We have a nice cool day today after some really hot days. The babies were all cuddled up and staying warm.

Bonus baby picture

Here's some colour to make up for the sad flowers in the dove planter box.

And a sleepy bee butt

https://photography.mangroveactionproject.org/

Every year there's mourning doves that nest in our planter that hangs on the backyard deck's railing. This morning I was able to get a couple quick pictures of the babies during the morning shift change :)

Here's one parent looking cute and keeping their babies safe.

What's growing in my garden? I didn't plant it. It's just doing it's thing. It's also become one with the mystery tomato plant growing beside/in/on it.

Here's a picture of the flower if that helps

Everything about this plant is comically oversized

I planted a handful of lemon squash seeds in the garden spot just to see what would happen. Well they were quickly taking over and my bamboo sticks wasn't working to keep them contained so I instead came up with this solution of chicken wire and fence posts to make my own arch trellis.

Whelp, looks like it still wasn't tall enough but I do at least have one flower in all that.

Identification source: https://www.takao599museum.jp/treasures/plants/?lang=en

The only ghost pipe I've been able to find so far this year. One of my favorite plants due to its ecology. Ghost pipes lack chlorophyll and are unable to photosynthesize. They parasitize a fungus that grows on tree roots to feed itself.

There are several old avocado trees on my corner, including the one that makes these small (tho not usually this small) green avocados that turn purple and shiny like an eggplant when fully ripe. The taste is pretty typical for a green avocado -- so much less fatty than a Haas -- but with a nice floral note that I haven't come across in other varieties.

Video

https://lone.earth/w/aNDieMBCCPjsZwPrzmoHdu

Does anyone grow stinging nettle (Urtica dioica)? I'm thinking about planting some next year in containers, mostly for fertilizer but I would also like to drink some tea just to see if it helps my allergies at all. Any tips, observations, opinions?

[...] Crossman turned to a third technique—a test for a set of genes called ZFX and ZFY that show up on the X and Y chromosomes. In Eau10b, Crossman found both genes, confirming that the animal had a Y chromosome. But the whale’s DNA also contained a double dose of ZFX, the gene carried on the X chromosome. The result revealed that Eau10b had a Y chromosome and two X chromosomes, meaning the animal was neither male nor female. Eau10b was an intersex whale—the first of its species known to scientists.

This combination of sex chromosomes occurs when a cell receives an extra copy of the X chromosome during cell division. A similar event can lead to female offspring with three X chromosomes, or males with one X chromosome and two Y chromosomes.

Crossman doesn’t know how many southern right whales with XXY sex chromosomes might be out there. Even Eau10b’s fate is unknown, since the researchers didn’t identify the whale when they took the DNA sample in 1989. But southern right whales can live up to 70 years, so Eau10b may be wintering off Valdés Peninsula to this day.

While intersex animals are often infertile and unable to produce offspring to help a population grow, Velocci says that in social species such as whales, intersex animals likely play important nonreproductive roles that benefit the population in other ways.

Studying intersex animals has helped scientists better understand how genes and hormones shape individuals as they develop. Through the process of domesticating livestock, people have known about intersex cows for thousands of years. On Vanuatu, in the South Pacific, islanders nurture a unique strain of intersex pigs prized for their delicate spiraling tusks. More recently, researchers have also documented intersex horses, dogs, moose, sheep, fish, and many different types of invertebrates. Intersex animals are rare across species, Crossman says, but they’re “more common than we historically thought.”

I only do chaos gardening now.

My seedlings didn't do well this year but there seems to be a bunch of tomatoes, cucumber plants and red mustard growing all over. All of them in very inconvenient spots. But it's happening and they are here to stay now.

I don't know why this cucumber plant is so big though. I didn't even know they could get to that size.

My other garden bed is an absolute free for all. I just threw a bunch of wildflower seeds from a nearby trial, a seed mix to attract hummingbirds, yellow clover and beans in there. Whatever happens, happens.

I'm pretty sure my dad hates it because there's so many "weeds" in there. I think it's pretty and there's always so many bugs hanging out there.

Cross-post from [email protected]

https://slrpnk.net/post/24657954

[Image description: the white and pink flowers of a black lace elderberry peek out from underneath the dark purple leaves]

I'm very hopeful that I will get some seeds from it this year, it would be awesome to grow it out to see how the genetics play out.