A gardening thread

Same here as far as pears go.  Not many pear trees here in Edmonton, mine is the only one I know of thought I am sure there are others.  This weekend I should probably dig up the back garden and get all my beets and potatoes out of the ground.

I think I finally killed the cursed raspberry after I relocated it for third time.
Tomatoes went well this year. I missed few suckers here and there so I have jungle bush tomato now. Herbs went bit worse then last year, but still holding up. There is some kind of mysterious invisible insect infestation going on, which I blame on global warming and approaching apocalypse.
I am most curious how will my birch tree project turn out. We planted it into ground two weeks ago and it´s still alive.

How is it even possible to kill a raspberry? No matter what I do they still sprout out somewhere unwanted.

Oh, and here's a picture of my pears. The all two of them

How hard or soft pears are most often depend on how ripe they are. 

What a pity. A pear should be as soft as a ripe Kiwi!

Hard and sour fruits often become soft and sweet when heated a little. Put them on a cake! 

Hmf, slighty jealous of people here being able to plant winter crops. Like Vella said, the growing season here (close enough to arctic), is basically over.
We got good crops of raspberries, as usual, both the normal red and also some bushes of yellow varieties. The secret for getting good crops from razzies every year, is to plant bushes at least on two different years. So when one bush rests more one year, the other will yield berries, and vice versa next year.

Damned pheasants ate all our gooseberries! I've already named the male pheasant 'Lunch'. And my salads and kale didn't survive the bugs during the summer. Next year, I'm considering a small greenhouse.

Vella, your pears look pretty similar to my grandpa's old apple-pear tree hybrid. Ours are round like apples, but have a distinct pear taste.

Oh, and baked the first apple crumble of the year today from the apples that were left on the tree after really rough early-autumn storms.  Hopefully the winter apples, ripe next month, will make up for the lost ones.

I used liquefied soap in a spray bottle against spider-mites and aphids once, it did not work at all for me. I sprayed the leaves of the plants nearly 5 times per day and the aphids didn't care at all. Neither did the spider mites. A handful of died simply because they drowned because I sprayed them so hard but the chemicals in the soap didn't do anything. Maybe it depends on the soap. *shrugs*

For me the only thing that has worked every time was waiting for the ladybugs to come, they immediately go on a  killing spree and completely exterminate any pest in a matter of days. 

Yes! My kids would bring those into the house and put them on the plants and we'd release them after a bit. I know that sounds weird, but they're ravenous little buggers. Have you ever seen a lady bug larvae? I'd always seen them in spring but never knew what they were until a few years ago. They're kind of ugly, I never would've associated them with ladybugs. Now I'm more careful when I see them.

2 words: Boobie traps

Also, I have a few houseplants:

Growing is tricky, but the Curing is the real bee-otch