Latest news with #Asiatic
Time of India
3 days ago
- Politics
- Time of India
U'khand Guv visits LU, praises botanical & literary heritage
Lucknow: Uttarakhand Governor Lieutenant General Gurmit Singh visited Lucknow University on Saturday and praised its botanical and zoological heritage. He found the rich collection of books at the Tagore Library impressive. "Uttarakhand Governor visited the Samvidhan Sthal and offered tribute at Dr BR Ambedkar's statue. He visited the departments of botany and zoology, culminating his tour with a visit to the Tagore Library," said LU spokesperson Durgesh Srivastava. He said the governor engaged with faculty members and expressed admiration for the department's innovative herbal garden named Sanjeevani. He appreciated the garden's unique Sun-ray-inspired layout and its rich collection of medicinal and aromatic plants, such as Mentha and Artemisia. Srivastava said the governor toured the zoology department and visited its museum, expressing great admiration for its rare and diverse specimen collection, including the skeleton of a one-horned rhinoceros, an Asiatic elephant, a preserved specimen of a giant 1.5-metre-long earthworm, and the Venus flower basket. He interacted with 15 PhD scholars, most of whom were in the early stages of their research, and lauded their depth of knowledge and enthusiasm. by Taboola by Taboola Sponsored Links Sponsored Links Promoted Links Promoted Links You May Like Is it legal? How to get Internet without paying a subscription? Techno Mag Learn More Undo At the Tagore Library, the governor looked at the original copy of the Indian Constitution, rare manuscripts, the ShabdBhed collection, and a copy of the Guru Granth Sahib. He also read a few lines from the sacred scripture and bowed in reverence, acknowledging its spiritual significance.
NZ Herald
4 days ago
- General
- NZ Herald
Gardening: Plant bulbs now for Christmas colour
Now is the time to plant them. As they grow from a bulb/tuberous root system, they are dormant during the winter months. If you have some lilies in your garden, they benefit from being divided every three to five years and you get new plants from the process. Planted now, your lilies will sprout during the late winter, then they will grow during spring and commence flowering around December. Lilies are easy to grow and can be left in the ground for a number of years. Each year, the clumps of bulbs will increase, as will the subsequent number of blooms. This is the time of the year when these and other dormant bulbs, such as dahlias, can be lifted and divided to create new plants. Most know the Christmas lily, though there are many other worthy colours, shapes and sizes in lilies that can be grown very easily. Both Asiatic and Oriental lilies make a wonderful cut flower to bring indoors during the summer. They can last up to two or three weeks in a vase by changing the water regularly and occasionally snipping the base of the stem again to keep the wound fresh. Asiatic lilies are generally earlier-flowering and there is a larger colour range to choose from. Most are not scented. They tend to multiply much faster than Oriental types. The growth habit, as a rule, is more compact, which can make them better for pots and small spaces. Oriental lilies are a bit later in flowering. The flower size tends to be larger and they have the famously scented blooms that are reminiscent of 'Grandma's garden'. The stems are usually taller, with a stately presence. Planting some each of the Asiatic and Oriental lilies is recommended as this will give you a longer flowering season of beautiful lilies. How to grow successfully They grow best in a sunny situation with rich, well-drained soil. The free-draining aspect is particularly important, as otherwise the tuberous root system can be prone to rotting and you can lose your plants during wet periods. If necessary, your desired spot can be raised into a mound to achieve the free-draining conditions. For great results, lilies should be fed Ican Bulb Food, once at planting, once before flowering and a third time after flowering, when the plants are storing energy for flowering the following year. Care should be taken to ensure the fertiliser does not come into direct contact with the bulbs. Planting them in groups of three to five bulbs in the garden usually gives the best visual effect. Taller-growing varieties will need staking so that wind doesn't snap off the stems during the summer. Adding a stake at planting time is a good idea to avoid the chance of root damage that can occur if stakes are added at a later date. It is also a good marker for knowing where your lilies are when they are dormant. And what about in pots? Yes, absolutely: using a good-quality potting mix is key to success, along with a pot that is not too small. I recommend Tui Bulb Mix or Ican Premium Potting Mix. Both have good structure. The addition of Tui Enrich for Pots & Containers every six months, and using liquid fertiliser Ican Fast Food as a top-up during the summer months, will bring success. They can be used to great effect in large pots with a mixture of plants, such as a permanent shrub, plus seasonal annuals and, of course, the lilies to come through for the summer months. Get inspired to plant something now for summer – call in to the store to see the range of lily bulbs available now. For more gardening information, visit Gareth Carter is the general manager of Springvale Garden Centre in Whanganui.
Time of India
4 days ago
- Time of India
Tantric rituals lead to wildlife crime arrest, 1 held
Rajkot: Forest officials arrested a 48-year-old man from Simran village in Savarkundla taluka on Thursday for illegal possession of protected wildlife parts allegedly used in tantric rituals. Tired of too many ads? go ad free now The seized items include the skin of a blackbuck and two lion claws. The arrest followed a raid conducted by the forest department based on specific intelligence inputs about the use of endangered species in occult practices. Range forest officer Pratap Chandu, who is leading the investigation, confirmed that the recovered items were found at the residence of the accused, Valji Matang. "We have sent the blackbuck skin and lion claws to a forensic laboratory for examination," Chandu said. "The accused claimed that these items were over two decades old and were brought into the household by his grandfather for religious purposes." However, officials clarified that the Wildlife Protection Act strictly prohibits the possession, trade, or use of any body parts of protected animals, regardless of their age or intended use. Matang was booked under relevant sections of the Wildlife Protection Act and produced before a local court on Friday. The court granted forest officials three days of custodial interrogation to further probe the origin and possible trade links of the seized items. Amreli district, which is home to 339 of Gujarat's 891 Asiatic lions as per the latest census, is considered a high-sensitivity zone for wildlife conservation. The forest department has been keeping a close watch on illegal activities involving protected species in the region.
New York Times
6 days ago
- General
- New York Times
These Are the Best Weeding Tools, From Roundup to Flame Thrower
If you were to sketch a yard designed for testing weed-control methods, it might look a lot like mine. My yard is in New Jersey, with a temperate climate (plenty of sunshine, plenty of rain, rarely blazing, rarely arctic). The soil is a type called Downer (the official soil of New Jersey), and it's productive stuff, earning the Garden State its nickname. The lot is oriented northeast-southwest, so some areas receive full sun all day and some areas get shade in the morning or afternoon. And, thanks to three huge walnut trees, some areas are dark and dank for the entirety of the growing season. Whatever conditions a plant prefers, it can find them here. The yard has not been tended in a long time, and 'volunteers' (gardener-speak for stuff you didn't plant and may not want) have taken hold. When the weather turns warm in the spring, whole sections of it sprout monocultures of creeping Charlie and purple dead nettle. The fences disappear behind walls of English ivy. Bumper crops of Asiatic dayflower and Asiatic smartweed grow in the raised beds. Broadleaf plantains and common dandelions march across the grassy sections like spear bearers. All of these things are non-native, and some of them are invasive (that means they're non-native and also harmful, crowding out native plants or otherwise disrupting ecosystems). This poison ivy vine was about 2 inches across and had climbed 30 feet up a tree. I treated it once with Roundup Weed & Grass Killer, and it never came back. Tim Heffernan/NYT Wirecutter Getting rid of them piecemeal would be the work of a lifetime, which is why I'm planning to kill everything and start over. My short-term goal was to get the worst of the weeds under control, make the property less of an eyesore, and maybe even make the yard pleasant to hang out in. State-school agricultural extensions proved to be a goldmine of advice. And I would encourage you to explore yours: It may identify locally problematic species or raise other concerns specific to where you live. In addition, I found North Carolina State University Extension's article Are There Alternatives to Glyphosate for Weed Control in Landscapes? to be a gem of clarity and concision. And it's a great general-purpose primer on glyphosate (which you may know as Roundup), other herbicides, non-herbicidal control methods, and the plants and situations they're most effective at addressing. The article A Guide to Weed Life Cycles, from UMass Amherst's Extension Turf Program, is also terrific, and it explains how to identify the different classes of weeds and why managing them requires different approaches. Then I gathered some equipment. I already had a transplanting spade (even before I wrote our guide to them), and I don't think there's a better tool for uprooting shrubs and trees. I also had our top-pick string trimmer and a hori-hori (a digging knife with a dozen uses, including weed removal). To these I added a couple of weed-pulling tools: a propane blowtorch; the first gallon of Roundup I've ever bought (as fraught a moment as ordering my first legal-age beer); and several herbicides that fall under the Environmental Protection Agency's 25(b) 'minimum risk' exemption from FIFRA registration. I added a spray bottle for general Roundup application and a couple of small applicators for daubing it on freshly cut stumps. They mostly proved effective at the different jobs for which they're intended, and this provided my first take-away: You'll get the best results if you keep multiple weed-fighting tools on hand. Connie Park/NYT Wirecutter The trademarked name Roundup is often used interchangeably with glyphosate, a powerful and controversial herbicide that Monsanto patented and began selling under the Roundup name in 1974. (Monsanto's exclusive right to sell glyphosate in the US expired in 2000, and then many other companies began using it in their formulas.) But as of 2024, no Roundup residential lawn-and-garden products contain glyphosate, including the basic Weed & Grass Killer that I used. This basic herbicide rapidly kills most plants, and it degrades quickly, allowing replanting within days or weeks. Roundup Weed & Grass Killer now contains three active ingredients. Triclopyr triethylamine salt (TEA) is what's called a systemic herbicide. Herbicides of this type get absorbed by the plants they're used on and spread to all of the plants' tissues, killing them down to the roots. TEA is also what's called a selective herbicide, which means it's most effective on certain kinds of plants — in TEA's case, woody plants and vines. It's applied to cut stumps to prevent regrowth (and it's frequently used to combat invasive species). TEA specifically works by mimicking an auxin, a plant growth hormone, triggering uncontrolled growth that kills treated plants within days or weeks. The EPA considers TEA slightly toxic to humans, not classifiable as a human carcinogen, practically nontoxic to slightly toxic to birds and marine/estuarine invertebrates, and practically nontoxic to fish and freshwater invertebrates. It is degraded by soil microbes within a few weeks. Fluazifop-p-butyl is a selective, systemic herbicide that's used mainly to kill grasses, and it's not effective on broad-leaved plants. It works by inhibiting lipid (fat and oil) synthesis, and that leads to the breakdown of cell membranes. The EPA considers it of low acute toxicity and unlikely to be carcinogenic to humans. It is degraded by microbes in the soil, and it does not travel well through soil, though the EPA notes that using both fluazifop-p-butyl and triclopyr 'in areas where soil is permeable, particularly where the water table is shallow, may result in groundwater contamination.' Like TEA, fluazifop-p-butyl is frequently used to combat invasives. Diquat dibromide kills by disrupting plants' cell membranes. It's non-systemic, which means it kills only the parts of a plant that it touches. And it's non-selective, which means it's effective on almost all plant types. The EPA considers it non-carcinogenic, of low oral toxicity, and of moderate to severe acute dermal toxicity to humans. It does not migrate through soil, and it's unlikely to get into surface and groundwater. Taken together, this mixture makes the Weed & Grass Killer a broadly effective herbicide in yards and gardens, and one that's quite safe to use and does not persist in the environment. (This allows for replanting of treated areas in as little as a day.) Still, I have qualms about using pesticides in general, and when I do, I make an effort to use as little as possible. In spring 2025, I tried three herbicides — from Sunday and Procter & Gamble — that are heavily marketed as being safer or greener alternatives to traditional formulas. Before using them in my yard, I spoke at length with Trent Lewis, Sunday's co-founder and head of R&D, and Mary Jane Watson, research and development senior scientist at Procter & Gamble. Sunday's Dandelion Doom uses chelated iron (iron HEDTA) to induce fatal iron toxicity in broad-leaved plants. Iron HEDTA is used extensively as a supplemental fertilizer (all photosynthetic plants need some iron), and using it as an herbicide is effectively a matter of vastly over-fertilizing. The EPA has found no reports of adverse effects from exposure to iron HEDTA, and it says that 'pesticidal usage of this biochemical will not have any harmful environmental effects.' Sunday's Weed Warrior is an ammoniated soap. Herbicidal soaps kill by disrupting the protective waxy coating on leaves and damaging leaf-cell walls; this leads to desiccation and cell death. I reviewed the Safety Data Sheets of several widely available brands, including Weed Warrior, and the warnings are that they can irritate the eyes, skin, or lungs and should not be swallowed; these warnings are similar to the warnings on dishwashing soap. Procter & Gamble's Spruce meets the EPA's 25(b) 'minimum risk' conditions. Essentially, this means a pesticide can contain only active ingredients that the EPA believes 'pose little to no risk to human health or the environment,' and in fact many of those ingredients are widely used in food and cosmetic products. Spruce's active ingredients are sodium lauryl sulfate (a surfactant found in a lot of soaps and shampoos), geraniol (geranium essential oil), and cornmint oil. Putting aside all other considerations, it smells delicious. (That wasn't a given. The complete list of 25(b) active ingredients includes dried blood and 'putrescent whole egg solids.') I didn't find any of them as effective as the Roundup. Neither did Wirecutter's Sebastian Compagnucci, an avid gardener who optimizes his weeding practices. This was largely expected: They are not systemic herbicides, which are absorbed into and kill every part of a plant. As both Lewis and Watson noted, that means treated plants' roots can and often do survive and regrow. It typically took two applications of the Sunday and Spruce products to kill the aboveground parts of the grasses, dandelions, and other weeds I used them on. Also, for the products to be the most effective, the plants have to be thoroughly drenched — not just lightly sprayed or wetted with a drop or two. So I wound up using a lot more of the Sunday and Spruce products than I did of the Roundup. Spruce comes in proprietary aerosol cans (they spray straight down), manual spray bottles, and jugs with built-in, battery-powered spray wands. Sunday's Weed Warrior and Dandelion Doom come in manual spray bottles and in jugs and pouches with battery-powered wands. Sunday sells refills for all of them, so you can reuse the original containers. But those wands aren't built to last, and the batteries will die. Spruce sells refills for its jugs and spray bottles but not for the aerosol cans, and its battery-powered wands aren't built to last, either. The incongruity between these 'earth-friendly' herbicides and all of that material waste struck both Seb and me. All told, I'm happier using tiny, targeted amounts of the Roundup Weed & Grass Killer and durable applicators of my own choosing. And I don't plan to keep using Sunday or Spruce after the batches we ordered run out. But I absolutely acknowledge their virtues, too. Connie Park/NYT Wirecutter If you've watched more than a couple of YouTube videos about gardening, I suspect you've gotten ads for Grampa's Weeder. It's pitched as an Olde Tyme secret weapon against unwanted grasses and broad-leaved lawn invaders like dandelions. Given my target-rich environment, I had to try it out. I also tried a similar tool made by Fiskars. This simple tool is an ace at pulling up deep-rooted lawn weeds like dandelions, but it's ineffective on other intruders and in rocky soil. On my dandelions and plantains, Grampa's Weeder and the Fiskars tool both performed as advertised, usually managing to pull out most of the taproots along with the foliage and thus killing the individual plant. (If you don't remove the taproots, a plant will just grow back.) Both the Grampa's Weeder and the Fiskars (shown) are adept at pulling out dandelions, taproots and all. Tim Heffernan/NYT Wirecutter Conveniently, you don't have to lean down or get on your knees to use either tool, the way you do with a traditional hand weeder. (You do have to use your foot to push them into the soil, however.) And they don't leave big holes in the lawn, the way a shovel or trowel can. That said, they are one-trick ponies. Neither worked well on the little walnut sprouts, for example, because the flexible but tough stems prevented the tools' claws from centering on and gripping the roots. They're useless in rocky soil, too, because the claws can't penetrate. I kept the Grampa's Weeder. It lacks the little ejector mechanism of the Fiskars weed puller, but I didn't find that to be much of a time-saver anyway. The simple bamboo-and-metal construction is sturdy, and it's comfortable to hold. And, above all, it's nearly silent. Using it became meditative after a while. The Fiskars weed puller, whose plastic parts never ceased clicking and clacking while I worked, became increasingly irritating to use. I think I'd find excuses to not use it, and that's how weeds take over. Connie Park/NYT Wirecutter Let's get one thing out of the way first: Flame weeding is not flamethrowing. Banish visions of Rambo torching the jungle from your mind. Using targeted heat to kill weeds, though, is an established practice. Steam and hot-foam equipment is used by some professionals, but for homeowners, propane torches are the way to go. For obvious reasons, they can't be used everywhere. They're intended for flame-resistant surfaces like concrete, asphalt, rock, and gravel — places where weeding by hand is difficult or impossible. The University of California's Agricultural and Natural Resources department has some additional guidelines on flame weeding safety, including advice on keeping extinguishing materials nearby and avoiding use in windy, dry, high fire-risk conditions. I tested a popular torch made by Bernzomatic. It hooks up to a standard 16-ounce propane cylinder (available for about $10 at any hardware or outdoors store), so it's light enough to carry in one hand. It has a built-in manual igniter, and its long flame tube lets you stand upright while working. This torch is lightweight, self-igniting, and long enough to use standing upright. It's a good (and satisfying) tool for controlling weeds on nonflammable surfaces. The test area consisted of gravel-choked sidewalk cracks, which the dandelions and plantains consider an excellent place to raise children. The Bernzomatic torch was easy to set up and made quick work of the weeding. After sweeping away any dead leaves and dry grass clippings with a push broom (to avoid unwanted flareups), I simply held the flame over each plant for a second or two — just long enough to make the foliage change to a slightly darker green. This indicates that the plant tissue has been heated enough to kill it; there's no need to burn the weeds to ashes. Seared to perfection. This picture was taken about 18 hours after I torched a strip of the driveway, but the plants actually withered within a few hours of being treated. Tim Heffernan/NYT Wirecutter One thing to note: Torches destroy only above-ground foliage. That's usually enough to kill young weeds outright, per the North Carolina State Extension's guide to glyphosate alternatives, but you usually have to go back and hit mature plants again. Drawing on energy stored in their roots, they can come back several times before their reserves are used up. Like weed pullers, weed torches are essentially one-trick ponies. You should not use them on lawns or in brush (a fire danger), and the flame isn't precise enough to target individual weeds within a crowded garden bed. With care, they can be used in open beds, but if the beds are mulched, make sure that the mulch is properly soaked before you light up. However, people do use weed torches for a few non-gardening purposes, like igniting brush piles and melting ice on sidewalks. There are more efficient ways to do both, but there's something to be said for the fun of wielding the awesome power of fire in your very own hands. None of the above options are ideal for use in vegetable gardens and flowerbeds. And Roundup should never be used anywhere you'll be planting food crops — not even to kill weeds beforehand. Try a stirrup hoe instead. Wirecutter's Sebastian Compagnucci got his stirrup hoe during the pandemic, when his garden became a refuge, and due to this tool's precise, efficient action, his weeding time was cut in half. For uprooting unwanted shrubs and small trees, I've never found a better tool than a transplanting spade. As the name suggests, this tool is also ideal for transplanting (or simply planting) things. And due to its short handles, a transplanting spade is much more maneuverable in the confines of a yard than a standard shovel. A hori-hori is one of our favorite gardening tools. Shaped like a short sword but dished like a trowel, it's great for digging out deep-rooted weeds that are growing close to plants you want to keep. In my raised beds, I found my hori-hori more effective than the weed pullers, which tended to sink into the soft soil and didn't get enough leverage to work properly. A string trimmer can keep weeds knocked down, and it can give desirable plants time to grow and eventually crowd out the weeds for good. I also use mine as a makeshift edger. All this said, now that I've gotten our weed situation under a modicum of control, I find myself frequently turning to the simplest tool of all: my own hands. It really doesn't take long to yank the weeds out of a patch of lawn or the corner of a raised bed. And this approach somehow seems more fair. The plants we call weeds are some of the great survivors and settlers of the living world. The least I can do is give them an honest fight. This article was edited by Jen Gushue and Harry Sawyers.
India.com
11-07-2025
- Politics
- India.com
India to start work on mega projects bordering China at..., Modi govt approves 30 projects, Siachen Glacier to...
(File) New Delhi: The government has approved many important defense projects for the border with China. These projects are spread from East Ladakh to Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh. These include infrastructure for forward aviation bases, construction of facilities for missiles and important road links on the Line of Actual Control (LAC) and other strategic points. These projects have been approved by the Standing Committee (SC-NBWL) of the National Board for Wildlife. Why is SC-NBWL's approval needed? This meeting was held on 26 June and where SC-NBWL evaluated more than 30 defense and infrastructure related projects and approved all of them. Of these, 26 projects are in Ladakh. The meeting was chaired by Union Environment Minister Bhupendra Yadav. Wildlife Board approval is necessary for these projects because these projects are in protected areas like Karakoram Wildlife Sanctuary and Changthang Cold Desert Sanctuary (Ladakh), Dibang Wildlife Sanctuary (Arunachal Pradesh) and Pangolakha Sanctuary (Sikkim). Which other projects are approved by SC-NBWL? The SC-NBWL has also approved the work of Arunachal Frontier Highway near the Myanmar border. The most important project was the road between Daulat Beg Oldie (DBO) to Border Personnel Meeting (BPM) hut. The 10.26 km long road is to be built at the place where senior army officers of India and China meet to discuss border related issues. This area is at an altitude of 17 thousand feet above sea level and also has the highest airstrip. The Defence Ministry had told SC-NBWL that there is no road between these two while on the other side China is building a solid road. Which animals are living in the sanctuary? Karakoram Sanctuary is home to Tibetan deer, shapo, wild yak, bharal, snow leopard, Himalayan grey wolf, lynx and marmot. Dibang Sanctuary is home to leopard and tiger while Asiatic black bear lives in Pangolakha Sanctuary in Sikkim along with other animals. Houses for soldiers of Artillery Regiment Apart from this, the other important projects that have been approved include housing for the personnel of the Artillery Regiment, a field hospital, construction of aviation infrastructure for the Forward Aviation Base in Shyok and construction of technical infrastructure to detect equipment of short-range surface-to-air missiles, etc. Apart from this, approval has also been given for the Siachen region. The Defense Ministry said that the Partapur project will be important for flight activities in the Siachen Glacier.
