A Solitary Lazy Morning.

Yes as the title says...after sending my little one to full day kinder, I had a nice solitary walk with Marco around the neighbourhood..well not exactly solitary since Marco is with me...but he doesnt talk! Of course I love having hubby and little one with me! But sometimes it is nice to have a walk so leisurely...not rushing to anywhere...not having an agenda to finish...These whole week's weather has been very merciful...20 t0 30 deg celsius...so that makes my work light...not much watering and no sick plants...things are pretty much under my control... My passionfruit panama gold is growing excellently at this spot...I have just pruned off the two leader shoots hoping lateral shoots will grow instead...The vine is growing taller and taller and I really wonder how I am going to train it...have to come up with a solution soon.

My carolina black rose grape vine from Daley's fruit is also doing fantastic at this spot. The eureka lemon tree however was not so fortunate. I dont think I would get any grapes this year but hopefully with a good pruning, I will next year.

These are the beans of (stringless pioneer) from Diggers Club. If not for the nets, I think the two plants would not have such nice leaves. Waiting to harvest beans!

Look at my Flemings' Brown turkey fig tree! Full of life! It looked really dead few months back...nearly got binned!

Hooray! Two of the cyclamens sort of died down and I wondered if they are coming back at all...the wonderful news is they are...little leaves and stalks are emerging from the ground meaning there are corms developed underground...Expecting beautiful blossoms out of the kitchen window in winter to come!

Yum...been harvesting a few sweet strawberries (strawberry delight) every alternate day....

Yippee! First ripened chilli padi!

My two new Purple king bean plants are doing well under the housing of netting! Away pesky butterflies and moths!!!

Samuel and I counted...7 cucumbers growing on the vines!

Two swelling bittermelons!

Two of the propagated strawberry delight plants are having flowers and fruits! So happy!

Patches A, C, D & E

The recent warm and long day time have made growth explode in my garden.

At patch A, the three purple king bean plants and the tomato beef steak plant are growing. I cannot seem to see any tomatoes developing at the moment even though there are flowers. I did not remember having trouble with my Mighty red tomato. Puzzled, I consulted fellow blogger 'Scarecrow' and she gave me this useful link : http://www.grow-tomato-sauce.com/tomatopollination.html

Putting veges and edibles aside, I am feeling really proud of this pot of Annabel daisy. It has grown in size about 6 times.

My beloved capsicum plant is developing its fruits steadily. It is ahead of most plants because this is its second season. Feeling more secure with it in a larger pot.

This is one of 5 calendula officinalis plants I have germinated. They are subject to caterpillars like many of my edible plants in the garden but with much vigilance, I have picked and squashed most of them. This one is budding already!

My strawberry delight at Patch C is doing well in its pot although also subject to caterpillars. Its strawberries are very sweet!

Lemon Verbena at Patch C is also doing well and I have allowed one stalk to flower just to see how the flowers look like.

Wow my lemon grass at Patch C which initially did not look like it was going to make it, has actually gone into growth spurt! Hopefully the eggplant supreme and passionfruit panama gold will speed up in growth as well or they could be overtaken by the lemon grass!

After treating my kaffir lime plant at Patch C with chelated iron (not much organic solutions for this), it leapt into growing beautiful healthy-looking new leaves and more fruits and flowers almost immediately...indeed it was iron deficiency!

Eggplant Supreme at Patch C is also doing well except having its leaves munched on probably at night by some insects. In the day, I cannot find any bugs on it.

This is Patch C : strawberries, kaffir lime, eggplant supreme, lemon grass, passionfruit, lemon verbena, capsicum and pixzee peach. Quite an assortment of plants cramped together.

This is Patch E : coriander and continental parsley both flowering and seeding. I did not care as I am surely alright for them to seed and grow new ones, which means new supply of herbs. There is another clump of lemongrass and my pot of bay plant there.

I was cleaning the dusty leaves of my three cyclamens when I saw this. A search reveals them as the fruits of the cyclamens. I read that using seeds is tough so I am just going to leave them alone. I wonder if there are corms in the soil. Hopefully! So that cyclamens can cover the whole of Patch D and under my pomegranate tree and grevilia. They have glorious blooms! See http://organic-is-better.blogspot.com/2009/09/golden-sheen-pittosporum-and-cyclamens.html or click on 'cyclamen' label on right side of my blog.

Flowers Galore!!!

This is a close-up of my snow pea flower. The 'veins' on the petals reminds me of fingerprints, wonderful creation : Once the flower withers, the pea grows :

My mosquito plant is flowering! I could have seen its flowers much earlier if some of the branches did not break in that strong winter wind :

This flower here is so far not identified yet. I suspect it to be some canna lily. Very orchid-like :

2.5 weeks ago, the lavender were still in leaves. 2.5 weeks have passed and I came back to glorious blooms. Even the bees are visiting these blooms. We watched in safety behind our living room window : The three cyclamens have grown a lot compared to when I just bought them :

The pot of gorgeous nasturtiums continues to grow and bloom which is really eye-catching :

The pot it is in is only 20cm but the nasturtiums have long since spilled over and toppled that I had to put the whole pot into a 30cm one for support.

The sunflower (Sun king) have sprouted in two clusters. Strange that the other two clusters did not :

Golden Sheen Pittosporum and Cyclamens

I am back in Singapore catching up with family and relatives. Had a bit of time to spare to update my blog while my boy is busy playing with all his cousins. What a wild time they are having. Here's a close-up of my golden sheen pittosporum. If this hedge is successfully grown over the next few years, I think it would be a really nice natural fence cum wind-break : The three pots of cyclamens which I planted into Patch 5 (shady spot) are doing well. The flowers are still looking good. I hope they will survive the summer heat (heavily mulched) and produce new corms underground and new flowers next autumn/winter :

So Much Work!

Work at new house : Vege patch D : Work with cow manure and lime. Planted and mulched 3 pots of cyclamens. Hope they will grow well in this shady spot.

Rake up fallen plum leaves.

Place leaves in make-shift netting in backyard to let them turn into leaf mould.

Succulent plants flowering beautifully.

Lavender growing new leaves.

Work completed for patch next to garage. Hope not to see weeds!

Work in rental house : Calamondins not doing well. Fruits attacked by aphids. Treated with pyrethrum.

Lemon verbena growing lots of new shoots after last trimming.

Cayenne Pepper under netting since finding out they were attacked at night.

Curry plant growing more shoots in the new house after trimming off lots of aphid-infested shoots.

Buk choy planted from pot to vege patch.

Treated oregano root ball with pyrethrum as it seems it is attacked by gnats.Repotted the oregano and wonder if it will survive the treatment.

Re-potted the aloe vera into a shallow wider planter. New pups emerging. Delicate...broke one.

Potted the Pixee dwarf peach with aged manure and premium potting mix.

Peach tree is losing all its leaves. (below)

Rake up to make leaf mould.