More garden content… I’ve been thinking about starting another blog for my garden and things related to that (herbal medicine) because there may be a lot of that in the nearby future, but I decided to just keep it all together and go with the flow. This blog has always been very personal and changing along with my interests, so maybe it’s time to accept that it is what it is, instead of trying to be “more professional”. It’s supposed to be fun. Don’t worry though, there will be knitting/crafting too 😉
Anyway, this morning I started early (before it got warm) and walked around.
Here’s what I’ve been doing:
:: watering the banana tree and wondering if it’s a plantain (banana in Papiamentu) or a banana (bakoba in Papiamentu). I asked when I bought it, but I was talking English and the woman I bought it from was speaking Papiamentu and Spanish (she wasn’t from Curaçao). I only realized there might have been a miscommunication about this being a banana tree when I was driving back home. I tried to look it up online, but I’ll have to wait until more leaves and fruit are growing to know for sure.
:: watering my papaya trees and wondering who’s eating the leaves. All six of them look like this or worse. I suspect iguanas, but we’ve also seen a deer on the other side of the fence and there is a part missing. I do hope this will stop soon.
:: hoping the geraniums (pelargoniums) I planted out yesterday will survive. Over the day they lost about all their color and they don’t look too happy. But if there’s one thing I’ve learned from all those years of working with plants, it’s that you have to give them time. Even if you think they’re dying, they’re often just trying to adjust. So we’ll wait and see. I did move them to a spot that has a little bit more shadow though.
:: noticing the neem tree is flowering. I checked online to see if neem flowers have any use. Oh yes, they do. So I gathered a few to dry them and I will be clipping more this evening or tomorrow morning. I also want fruit, so I have to be careful not to clip too much.
:: thinking this ancient Kalbas tree just outside our property may grow one kalbas this season. At least if I’m right about this being the flower. It’s fun to get to know these local trees and plants.
:: treating my desert rose with dish soap (diluted of course) and hoping that will get rid of the bugs that are bothering it. It’s still flowering (all year long!), but it doesn’t look as happy as it usually does.
:: wondering what tree this is. It’s almost always bare (iguanas eat the leaves), but right now it has flowers that smell wonderfully sweet and there are berries on it too. Maybe it’s time to join some of those local gardening groups on facebook so that I can ask if someone knows.
:: planning to do so much more. Sow some of those seeds I bought Wednesday, plant my avocado tree (it needs more room than the planter can give it), remove more thornbushes to make room for more plants, make ginger oil, look up more recipes like that… Oh, the list in my mind is endless. I think I’ll start by writing it all down, that might help 😉