Today is the last day for daily posts.

I have been churning pictures to display and share here in this blog and the Blotanical on daily basis. Out of necessity , I have to make a change. No more daily posts, Only Wordless Wednesday for the next two month. I am going for a long, long trip overseas......

The Wordless Wednesday to be posted later are pictures I have collected earlier, to share here but I will not  be able to respond to your comments. Do come and share your time and thoughts. Garden is the big wide world, Blotanical in its funny way manage to link these little gardens to a much bigger and more meaningful world called Garden of EARTH......... and its ours, all of us.

I will return......

Cheers
~bangchik and kakdah

35 sunflower seeds altogether

sunflower drying up.

the seeds.

The episode on sole surviving sunflower in our little vegetable garden is about to end, as I finally separate the seeds..... There are 35 good seeds and about 10 not so good ones. I guess the bigger and more rounded seeds are the good ones, and they really look promising. The other 10 seeds are smaller and thinner, therefore it is fair to put them aside. Who knows, the smaller and thinner ones may germinate into some interesting looking dwarf sunflower!

By the look of it, we are ready to go on with the second generation of sunflowers. Even though the mother plant produced only one flower, it really gave such an impact to our experience and added some interesting colour to the garden. The other companions, an eggplant and two basils still growing and the eggplant is currently bearing two lovely looking purple fruit.

Growing sunflower in a cluster with other different plants enable us to view and compare them. At least now, I do understand that in a race who would last longest, Sunflower is the first to go leaving the eggplant and basils to continue playing hide and seek with sunshine, rains and gusts of wind in our little vegetable garden, Putrajaya, MALAYSIA.

Lets grow sunflower to uncover the secret of beauty!

~bangchik

Putrajaya Malaysia

Wordless Wednesday: the lines

~bangchik

Putrajaya Malaysia

the old leaves won't fall, these Ulam Raja.

ulam raja

Ulam raja has old brown leaves hanging down still intact, protecting the stems against scotching hot sun.  The plants were planted in clusters, very close, barely six inches apart. They do create an impact, and the hanging old leaves give a lovely tone of green and brown.

Kakdah cut off the shoots for salads. She purposely  created the pyramid look, by cutting the shoots from the outer plants first, and progressively moved to the inside. There is no sign of ulam raja flowering yet. Ulam Raja is getting very tall, almost 5 feet, much taller than their normal height of about 3 feet. Neighbours and friends has been asking about the secret recipe for such height.... Regular watering, adequate poultry fertilizer and a little bit of attention may be.. haha.

~bangchik

Putrajaya, Malaysia

the fate of marigolds after pruning

marigolds now quite bushy.

 

 

zinnias at the other end

 

Marigold buds against flowering zinnias

 

Soon yellow of marigolds

will blend

with pink of zinnia.

My little experiment on pruning marigolds waits for some interesting result. An earlier post on pruning is here ; Pruning marigolds at Walkway Bed  .  There are signs of marigolds ready to sprout the lovely yellow little blooms.  

~bangchik

Putrajaya Malaysia

Shade of Coleus ~ green

This coleus looks different from the one posted here , Coleus having combs. I am not too sure if they are of different variety. Could the sunlight has anything to do with this? The one with pronounced reddish edge in the earlier post are more exposed to sunlight. This particular coleus, not hidden much , but I observe that it does less sunbathing!... I guess the heavier green patch is a way to maximise photosynthesis....

Such a behaviour ......

Happy gardening
~bangchik and kakdah
Putrajaya Malaysia

Bougainvillea bathed in pink.

An attempt to create blurry image at close range is to focus on a slightly further object of the same colour tone. The nearer object will be blurry thus creating the bathed in pink look.

~bangchik

Putrajaya Malaysia

Kamunting, a wild plant.

kamunting
pink and white flowers

close-up of the white flower

 

 

location: 
50 meters from Kakyah's house, my younger sister.
Pantai Remis, Perak.

Kamunting.

A place in Taiping Perak is named after this plant. Kamunting. The plant continues to stay wild and has never find a home in anybody's garden that I know of.  It really strikes my childhood memories, this plant. The ripening berries are so sweet and nice, and it is normal for us to meander a little bit on the way home from school... just for a pocketful of kamunting berries.

The place I grew up, is really sandy. Kamunting seem to love sandy habitat. They have the habit of making dense fibrous roots , as a support. Old roots decompose and new roots come out... So in fact the plant is making the best out of the sandy environment, creating their own healthy environment to thrive on... A real survivor...

They produce lovely flowers... almost similar to senduduk. But I notice two different set of flowers, the white and the light purple. I don't know, but I guess one is male and the other is female... Even the stigma is different in both flowers,  Or they start off being white and develop into pink a while later... Huh.. When I was young, the different flowers never attract my attention as much as the lovely and juicy berries... haha.

~bangchik

Putrajaya, Malaysia

Wordless Wednesday: Spiky and Vibrant

~bangchik and kakdah

How long do I have to wait?

sunflower

[bunga matahari]

 

sunflower

 

even the stalk is yellowing

 

The sunflower must have a very stiff neck now, for not being able to follow closely the path taken by the sun. It used to be very responsive and possessive  if I may say, never allow the sun out of its sight. Some of us may know why sunflower has to exhibit such behaviour when the flower is at its prettiest.

Now it is getting much older, with stiff neck and wrinkles. The leaves are yellowing..., the remnants of stigma are browning fast. And I saw one or two ants making regular trips up there, and I wonder why....

I wonder when the seeds will mature.. Do I have  to wait until the seeds dry up there or cut the old flower and dry out myself?....

 How long do I have to wait?

Have a nice day,
~bangchik
Putrajaya, MALAYSIA

different shades of color

matured and baby cups hanging in the air,
of asin-asin

old and young beans

 

 an old leaf

of winged bean.

 

ulam raja against winged bean plant

 

 zinnia against marigolds

 

the sky and the houses

~bangchik

Putrajaya, Malaysia

The fate of the tangled third banana.

tangled up banana releasing itself.

 

crumpled and dried up portion of the leaf

 

the flower and the little fruits

I was sharing here about the third banana got tangled up with the leaf sometime ago [The third banana get entangled.] They break free now, and I don't investigate further why they got tangled up in the first place..... Yea, when a solution is arrived at, there is no point to probe further why the problem appear in the first place.....  as the  Beatles has been singing away "Let it be... let it be.... let it be..."

But I did notice the crumpled and dried up portion of the leaf that has been holding up banana flowers and fruits for a week or so. Possibly the leaf tried to have a feel what being pregnant is all about?.... huh!

~bangchik

Putrajaya, Malaysia

Matching up roselles against marigolds

red roselle and yellow marigold.

the blurry background is ixora.

 

roselle and marigolds are real companions.

I keep on coming to these marigolds. They are immediate companions of roselles. We relax a little bit on roselles, and now the branches are drooping down, heavy with strikingly red colored fruits. Marigolds are flowering making the lower end of vegetable bed really multi-coloured.

~bangchik

Putrajaya, Malaysia

Tapioca after heavy pruning.

We did heavy pruning recently. All branches gone. Out of the many tapioca plants, we keep only 2 plants, the rest were pulled out. .... We managed to get quite a good harvest of  the roots (ubi kayu), enough for  afternoon snacks. If the roots  turn out to be fluffy, we call them "empuk".  That's awfully nice.., and has rural feel in it and definitely very nostalgic..... When roots are too matured, they become so hard and woody

But new shoots appeared within days.... With such zest, I wonder if plants ever get caught up with obesity.... hmmm...

~BANGCHIK AND KAKDAH

putrajaya, malaysia

A breather along the highway.

I dont normally drive for long. Two hours is just about it. I normally swerve to the left and have a good rest at one of the many R&R.

This is Bukit Gantang..... a lovely spot to rest and eat or drink. It wasn't weekends or festive seasons, otherwise the whole place will be crowded, and at worst we cant get even a parking place.

a guy
suddenly appear as I was clicking

Rest and Restaurant
[ R&R]
is almost like a garden
to whoever that stop there.