definitive end of Codeberg. If Codeberg truly has gone woke, people who espouse 'anti-censorship at any cost', like the author, will leave. But many others will remain.
Comment · 3 months ago
I'm starting to get a bit of fatigue for these projects that boil down to just "I asked Claude to re-write this code into a new language that's in vogue right now!"

I really don't understand why this is needed outside of an opportunity to show how impressive LLMs can be when working within large codebases, but even then people in the comments are finding bizarre implementation choices that a human developer wouldn't make. I'll stick with Postgres and its - gasp - C implementation for now, thanks.

Comment · 4 months ago
I think literature, music and programming are all crafts, but I can't quite go so far as to call programming 'art'.
Comment · 6 months ago
When I was younger, bonsai always seemed to have a notoriety of being difficult to care for. I've got a ficus which I've owned for about 4 years now, and it's doing well because my apartment emulates tropical/greenhouse conditions on even mild spring days. I'm thinking about getting a large cloche for it to try and ramp up the humidity even more and encourage aerial roots. I've also got a Chinese elm next to it that's doing well, which I will move outside in the summer. The only worry with that one is how to keep it dormant over winter - I'll have to move it inside but I'm worried it will be too warm.

More recently I bought a Japanese maple shrub from a nursery. I was planning on turning it into a bonsai, but it's already re-grown its leaves for the season so best not to prune it harshly like I was planning. I think that's the main lesson to learn with bonsai - patience. It's going to be almost a year now before I can do anything major to it. Until then it will just be some extra balcony foliage.

Comment · 7 months ago
I thought that was always the case. Dig as required to get your soil to the correct type for what you want to grow, then let it be and don't dig.

Digging to turn the soil seems like an old adage that has been passed down through generations, but modern scientific studies are now showing it provides very little to no benefit for yields.

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