Here Comes the Rain

It rained today. For the first time since round about April. Locals have remarked on how this has been one of the poorest dry seasons up here in the North the last few years. In my three and a half years up here, I must say this last 'Dry' has been quite humid and warm!

In a way I AM happy that the Wet is on its way. Why delay something which is inevitable? But I also hold fears for the new seedlings. Hopefully they will find their way and not be drowned by the watershed that is sure to come.

In a sad turn of events, the cherry tomato plants are looking a little bedraggled. Most of the ones in the middle bed have been afflicted by some sort of wilt. I'm guessing there is something in the soil which isn't agreeing with the tomatoes. I have put in potash, fed them with Liquid Powerfeed and chicken poo. Nothing seems to have made the soil to their liking. Though there is fruit on the tomato trusses, they are not growing noticeably bigger. All of the fruit is still quite green and minute.

Two of the Grosse Lisse plants in the large bed are also affected. It's a matter of time before the wilt spreads to the rest of the healthy plants. Most of the Grosse Lisse haven't even flowered yet, and are unlikely to. The plan is to leave the affected plants until the sorry end, then removal.

Luckily the rest of the plants are still holding up. The zucchini plant has sprung up like never before, although no fruit as yet. The eggplants are powering on, and I'm proud to say we have a Lebanese cucumber growing longer and thicker than my middle finger!! So now I know that my hand pollination has been successful and will keep up the good work - as I have yet to spot any bees to do the job.

EGGPLANT FLOWERS

LEBANESE CUCUMBER

BIRD'S EYE VIEW (Middle Bed)

The Final Bed

Well... yesterday was another big development for the Troppo Food Garden. I prepped the third (and final) bed in the morning to plant later that the evening. The plan was for a "Brassica" Bed, and I filled it with Pak Choi, Chinese Cabbage (Wombok) and Chinese Broccoli (Kailan). In the centre, I transplanted an orange marigold from the middle bed, which was being slowly overshadowed by giant zucchini leaves. Hopefully this new spot will prove favourable.

This third bed is the smallest of the three and receives less sun. Which shouldn't be a problem as these brassicas are fine in either part shade or full sun. (According to the packet instructions.) The advantage of the third bed is that it also receives full morning sun and is shaded by the time the sun reaches boiling point in the middle of the day. As there are plenty of leftover pak choi seedlings, I have planted four in individual small pots, three in what spare space exists in the pumpkin patch. Will do a comparison between all the differently situated pak choi to see what aspect and soil they favour.

Not much mention has been made of the cucumber plants, which have silently been doing their own thing. My boyfriend discovered two open female flowers in the middle bed. I had so far thought that none of the cucumber plants were bearing. However, other dead unpollinated cucumber flowers were subsequently discovered, which leads me to think that the cucumber needs hand pollination, just like the pumpkins. I tried just that this morning.

There are a few challenges when it comes to hand pollinating cucumbers. The first is the SIZE of the actual flowers. The largest cucumber (Lebanese) flower which I have come across is roughly the diameter of a 50 cent piece. This makes pollinating them quite fiddly, as the actual organs of the male and female are no more than approximately 4mm in diameter.

The second thing is male and female cucumber flowers look almost identical face up, so you have to look at what's behind the flower to determine its gender. Obviously, the female will have a miniscule cucumber attached to it, whereas the males sit on a plain stem.

Thirdly, cucumber flowers don't seem to produce as much visible pollen as pumpkin flowers do. The fine paintbrush I normally use for the pumpkins was not sufficient for such a dainty task. In the end, I had to sacrifice two male cucumber flowers by peeling back their petals to reveal the stamen, and placing that as a whole INTO the female flower. A rather indelicate process I must admit. If it works, I shall be recommending this technique however!

FEMALE CUCUMBER FLOWER (with stuffing)

Dressing the Fence

Here is the final site for the climbing beans and snow peas. We decided to place them next to the bare fence in the hope that they will climb all over and eventually shroud the fence. My boyfriend placed some wiring on the fence with the hope of enticing the beans and peas to clamber onto. A bare patch of fence just seems like an empty canvas calling out for some colour and life.

We spaced the beans 15cms apart, according to the packet instructions. I decided to intersperse them with snow peas as well. Not sure how well that will work, and I wonder whether the beans will take over the peas. See what happens I guess!

The passionfruit vines planted nearby seem to be slowly but surely taking to the wires placed on their part of the fence. Our final aim is to have the whole back fence covered with food-producing plants or bee-attracting flowers!

To that effect, I am happy to report two of the nasturtium seeds have sprouted. I started off another four today in a recycled food container. I am becoming somewhat of a pro at punching holes into used plastic food containers for seedlings!

The chickpeas I planted 3 days ago have also germinated into what you see below (about a week later). I find the pale green leaves and long stems quite appealing. Apparently chickpea plants also bear white or violet flowers (depending on variety). Win-win situation for me! I must admit to being a fan of the humble chickpea. They are a versatile addition to curries, soups and many vegetarian dishes. Can't wait to try making hommus using home-grown chickpeas!

Baby Tomato

I found our very first tomato growing in the garden. It is a tiny, green cherry tomato; slightly larger than a pea. Thank goodness it survived my prior culling of tomato flowers. I had read somewhere that pinching out flowers on young tomato plants would aid their growth, and I did just that, not knowing that my plants were already mature and ready for fruiting! So after a severe bout of guilt, I left all the poor tomato plants to their own devices, vowing never to pinch off another flower again!

GREEN BABY CHERRY

Anyhow, luckily this little green tomato found its own way despite my meddling. It hangs on one of the lower branches of a large cherry tomato plant. I discovered it when I was staking a wayward tomato branch. (Cheers, applause) That describes the noises going off inside my head as I made the discovery. Very happy right now just thinking about the lil' tomato growing bigger and bigger.

Yesterday, I also planted some ginger and galangal in polystyrene containers. I'm not sure whether this latest experiment will work, as I acquired the ginger and galangal pieces from a local market. The lady who sold me the ginger said it came from "down south", adding helpfully that it "won't grow here". However the man with the galangal said he grew his locally. From researching the internet, I found that the main thing is to keep the pieces moist and humid, once planted. This is the preferred clime for these members of the Zingiberaceae family. Ginger and galangal crops take about 100 days to reach harvest potential, so once again, I will be playing the waiting game!

GINGER & GALANGAL PIECES

From Little Things Big Things Grow

SOWN SEEDS - DAY ONE

Venturing into the world of packet seeds is like gazing into a garden of endless possibilities. There are so many from which to choose, ranging from the humble potato to mysterious sounding things like amaranth and mizuna. After spending about 4ominutes perusing through almost every packet on display and speed-reading through planting instuctions, we finally purchased just four types of seed. (How restrained, right?) They were Climbing Beans (Blue Lake), Nasturtium (Trailing), Pak Choi (Hei Xia F1) and Snow Peas (Climbing).

As these were our first packets of store-bought seeds, my boyfriend planted with great care, all four varieties in used seedling trays. Just SIX DAYS later... Behold how they have grown! (Even though most of the seed packets say germination takes 7-10 days). Seed actually began to sprout on the third day in most cases, with the exception of the Nasturtium (14-21 days).

We chose this as we currently have no beans growing in our garden, and apparently they grow well most of the year in tropical climate. We also wanted a climber which will help cover our bare fence, AND at the same time give us nutritious food. Win-win!

CLIMBING BEAN (Blue Lake)

I didn't think Snow peas would grow well here even though I love eating them. My boyfriend seemed determined however, to get them to grow. Here's hoping he succeeds!

SNOW PEA (Climbing)

Pak Choi is such a versatile vegetable in Asian cooking. I chose it because of this reason, and also because I know it will grow in this climate. (My next-door neighbour grows it in proliferation.) In the same pic are also capsicum seedlings which we grew from collected (not store-bought) seeds.

PAK CHOI (Hei Xi F1)

Finally I have included a picture of the sweet mint seedling we bought, as I forgot in a previous entry. I decided to grow it in a pot as I have heard mint loves to take over any area of the garden in which it is planted. I have never really cooked with mint, but it's one of those handy kitchen herbs.

SWEET MINT

Pics of the nasturtium to follow when they finally sprout.

Guava in the Ground

SMALLER LOCAL GUAVA

Today we planted the smaller of the two guava trees. It stands at around 70cms high and has two main stems. It has been looking rather bare of leaves and my boyfriend and I weren't sure if it would survive much longer in its pot. The soil that came with the pot looks rather dark and solid, not friable and moist. So we have a suspicion the guava may not be receiving enough water even though we water it regularly.

This morning, we made it a priority to plant the guava. After all, it has been waiting patiently with us for a couple of months now. I'm not sure what variety of guava it is, but it is probably the most common one grown in the tropical north, with a green skin and pinky red centres, also known as Cherry guava.

Two days later, my boyfriend planted the larger guava, known as Indian Guava, var. Allahabad Safeeda. Apparently it is a small evergreen tree of 3-5m which bears large rounded fruit with pale yellowy cream skin and white flesh with few seeds. It is in a full-sun position as recommended, however its leaves seem to be curling and browning at the edges. Overall though, the tree seems to be reasonably healthy. Hopefully both trees will be happy in their new spots in the garden. As fruit trees go, guava seem unfussy as to they type of soil it calls home. One website I searched says "They will thrive in any sort of soil from sand right to clay soils". (Greengold Garden Concepts) The site also recommends adding dolomite to the soil around the tree after planting. Maybe I should try that and see if the leaves improve. Also, both trees should bear fruit within 12 months of planting. Looking forward to that!

Guava fruit is crunchy and fragrant. I remember eating heaps as a kid, sometimes mixing crushed salted plums to the fruit to give it a tanginess when it lacked sweetness. Sometimes guava skin can be a little bitter when picked too early, but fully-ripened guava is delicious and soft.

INDIAN GUAVA

A-Maize-ing Corn

As mentioned previously, one of the sweetcorn is overtaking all the others in terms of height and growth. I noticed with excitement that the silks are now about 6cms long and a lovely bright green colour.

ONE ABOVE ALL OTHERS

According to a video I watched on YouTube on pollinating corn - which was hilarious as it was informative - the corn in my garden is still in its early stages. The silks and tassels need to be a goldeny yellow colour before they are mature enough to "mate". Or do what plants do.

As I can't seem to find the link to the corn video on YouTube, search "corn pollination" or the video's producer "TRYtoHELPyou" on the site. He offers very easy, direct instructions on how to hand pollinate ears of corn. So simple it's mind-boggling. The end credits are amusing too.

But basically what I have read and learned about corn is that the pointy bits on top are the male "tassels" which produce pollen with which to fertilise the female "silks", scientifically known as elongated stigmas. The proper name for corn is maize, and its scientific name is Zea mays.

In order to hand pollinate your corn (usually the job of wind or breezes) run your fingers along the horizontal stems of the male tassels to gather the pollen. Then merely sprinkle as much of the pollen onto the awaiting silks. The aim of pollination is to form kernels on your ears of corn. An unfertilised ear of corn looks kinda like a baby sweetcorn you find in stir-frys. Just a conical shape with tiny bumps without lovely rounded yellow kernels to complete the picture.

Once fertilisation takes place, the all-important kernels will begin to form on the ear of corn. You know pollination has been successful when the silks turn brown and start clumping together. The picture below was taken about 2 weeks after the silks started showed.

FERTILISED CORN

Fruit of Dragon

Now there's an unusual name for a fruit. For such an exciting sounding name, the taste of the dragonfruit is somewhat... bland. Its outer appearance however is, one supposes, from where the fruit derives its name. Dragonfruits have a fleshy, deep pink outer skin, tinged with emerald green. The plant on which it grows resembles a cactus, with thorny clusters which makes removing them from pots to plant inground slightly challenging.

Today, I did just that, to one such dragonfruit plant. We bought it from a local home nursery, just around the back laneway from our home. At the same time, we also bought a Ceylon spinach and sweet mint. The lovely lady who runs the nursery also sportingly let us into her chook shed to dig out some chook poo for our garden. We carried the chook poo in two big buckets back to our yard and put it in the compost to mature. The lady said to leave it for four weeks before adding to the garden beds. This was only one week ago.

CEYLON SPINACH

I have come to realise gardening is as much a waiting game as it is sometimes physically tasking, a lot of research, planning and trial-and-error. I must admit, in the last few days I have felt somehow deflated at times. My mental conversation goes along the lines of: "The plants are in. Now what?" I am not a patient gardener... nor am I in fact, a patient person at all.

In order to boost my spirits, and trick myself into delving further into this garden adventure upon which I have embarked, I take stock of how far the garden has come since June. I observe the tiny things which have grown, or are about to.

A couple of days ago, a tiny arrowhead peeked out from the top of one of the sweetcorn. I was pleasantly surprised as I was proud. So far so good. Although ginger and black ants love nestling amongst corn leaves, right near where new ears of corn will sprout. I hope this doesn't mean the ants will destroy all cobs before they mature. The ants are still overrunning the garden. The nursery lady from round the back - let's call her Mrs Mulch - says ants are a nuisance and should be gotten rid of. However an author I am reading lately, Babs Corbette, seems to think ants are good as they help aerate soil and dispose of dead matter, in her book "Intimate Secrets of a Flamboyant Gardener".

What I need are worms, which would do the job a hundredfold of ants, if indeed, that is what ants actually do. So far, all the ant activity I have seen is either intrusive or unintelligible. Worms would not disturb or eat living plants, as they are only interested in consuming anything which was once alive. Hmm.. worm farming. Now THAT'S an intriguing thought.

Butternutty

Not much to report except the baby pumpkin is growing. SUCCESS is mine - with hand pollination - mwahahaaHAAHAHAHAH!!! The baby pumpkin started off quite green, and now it's quite a pale green-almost-white colour. The flower on top of its head is shrivelled and browned, but still attached. It makes the pumpkin look as if it has a brown mohawky tuft. I have the urge to draw eyes and a mouth on it and call it "Wilson".

I noticed also that another tiny female bud had started to form on the same vine which the baby pumpkin is growing. Except the tiny bud has now turned yellow and growth has stopped. Perhaps it's another plant-survival thing, where only one fruit can form on any one vine. Elsewhere on other vines of the pumpkin plant tells the same story. Where there is more than one female bud starting to form on a vine, only one will remain green whereas the others turn yellow and stunted. Maybe it's just a coincidence? Maybe it's a natural selection thing? Whatever it is I will get to the bottom of it... one day.

P.S. I also obtained an out-of-date bag of potatoes which I am now storing in the cupboard until they sprout 'eyes'. Then I shall plant those too!! MWaaahhaahahahahahhhAAHHAHA!! I think all this success with planting may be messing with my head....