During the growing season, lay acid fertilizer, fish emulsion, or bone meal across the soil at the base of the plant. You generally won’t need to do this from November to February. These pests can sicken your plants over time so it’s important to spot them early and treat the problem. Whiteflies look like miniature white moths and mealybugs look like tiny cotton balls stuck to the leaves. Check the top and bottoms of leaves as well as the stems for any insects.
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One-sentence summary -- Fertilize the gardenia every 3-4 weeks. Look for whiteflies and mealybugs.


The first step in identifying palm trees is to check the shape of the fronds. The most common frond shape looks like a feather; the leaves extend out from a long stem that grows from the tree’s crown. If your palm’s fronds are feather-shaped, or pinnate, you can narrow down its subfamily and look up types of pinnate palms in your area. Pinnate, or feather-like, fronds are found on some of the most common palm varieties, including the areca palm, coconut palm, queen palm, and date palm. If the fronds aren’t feather-shaped, they’re most likely fan-like palmate leaves. Fan fronds have leaves that grow from a single point. The leaves are usually attached for a portion of their length. In some species, the entire structure can grow at least 8 feet (2.4 m) wide! As with pinnate leaves, if your palm has fan-shaped palmate leaves, you can narrow down its subfamily and look up palmate varieties that grow in your area. Examples of palmate species include the Bismarck palm, Mexican fan palm, and windmill palm. Sabal palms, which are native to the United States and Caribbean islands, have costapalmate fronds. The leaves grow from an extended structure called a costa instead of from a single point. They still look like fans, but they’re kind of like a cross between feather-like pinnate fronds and fan-shaped palmate fronds. While uncommon, one family of palms have fishtail-shaped bipinnate leaves. In bipinnate fronds, leafy, feather-shaped secondary stems grow from a main stem. Palms in this family grow in Southeast Asia and Oceania. Individual palm leaves fold down the middle to form a V-shape. Check your palm’s leaves and see if they form a right-side up V or an upside down V. Leaves that form an upright V are called induplicate; leaves that fold in an upside down V are called reduplicate. The leaf folds can help you further narrow down your palm’s subfamily. For instance, if your palm has feather-shaped pinnate fronds and upright V-shaped induplicate leaf folds, it’s probably a type of date palm.
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One-sentence summary -- Look for feather-shaped pinnate leaves. See if the fronds are fan-shaped if they don’t look like feathers. Keep an eye out for unusual frond shapes. Note which direction the leaves fold.


You can use this technique in drawing a realistic cloud. Choose light gray for the shade of the clouds.  The shades of the clouds are usually located at the bottom part of the clouds.  However, shades always depend on where the light source is coming from. Using white oil pastels make circular strokes of the medium to the colored paper. Use your thumb or index finger in smudging the colors.  Carefully wipe the colors with your finger, according to the shape of the cloud, to show the smudge effect. Repeat the same circular strokes that you have done earlier.  Only this time do not put too much pressure on the pastel strokes.  Do it enough to show the actual shape of the clouds. Add light and few strokes of lavender on the bottom areas to show the shade of the clouds.
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One-sentence summary --
Get any blue colored paper. Take one of your oil pastels for the shade of the cloud. Add white. Smudge the colors. Put on the white oil pastel strokes. Add the shade.