In progress

Let me post some information on the currently growing crops and herbs.

The tomatoes have picked up the pace of fruiting now and every other day we find new fruits peeping out.

The 'trial' french bean plant has formed nice and shapely pods. This is the first time we are growing organic french beans at home. I do not know about the other varieties but this french bush bean variety has produced pods within a month of germination. That is REALLY fast and quite suitable for a household like us.

We have already picked the pods as it is important to pick the beans when they are tender. Once a pod reaches full maturity it is suggested that the plants stop producing any more pods since it has attained its goal .ie. a successful reproduction.

Having met such a success in a very short time, now we have sown the next set of bean seeds in two containers and they have germinated too. So as per calculations in approximately a month we might have a bountiful french bean harvest.

I had earlier posted about planting new Mint cuttings. The newly planted cuttings have taken very well to the soil and showing good promises in terms of new leaves.

Now to the not-so good news. Our cucumber plant was thriving until it formed the first fruit. After that the plant stopped producing anymore flowers and this small fruit also seems to have stopped the growth. I had a very careful inspection of the plant and they are no pests in the leaves or near the roots. The soil is well watered and drained and provided with compost often.

We have to wait and see how things turn up .. whether it withers or thrives is up to Almighty now.But I hope they dont become yet another one-fruit casualty.

New Beginnings

It is time to plant the next set of veggies for the upcoming season. We have planned to grow tomatoes,brinjals(eggplants), two varieties of beans (french and broad) and a few other short term plants. The main criteria used for the selection of vegetables is this : simple and easy organic gardening.

When growing the plants directly in the land, the only thing required is to sow the seeds and take care of watering the spot regularly.But when it comes to container gardening, most of the times the seeds directly sown in big containers do not take life. The main reason could be water logging, since the saplings will be very small and the roots will get drenched and drowned if over watered. Too little water and the plant dies. Hence it is preferable to get the seeds germinated in small pots and then once it grows to a height suitable for the big container, then transplant it.

So over the last few weeks, we took this task to completion. The first step to ensure good harvests is to solarize the potting soil by leaving the soil spread in the terrace(or wherever possible) exposed to sun for at least a week.We had a tub of home made compost that was just about done and ready to be mixed with the soil.This compost too was let to dry for the full week along with the potting soil.

Compost 'cooked' to perfection

On the other hand,we had the saplings growing in small boxes(mostly the small curd tubs) in the front yard. The potting mix used for germination was coco-peat+vermi compost mix.

The germination happened very quick since we had the ideal climate. The saplings were then checked often to ensure they had even moisture.


Once the soil solarization was complete, the compost was mixed with the potting soil and then filled in the selected containers. They were watered well and left overnight to let the soil cool down completely. 

The next morning, we took the saplings to the terrace and placed them in their new home.

As you can see, the saplings have grown well and it is time to take them out of their small home.The technique is to gently tap the sides of the box and pull the saplings out.They would come out as a whole along with the soil as if they are glued together.Then put them in a plate and separate them into individual plants.

My mom is the mastermind behind the planning and planting(evidently as seen in most of the pictures).I merely helped and executed her instructions carrying the pots and doing the mixing and such stuff. My sister and dad too spent few hours in the activity whenever possible.

Apart from the joy of growing, it was splendid to have spent a passionate time with my mom and family doing the things we all love to do.

Now all that we have to do is wait for the plants to conquer their new home and reproduce well.

Carrots and Radish

Our attempt at growing radishes met with moderate success this time.

Look who is peeping..

Just recently we harvested a bunch of radishes which were of various sizes, two of them being very sturdy and stout compared to others.

The seeds used were from the local market. For the third attempt I think we most probably will acquire seeds from the town seed shop and use it, aiming for a better harvest. But still compared to our first batch, this one should be considered 'anything is better than nothing'.

An aerial view of the radish leaves..

While radishes were still elusive to us in terms of good harvest, we struck gold in our first attempt at growing carrots. As anyone who had grown a carrot says, it is very easy to grow them provided the soil used is very rich and loose and sandy.

1 month old carrot plants

We grew our carrots in a small plastic container.As this is our first ever time, we did not want to take risks by planting them in big containers and leaving chances for over/under watering effects or fertilization problems. As a result of using a small container, the carrots were also very small in size,yet suitable as a snack now and then.

The moment of truth

It can't get any fresher than this

We are picking the carrots as and when we feel like it ; there are still a bunch left to be harvested. Unlike the carrots available in shops, the home grown ones are definitely sweeter and certainly the freshest. It is yet to be experimented whether carrots grow year round in our hot climate(especially during the upcoming summer days).But we are determined to try our best!

-------------------------------------
P.S : I had scheduled this blog post to be published this Tuesday. Meanwhile we had already harvested the entire batch and had it as a nice evening time snack this weekend. The plants are already 2.5 months old and we did not want to leave it to any chances like our onion harvest.

Rose Gallery

We recently acquired two new rose plants from the weekly Sunday market. The white rose is something that I had longed to own for a long time now and happy to find a very healthy and bushy plant(compared to the other plants in the shop) for twenty rupees.

This plant already had two flowers in it with a couple of buds that were yet to open and a lot of new branches.

The second one is a plant that produces double colored roses(yellow and orange).This plant's flowers seem to be (light)yellow colored on the first day and if left overnight, it turns into a dark yellow rose

with bright orange color near the petal ends.This too cost us twenty rupees but the plant was rather skinny with just one branch.But on closer inspection we saw lots of minute basal canes peeping out. Since we now know the secret to motivate growth in rose plants, we immediately bought it.

I had mentioned before that we had allotted at least 10%  of space to grow ornamental plants in our garden and retaining 90% to grow vegetables. We have a handsome corner in our front yard which is very suitable for placing the containers which hosts the rose plants.So the new ones have been put in nice big containers and added to the lot in the said front yard corner.

Okay, the secret I mentioned above in growing rose plants is this - adding regular dose of Panchagavyam(PG) and Epsom salt. Earlier we were ignorant of the ways in getting the rose plants to produce new shoots and buds. But after getting to know about Epsom salt and PG, now we were able to increase the blooming period and induce new shoots in them. We have rose buds forming and blooming almost non-stop for the past six months. For instance, I am proud to present a glimpse of the yellow rose 'bouquet' that is currently decorating our front yard.

Now a year before we would not have even imagined expecting 6 buds from a plant for a season(in total). Now to have 7 flower buds per branch is well beyond our imagination.

With regular application of Epsom salt and PG we see that not only the quantity of buds increase but also the color of the roses improve.

Even the size of the buds are much bigger than they were before.The hues in the red rose is much pronounced now.

We certainly owe a lot to Epsom salt and PG. As long as they are available readily in the market we are all set in the rose department.

Chillis

The chillis have started producing fruits now. Since they were planted directly in the land and we do not have a good quality soil,it is been a long struggle growing them. The main problem faced was the leaf curling which occurs when there is a calcium deficiency in the soil. This was rectified by using a dash of lime stone dissolved in water.

We faced aphids attack and rectified it by using wood ash.

We have a total of six plants growing in the garden but only two are producing fruits and the rest are still to recover from the leaf curl effect. I do not have high hopes for them as I suspect they are damaged beyond help. But what is producing is producing well.

Surely the next batch of chillis will be grown only in containers.Now that the weather is changing and daytime temperature is raising I am sure our next batches will come out with a zing.Fingers crossed!

Harvesting Spring Onions

I have mentioned earlier how we had failed to grow spring onions in our earlier attempts. So imagine the joy we felt when we harvested these beauties.Indeed it was such a proud moment.

They do seem to have a lovely earthy smell when they are out

 In reality we did not plant spring onion as a crop. We wanted to grow them as we heard that the pest problems rarely occur in places where onions and garlic grow. So we had planted onions in corners of our foam box which we used to grow coriander and fenugreek.

Spring Onions at the corner of foam box

Hence we had planted only four or five onions in total. Although I must admit we missed harvesting the onions on time. We were late by at least a month for the sheer reason of not knowing when the onions are ready. By the time we made a decision to do the harvest, we noticed some of the onions that grew newly,have already started developing new leafy shoots. For the same reason the volunteer spring onion I mentioned in my post HERE had gone well past its harvest stage and turned up to have only a fluff of roots and nice green shoots.

But still the bunch of onion we harvested is actually is good bonus for us. We now intend to grow them as a crop since they require absolutely no maintenance and easily grown. We certainly look forward to a day of harvesting a plateful of onions.

The best of the best :)

Minting all the way..

I am proud to say that when it comes to our culinary mint needs we are self-sufficient with our garden produce.Mint is very easy to grow and it grows well even in poor quality soil.One inherent characteristic of mint is that it propagates very fast and produces branches profusely. If left alone it might even taken over the entire garden.So it is suggested to harvest the stems often at frequent intervals and keep them confined if grown at home.Our garden's mint bed is more than three years old. It is a 2 feet by 1 feet wide space just near by the garage and has provided us with a constant supply of mint leaves whenever we need it. Our culinary requirements for mint are only occasional but when used we use them in ample quantities.

The maintenance effort required for growing mint is very minimal.The only task required is to ensure that the mint bed stays moist to get good healthy leaves.When we do the harvesting we take care of weeding the bed too. 

Mint bed - year 2012

Once a year we scrape off the entire mint bed leaving the roots alone in place.The roots underneath start developing new shoots leading to much better harvests.But unfortunately during this re-growing period, we have to rely on the shop bought mint leaves but the best of the stem cuttings from this bunch will be planted in the mint bed so that the mint population increase quickly.

Some days back, we had to resort to the shop bought mint leaves since the mint bed rejuvenation was happening. Normally we would select and plant the stem cuttings immediately after the kitchen use but due to a family trip we could not do it on the same day. The stems do not propagate if kept refrigerated and cannot be kept outside too as they will be dry by the time we come back. So we followed an alternate method for propagating mint cuttings without planting it in soil immediately.

The trick is to soak the cuttings in a bowl of water and leave it in the sunlight. By the end of a week, we could see tiny roots developing in the cuttings and the stems were very healthy. Some had developed new leaves too.

The stems were then planted in the ground. Even though its been a week, you can see the stems posing fresh and healthy looks.





We also have mint growing in a foam box.This is a recent development and set up as a back up supply when the mint bed is rejuvenating.It hasn't fully developed though as much as we expect it to be.

While growing in a container(in this case, a foam box) one should also keep in mind of the fact that mint is a very invasive plant(as said earlier) with very vigorous roots and if grown in a container,the roots grow by the edges of the pot and try to expand the boundary. Look at our foam box and could you spot a mint branch that is doing this already?




We would like to make up our mind this one instance and leave this branch as it is by calling them smart as they are already 'thinking out of the box'. But to save the box we are going to strongly 'discourage' the other branches from peeping out.

A visual treat.

Everyday, the first thing we do in the morning is to go out and have a look at the plants. I can vouch that maintaining a garden is such a stress buster. Add a few ornamental plants to your garden.. and they take care of making your mornings colorful and energetic.

So here is a picture post again, mainly displaying the flowers(and a tomato!).

Picture perfect Panneer Rose(s). Picture taken by my Mom.

An 'arty' shot of the Bean flowers.

Finally here is a 'funny' shot of our home grown tomato enjoying the republic day celebrations.