Yup - definitely not lemon balm, and sure looks like lemon basil.

If runners are a worry, you can always put them in a container!

I put mine in these “plantainers” that you can find at most big box stores, and they seem to like it: https://www.homedepot.com/p/MacCourt-20-Gal-Large-Plantainer-Preformed-Pond-Liner-PP2615/308771723. Drill holes, optionally paint white (if you live somewhere hot), add soil/fert/plant, and you’re off to the races.

Make sure you know about the University of Arkansas cultivars before pulling the trigger though! They’ve got some pretty impressive varieties, including ones that produce fruit on first-year branches.

You didn’t start by asking a question. You needlessly trashed a helpful suggestion from a place of ignorance, then asked a naive question defensively to mask a lack of knowledge.

That is rude and trollish behavior.

Since it seems like you don’t know much about bash at all, I promise the book will help you.

You can be someone who actually knows what they’re talking about instead of making embarrassing, snarky comments that expose your lack of education on the topic at hand.

Bash has had some nice minor features and syntax sugar added, but the fundamentals are entirely the same. All the examples in the book work just the same today as they did when it was written.

What was added in 4.X or 5.x that you can’t live without? What do you think has changed that merits inclusion?

It’s a 36 y/o language, mate. I still reference my copy all the time, and found it to be a great definitive resource when I was learning.

How many bash 4/5 features are you seriously using on a regular basis? What do you think is out-of-date?

I highly recommend O’Reilly’s Learning the Bash Shell in paperback form: https://www.oreilly.com/library/view/learning-the-bash/0596009658/.

The other responses you’ve received so far don’t offer much insight into the historical background and underlying mechanics of the shell, which are crucial to understanding the "Why?"s of command-line quirkiness.

• I don’t want to spoil your fun with the mint, but the runners above ground aren’t the ones to worry about. Mint likes to spread through its roots… a lot. Best kept in a container ;).
• Most pests are visible to the eye, but there are a few exceptions like spider mites. You’ll typically know you have them by other obvious signs though. A loupe can be helpful for insect ID, but isn’t crucial.
• You can mostly ignore the nutrition from that compost. You’d have to do some math to know the impact of that fertilized garden soil, but it’s likely quite modest. Feel free to use 1/2 - 3/4 the recommended amount of granular for the first month or two if you want to be conservative.
• High NPK numbers aren’t necessarily good or bad, but they are more concentrated and can be more liable to burn things, depending on their form factor and nutrient release pattern.
• As for lettuce/onion seedlings, ideally you till some fertilizer into the bed while you’re prepping it. You could give them some liquid fertilizer at half-strength to make up the difference - but yeah, they’ll still do fine if you just sidedress in a couple of weeks. Both those plants really like higher-nitrogen feeds, so you might want to think about getting a different fertilizer for them down the road.

All that being said, don’t feel obliged to follow any of this if you don’t want to. You’ve definitely set yourself up to get something edible and tasty, so don’t sweat the details if it starts getting in the way of your fun. Hope it helps and happy gardening!

Thanks! I’m in central Texas - zone 8.

My wife and I are talking about moving up north towards the end of the summer, so I’ve been trying to make the most of this last season. I’ll definitely miss the early start of spring, but I’m excited to try out new local plants wherever we end up. Having to hunt for plants that can deal with weeks of >100F days and no rain gets old after a while.

Great start OP! Some blunt honesty: it’s overcrowded to the point that you will not be getting optimal results - but you’ve set yourself up for some good learning experience nonetheless. Further guidance:

• Get some balanced granular fertilizer (e.g. 5-5-5) and apply according to package instructions, mixing into the top 1-2 inches of soil beneath the mulch without injuring roots. Do not be afraid to use basic-ass Miracle-Gro or the like; organic ferts do not have magical properties that make them more effective than inorganic.
• Don’t overtreat for pests: get a spraybottle of insecticidal soap for spot treatment of aphids and the like. Hand-pick larger bugs like hornworms. If you have a problem that the two above steps can’t solve, reach out to your ag extension office for ID help and further guidance. Eschew neem oil; it’s noob bait.
• Figure out how you want to support those tomatoes. Premade storebought cages will suffice for this year, but you’ll want to make your own cages from wire panel (100x easier than it sounds) or set up a staking system eventually.
• “Full sun” is a bit of a misnomer: in practice, it’s a shorthand term of art for 8+ hours of direct light. Fortunately, everything you planted will be happy with that 6-8 range. You’ll be sacrificing about a third of your max yield, but you’re spot on that it’ll make life much easier in the summer.
• Planting mint in-ground is a home gardening rite of passage. You will learn from that. Welcome to the club ;).

“Liquid fertilizer bad” is already an unhelpful reductionist take, but commenting that on a hydroponics post suggests you aren’t interested in engaging with the posted content, and are instead looking for a reason to be combative. A quick peek at your post history here suggests that this is a common pattern of behavior for you.

Please reconsider the way you are engaging with this forum.

Synology runs a proprietary OS OOTB that’s had multiple sloppy vulns exposing full remote access to users’ files. Putting your data in the hands of fuckups who have and will continue to leak it is the opposite of total control.

It’s completely trivial to store any data you want to in a cloud provider 100% securely just by piping it through openssl before uploading.

The cultivars of the overwintered plants are anaheim, time bomb, and serrano. The new starts have a jalapeno, a tasmanian black, and an ancho/poblano.

Good eye on the bird peppers! I’m a huge fan of those guys too - I use them a lot in fermented salsa.

That sounds heavenly! Do you have any favorite cultivars that do well like growing like that?

Condolences for the freeze!

Yeah, I can totally see that approach making sense for containerized plants. The fresh soil + root wash are really nice for the pest control benefits, but it seems easy enough to (e.g.) dust some diatomaceous earth on the pot occasionally to much the same effect.