Oh interesting, would these be the larvae then? A quick Google tells me that we have over 60 different types of native ladybugs here, so I’m gonna have to do some searching. Thanks.

And yes, I realise bugs all have their role to play and aren’t inherently good or bad. But I was looking for “is it likely that these clustering bugs are killing my plant”, i.e. are they a foe in this situation.

I think you’ve already had plenty of replies here, but yeah here in western Europe, straight from the tap. I’m also fortunate not to have any chlorine in my water. It’s delicious.

One thing about the chlorine, it also just evaporates over time without boiling. Filling a jug of water and leaving it standing around for a while will also get rid of that chlorine smell/taste!

That sounds fun! I was actually thinking about doing something similar, but only about a few ones I think are special. Would love to see it.

Edit: what I mean is, I think it’d be interesting content, not that I’m in any way trying to “compete”!

Cute! Are there bugs in there/what are you doing about feeding it? I’d love to put some of my savage garden in a terrarium too, but I’m worried they’re not gonna get enough to eat…

What a beauty!

I am totally with you! Mostly in conversation I try to use the Latin names. Works fine, because the person I’m talking to generally either 1) doesn’t know anything about plants and wouldn’t know the common name either, or 2) does know about plants and most likely does recognise the Latin.

Common names are really impractical IMO. For example, a while back I was giving away some cuttings, and someone offered me a cutting from her “umbrella plant” (translated) in exchange. So I said sure, fully expecting a schefflera. But she showed up with a cyperus alternifolius, which (at least in my language) has exactly the same common name. How is this useful? 🙄

That’s a good one too!

I mostly play big campaign games with my partner, for example currently we’re playing Frosthaven and Oathsworn (and have Aeon Trespass lined up). Other favourites are Aeon’s End, Spirit Island, Terraforming Mars. Me and my friends have a strong preference for cooperative games!

Some more low key games that we tend to bring out with friends who don’t game a lot are Isle of Cats, Thunderbirds, Namiji, and The Crew.

I wasn’t planning on going back to Reddit, but I don’t think I’ll be able to resist watching the dumpster fire 🔥

I’m so glad to have found a reddit alternative that I actually want to use. I just joined yesterday, but I’m really liking it so far. And I love the general air of friendliness y’all seem to have cultivated here!

I’m actually curious what people would say about mine!

Yeah I saw the composting community and subbed right away! I only joined Lemmy yesterday, so still getting my bearings, but it’s been so nice to hunt for all these small niche communities.

Yesss a place to talk about the little poop noodles! I’ve had a bin going for about 2 years. I use a stacking bin with 5 trays. After starting it, I realised that the whole CFT idea doesn’t work as well as I was expecting, so essentially I treat them as independent bins that the wormies are able to move between freely.

I’ve found that a pretty laid back approach to feeding them works the best for me. Whenever I have kitchen scraps, I toss them on top. I add a small part of our coffee grounds (we drink a good amount), the rest goes straight into the garden. And whenever I feed I toss in a similar amount of dry shredded cardboard. When a tray is full, I move another one to the top and start feeding that.

For bedding, I just use the cardboard I toss in continuously, and lots of small bits of browns that are too big to be composted by the worms. Like small sticks, some corn cobs that went in whole (the worms love to chill inside them), a load of pistachio shells that have been in there for a year that the baby worms always sit in, etc. Whenever I sift out a tray all that stuff just goes right back into the new one I’m filling, the worms seem to love it.

Seems to work well for me! Only problem I ran into recently was we had a lot of rain, and apparently so much moisture got in through the air holes that parts of the bin turned anaerobic. Which apparently attracted a whole lot of ants. Fortunately I managed to dry out the bin a bit, and got rid of most of the ants. So all’s well in noodle town again.

Sure, nothing is always good or bad. Of course. That’s also not what I was saying? At least, what I meant was, washes are great for someone who has no idea what they’re doing yet. Because without having learned any skills, a lot of things you try don’t work out. Washes, however, even when applied without skill, generally do work out great and massively improve the beginner’s paint job. Obviously, not always, but it’s a very very safe bet.

And then, if you do know what you’re doing, you might use loads of different techniques. But washes are still great to have and can provide great effects when the mini calls for it. But since we were talking about beginners taking up painting for the first time, I figured a nuanced discussion for experienced painters was not what we were looking for. :)

This looks really good, especially considering it’s dollar store paint!

Does anyone know of a mini painting community? I’m new to Lemmy and still finding my bearings but I’d love to see more mini painting content.

While I mostly agree with you, I do think that contrast paints are a great shortcut. However, not for new painters necessarily. But once you get the hang of painting a bit, they can be fantastic for speedpainting.

Washes, however, are talent in a bottle for everyone starting from the very first mini they paint. It’s amazing how they can turn your mini from “argh this is a mess” to “this looks amazing!” so easily.

That looks super cute!

One thing you might want to know, it costs venus fly traps a lot of energy to create flowers. It can be a risk to let it flower, since it might take so much energy that it dies off afterwards. Of course you know your own plant best, just in case you see it starting a flower stalk when it’s not doing too well, you can (literally) nip that in the bud!