• Jayjader@jlai.lu
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    1 hour ago

    It’s a bit clearer in french; “weed” is “mauvaise herbe” which literally translates to “bad herb/grass”.

  • Destide@feddit.uk
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    12 hours ago

    My co-workers call me weed I think it’s because I’m tenacious. So much in fact I have a meeting with HR on Monday probably a pay rise

  • simulacra_procession@lemmy.today
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    14 hours ago

    How about honeysuckle vs trumpet vine? Both grow like hell, invasively, where I live. One is a tasty and pleasant treat when flowering. The other is just… there, growing. A lot.

    • Wolf@lemmy.today
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      12 hours ago

      Same rules apply. If you don’t want it there, it’s a weed. If you don’t mind it being there, it isn’t.

  • Mossheart@lemmy.ca
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    20 hours ago

    Weeds are just highly successful flowers that have earned resentment from others.

  • 🍉 Albert 🍉@lemmy.world
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    23 hours ago

    i call this the weed paradox.

    even though weeds grow unassisted. it is impossible for everyone to grow weeds in their garden. for is they try, they are no longer weeds

  • 1ostA5tro6yne@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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    1 day ago

    OOP is the author of something like seven published novels, one of which has been adapted into a movie and another of which may soon be made into a streaming series. Never feel embarrassed to say what you learned today.

    • ballgoat@lemmy.zip
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      1 day ago

      It’s easy when you didn’t know something that is completely reasonable not to know, like in this example, but it’s always good to admit your ignorance.

  • CoffeeJunkie@lemmy.cafe
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    1 day ago

    The general definition of a weed is “any plant growing where you don’t want it to be”. A corn plant in a bean field is a terrible weed.

    • Grass@sh.itjust.works
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      1 day ago

      what the hell is a bean field? also beans are great with corn they climb the stalks, also have squash, then boom you have the so called three sisters.

        • Grass@sh.itjust.works
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          1 day ago

          oh I’ve only grown vine beans. The ones I have that were originally smuggled when all the invasive species were brought in grow easily 10+ feet high and any I can’t reach are left to dry on the vine at the end of the season and the poles are toppled to grab them

          • faythofdragons@slrpnk.net
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            1 day ago

            I suspect that’s one of the reasons they’re grown in greenhouses commercially. They use a lift to pick, and it’s easier to drive over pavement than dirt.

      • CoffeeJunkie@lemmy.cafe
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        1 day ago

        I am aware of, and deeply intrigued by, the three sisters method. It’s just not a commercially viable method of growing those crops; I don’t know what the harvest would look like.

        We need to grow a lot more industrial hemp, but I’m afraid that’s a bit of a pipe dream unless we change…literally everything.

        • ikidd@lemmy.world
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          19 hours ago

          We have neighbors with tons of hemp bales mouldering in the field because the processors won’t take them because they don’t have anywhere to sell them to. Maybe it’s incompetence, or maybe the hemp hype isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. There aren’t a lot of people willing to grow it anymore.

    • stray@pawb.social
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      1 day ago

      In Swedish the prefix for bad stuff is the same as the prefix for not or un-. So a monster is a not-animal and a weed is ungrass. Which is especially interesting to me because that same prefix (o) is for better versions of things in Japanese.

      e: This got me thinking about “plant,” and I realized it’s literally the verb to plant. In Swedish it’s a growth, or thing that grew. Japanese and Chinese: planted thing. Spanish is also the same as the verb. I feel kinda bad we mostly talk about them in terms of farming them rather than giving them a proper name. Like if they get sentient someday, plant will probably be considered a slur.

      • NoneOfUrBusiness@fedia.io
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        1 day ago

        that same prefix (o) is for better versions of things in Japanese.

        Puts on nerd glasses well ackshually it’s used to elevate the status of something, such as with people, objects or other entities of social or religious significance (for example other people’s family members in a polite situation). It’s more honored than better.

        • stray@pawb.social
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          1 day ago

          I don’t love the honor translation partially because it’s been used in racist caricature, but also because it’s often inaccurate. Like you might say ohana because you’re in an extremely formal interaction, or because you want to sound poetic or whatever, but you’re not actually saying “honorable flowers” usually. You can mean that though. I feel like it’s too context-sensitive and culturally nuanced for simple translation.

          • NoneOfUrBusiness@fedia.io
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            21 hours ago

            Like you might say ohana because you’re in an extremely formal interaction, or because you want to sound poetic or whatever, but you’re not actually saying “honorable flowers” usually.

            I think the most common instance would be simply wanting to sound cute.

      • Evkob (they/them)@lemmy.ca
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        1 day ago

        I think this is something I might be too French-Canadian to understand, here we’d call it “pot” or perhaps “herbe”, both of which don’t translate to “bad grass”.

        Unless overseas “herbe” translates to weed. We use it pretty interchangeably with “gazon” (which just means grass)

  • tiramichu@sh.itjust.works
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    2 days ago

    My definition: aggressive spread and resilience to removal.

    Plants that are pretty might get more of a ‘pass’ than ones which are ugly, poisonous or thorny, but ultimately, even the most beautiful flower becomes a weed when it’s suddenly everywhere and you are fighting constantly to get rid of it.

    • GreenMartian@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      2 days ago

      aggressive spread and resilience to remove

      Many would argue that mint is an herb. But if you ever had your garden invaded by mint, you’ll definitely classify them under weed.

      Always plant mint in a pot. And if your neighbour has mint in their garden, you better have a 2m trench filled with concrete between their garden and yours.

        • jballs@sh.itjust.works
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          1 day ago

          I love stumbling across random information like this. I had no idea that mint spread so aggressively - and will likely never need this information. But it’s fun to learn.

          • Brainsploosh@lemmy.world
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            1 day ago

            Not only does it spread aggressively through it’s roots, but it also grafts onto almost anything. The roots connect to other plants and create new hybrid mints.

    • squaresinger@lemmy.world
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      1 day ago

      My definition: aggressive spread and resilience to removal.

      That fits to a lot of useful plants too. Strawberries, Brambles, Mint, just to name a few.

      • snooggums@lemmy.world
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        1 day ago

        Yes. If you don’t have adequate containment then strawberries can absolutely be a weed.

        A delicious weed, but still a weed.

        • squaresinger@lemmy.world
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          1 day ago

          And that’s the actual definition of a weed: If you don’t want it there, it’s a weed. If you do, it’s not.

    • Evil_Shrubbery@lemmy.zip
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      2 days ago

      aggressive spread and resilience to removal

      Humans are a weed.

      becomes a weed when it’s suddenly everywhere and you are fighting constantly to get rid of it

      (Humans! :))
      But you are fighting constantly to get rid of it bcs of some arbitrary goals. And the fact it’s spreading means that it’s perfectly adapted for survival in that environment you created, so it’s perfect for that pace.

        • Evil_Shrubbery@lemmy.zip
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          2 days ago

          My sounding port is DC 24V compatible, just hook me up, I have still decades of battery life to offer!

      • Not_Dav3@lemmy.world
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        2 days ago

        the fact it’s spreading means that it’s perfectly adapted for survival in that environment you created, so it’s perfect for that pace.

        There is such a thing as exotic invasive species that destabilize the local ecosystem, though.

        • Evil_Shrubbery@lemmy.zip
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          1 day ago

          Yes, humans.
          We destabilised to fairly high extend literally all the ecosystems (unless you count battery cage farming as an (artificial) ecosystem, that one boomed, agricultural monocultures too).

          But I’m not just continuing a bit, humans are rally the source of a lot of invasive species introduced to local environments where otherwise that wouldn’t happen. And it mostly happened unintentionally, but intentionally too.

          The dif I wanna point out is the scale & timeframes.
          Eg naturally (by which I mean without human involvement) invasive species mostly happen really slowly, and from adjacent ecosystems (sure, there are exceptions, but it’s like spiders shooting butt-strings into the air & just by chance floating to Hawaii). Bcs ecosystems overlap, there is no strict boundary for the species.

          And that is what always happened throughout history, it’s part of evolution (ever fauna actively transferring various species to new environments).

        • Evil_Shrubbery@lemmy.zip
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          2 days ago

          True. Which still leads to an infestation.

          On non-logarithmic scale:

          And don’t forget that shown is just the last couple of thousand of years - there are 4 more millions of years prior to this of slow growth (and some collapses) but it wouldn’t even register on such a chart.

          Ugh, I guess this is far off topic.

          • jballs@sh.itjust.works
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            1 day ago

            The average growth rate from 10,000 BCE to 1700 was just 0.04% per year.

            Wow that’s crazy to me. I had always envisioned humans steadily spreading and growing constantly. I had no idea that we were basically treading water for so long.

            • Evil_Shrubbery@lemmy.zip
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              1 day ago

              Yeah, 4 million years of various “humanoid” species cohabiting & barely making it through (one big event wiping out the whole species - that’s why we have such a shallow gene pool & all look “identical” relative to difs in other species).

              But the rapid growth was always unsustainable, the gens lived on natural wealth that they just took out of (into?) the economy way quicker than the replenishing cycle. But the difference between a million and a billon is unimaginable, that’s why we can now witness the collapse (mass extinction event) within a generation.

          • outhouseperilous@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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            1 day ago

            Love the malthusianism. Why focus on person or life quality when you can terminate your thoughts with ‘human bad’?

            No need to ever fix or grow if just ‘human bad’.