Yellowish Orange for marigolds

Marigolds at upper end of veggie bed burst into yellow and orange dots. The plants are getting very heavy and with soft soil, strong gust of wind may just topple them down.

orange

yellow

orange

Marigold flowers and leaves
do have special smell....



How would we describe marigold's smell?

Coleus having combs

This is a different type of ati-ati or coleus, with leaves bent and twisted. The other ati-ati posted earlier has little light blue flowers attached to a long stalk( Colorful leaves, ati-ati.,) but these don't produce any flower, at least not yet.....

the leaves really look like chicken combs..



What do you think?

Sole Survivor: Our Sunflower.

If any of the many insects take a liking to our sole surviving sunflower, we may not be able to see the first bloom. They do like the leaves, munching at will. I wonder which insect did that. But the bud is developing fast just to warm our hearts.

1

2

3

4

5

The plant is small and short, barely a foot. Must be dwarf specie. The plant doesn't look too happy with two leaves bitten into half , but I sense the fighting spirit in this little plant to go the distance, and present Kakdah with the best sunflower bloom ever!!.. Watch Out.....

(from google pics)
I googled for sunflower buds and found this,
and it looks awfully similar to ours....

How long will the bud take to open up?

Meme Award, what is it to tell, Belle?

Thanks Autumn Belle of My Nice Garden for the award (Meme Award For Me). It has been long since I last get to the stage and grab an award, hands high in the air , oscar style..... haha .... But how many times did I get on my knees, so absorbed and passionate about dirt, poultry manure and caterpillars, leaves, buds, blooms, fruits, seeds and focussing/zooming/clicking/snapping .... countless!!!!

About me? and me? 7 times over.... 7 P!

1. Persona

Bangchik and Kakdah.
I have been telling about my heavily tanned complexion,
and between the two of us,
the storyline is always about me
getting too involved with golf and gardening!!
But the truth is I inherit
a programmed genetic elements down the line...
thus the heavy tan!

2. Pre empt gardeners generosity.

I dont share with many about pre-empting gardeners generosity. We cannot assume kids grow up thinking like kids. For all we know kids may even be thinking like world leaders, doing pre-empt with wars. For six years, like others, I walked to the primary school with the eldest sister, brothers and friends carrying bag full of books. We passed through houses and gardens. On a hot day, who could resist looking at ripe watermelons. I don't know, but we could just be right about pre-empting gardeners generosity by taking one and share under the shade of a coconut tree..... I have been generous with garden produce until now, with neighbors and little creatures of the garden, so my childhood guess might just be right....

3. Place called home.

Tronoh home. The house is being rented out for the moment..... Every single cent of RM600 rent went into Kakdah's account. Huh.., cheap for a bungalow, but we cant expect too much for a property in Seri Iskandar, Tronoh... So this is going to be the place called home in a few years time.

Cars belong to the tenant.
The plate numbers blackened for secrecy,
but the house number remains
for everyone to see.

4. Playing Golf....

I took up golf rather late, but was very passionate about it, until a doctor by the name Dr Hari told me in Mac 2009 to lay off strenuous exercise for a while.. and the bag is still standing at the corner.

5. Passion

Gardening, I guess I inherit it from Dad and Mom and it is always in the blood.

6. Passing down the batons.

kakdah and the two sons,
Yeop and Adik
aged 21 and 20 respectively.
Farah or fondly known as Kakak, the eldest,
is far north with her husband and two of her own, Adlina and Adli.

7. Parading

left to right: Ramli (son in law), Yeop, Kakdah, Farah, Adik, and the red bit is Bangchik.
Adlina (2 year old girl) and Adli (1 year old boy) were not born yet then..

I would like to pass the award to 7 0thers:

1. Valeri: My Small Cornish Garden for her tenacity.
   
2. Joanne:Joanne's Cottage Garden for her support for Blotanical circle.
   
3. Queen Janet: The Queen of Seaford for being so poised all this while.
   
4. Garden Mom: Garden Mom for her untiring effort.
5. Green thumbs: Greenish Thumb for her acute observation.
6. Patsi:Garden Endeavors for her colourful thoughts.
7. Kim and Victoria: Our Life in Idaho for their untiring presence.

Special mention goes to Carrie of Grow Our Own. Her strong conviction with gardening is fascinating and she manage to share the ups and downs in her direct and stylish way. She is promoting whats known as eco-theraphy . She probably has got up from her 1 more sleep before going off to France.

But there are so many friends in Blotanical, and I am reserving other awards for them......, so the next 7 connecting awards and a special mention will continue .........

Finally, this guideline may help:

1. Link back to the person who gave you the award

2. Reveal the 7 things about yourself

3. Tag 7 other bloggers at the end of your post and link to them

4. Let each blogger know they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.

5. Let the tagger know when you post is up.

Cheers everyone.
~bangchik

Sharing papaya with nature.

I was guilty of looking down more than looking up. So must so that I missed picking the ripe papaya. Then one day, I saw an over ripe papaya, mutilated by nature ..... hidden behind rows of potted parsley...

I was guilty again for not recognizing that nature would love to test my generosity too, only this time by pure accident or rather sheer negligence...

what do they think, these creatures as they bore and bite?

Marigolds and Ulam Raja, where do they differ?

When we own a small vegetable garden, none of the plants will miss our attention. In a way we babysit them to the end... Some end up on dinner plate but some are meant for snails, grasshoppers , and caterpillars. Thats how nature prepare itself for continuity , trying to get some form of equilibrium.

As we babysit plants, we become so familiar with the plants. Not only on the flowers, but leaves, the stems, the branches, the color and their smell. A visitor to this blog recently posed a question which in the end, make me promise to myself to see and probe at the differences of Marigolds and Ulam Raja.

ulam raja 1

ulam raja 2

ulam raja 3

ulam raja 4

ULAM RAJA

marigold 1

marigold 2

marigold 3

marigold 4

MARIGOLDS

They look similar, and yet differ in many ways. Ulam Raja exhibits what I term as "leaves upon leaves", and are grown for fresh salad. Marigolds on the other hand are grown to add colors to the garden with their orange blooms. Ulam Rajas are growing fine at the moment but I suspect something not very right with our blooming marigolds, and I will write about it later....... huh.

A new veggie bed replacing papaya.

new veggie...
sown direct on bed

This patch is the earliest we worked on. Four baby papayas to start with early last year. One died. Two remained there, and the third was shifted to a different location, much closer to the house. The third grew and produced good and juicy papayas all this while. The other two on the original position grow at much slower pace, not too high about 5 feet, and fairly thin.

Then one day I made a decision to pull the two out. The place simply not suitable and we dont wish to frustrate the plants further. For half a day, I worked on that patch, by turning the soil over and mix it up with half-done compost after pulling out the two papaya plants.... Kakdah gave the two papaya shoots to Mai, her friend on the other block. Boiled papaya shoots is a delicacy as salad.... slightly bitter but nice.

Pak Choy, Choi Sum and Taiwan Sawi were chosen to fill up half the patch. The other half holds compost leftover for a while.

There we are, making crucial decisions on plants we already have and those we haven't grown yet .... That is a lot tougher than deciding which branch to prune. Very tough, to commit on something which cannot be undone later.

We have to lose them early.
the soil is very hard 8 inches down,
the papaya roots simply cant push through.

You just have to look up....

We have been walking on pavements. Eyes are always on the lookout for signboards, holes or whatever and we keep on walking to the shops or to the car on the way back , safe and sound. It would be a great idea to LOOK UP once in a while. We don't know what we have been missing all this while...

the flower is supposed
to fall onto the ground
but
get itself entangled
on an old stalk

a palm tree

Location: close to Perhentian Bas Kajang.

a girl, a mother and a boat.

Putrajaya Lake.

A girl and a mother returned from a boat ride.

the boatman helped the girl

they walked, feeling contented.
"what a ride", as she sipped her orange juice.

but the father ( I assume) was a little far back


What do you think?