Terrace Garden Update - September
September is interesting month from my perspective as it is the time to start sowing the seeds and wait in bated breath for them to fruit/flower. All the while i have been ignoring flowers and herbs but realize now that they are needed for pest control and pollination as well. Flowers like cosmos and hollyhocks attract lot of butterflies and i have experienced few times with quite a few butterflies hovering around the cosmos plant i had pre summer but lost due to mealy bugs and intense summer.
Back to vegetables, this month has been mostly root veggies. The root veggie Colacasia (cheppankizhangu) is my all time favourite for growing due to pest free and needs very little care except for regular watering and of course harvesting. This colacasia grew himself which i thought would have been from compost bin after being discarded as rotten. All root vegetables needs a well drained soil and i personally feel a soilless medium is better (mix of coco peat and compost should do). In addition to colacasia i also planted a few Turmeric rhizomes graciously donated by my Bangalore friend. I have planned to use the Turmeric plant for the pongal festival. :). In addition to this my Bangalore friend also send few rhizomes of Himalayan turmeric which is currently in a 5 litre plant bucket. This 5 Lt paint bucket has been having very good diversity. A volunteer tomato plant, a brinjal and Elephant foot yam (Senaikizhangu) all came by itself. :)
As a fan of greens, i loved those greens which has long growing season along with cut and grow varieties. Celosia Spinach is one such variety which has green and purple colored leaves and goes easily from seeds. Seeds were donated by my friend from Delhi who attended the "Seed Diversity" festival in Delhi early this year. I heard that there is also a white version of this variety which is called as Pannai Keerai as this grows wild across the farms/pannai. I was checking with my friends for seeds and Usha ji graciously sent across the seeds. But to my surprise i had a plant growing in the pot where i seeded Sukkan Keerai and the plant growing in it i assumed to be Sukkan. But to my surprise i found that to be Panna Keerai after seeing the white spikes of flowers. Thanks nature. :) . Also growing Water Spinach (called Kang Kong in South Asia). Seeds as usual courtesy from Bangalore friend and found the germination and maintainence to be hassle free. It grows from cuttings as well and was successful in rooting one cutting. The surprising part is out of the all Water Spinach plants one plant seem to be vining while others are erect plants. Not sure if there is a vining variety of water spinach. I am not complaining. Had few attempts growing New Zealand spinach. The germination was not great and whatever left post transplant not everything survived albeit one. Keeping fingers crossed. Apart from drumstick (chedi murungai, 3 nos) growing for greens have volunteer Manathakkali growing wild from one of the 20 lt paint bucket and i left it to grow. Thavasi murungai which was struggling to grow has suddenly picked and started to look better. Swiss chard and Kale is doing well now. The green ponnankanni patch is affected by pests and i need to prune them to get fresh leaves pest free.
In addition to this had quite a few volunteer tomatoes and snake gourds growing in 20 lt containers. I started growing Vathala Valli Kizhangu also called Air Potato last month. The rhizome of this was given by Anoop sir and after moving this to a large drum it has started to do well. I wanted to grow Bavani Kathiri for a long time but didnt get hands to seeds. However there was a volunteer eggplant growing and found that to be Bavani and left few brinjal to save seeds. Nowadays lots of volunteer plants growing helping me to spend less time in seeding and bringing them up. Thai long brinjal after pest attack seem to be doing OK and first set of long brinjal is coming up shortly. Salkethi okra (long podded ones) after doing exceptionally well initially had attach Yellow Mosaic virus and i am taking a risk of leaving them though it has started fruiting. Taking a risk here. I grew white Kanthari chilli (seeds from theyoungfarmer.com) which was doing pathetically bad but managed to survive the harsh summer. It has never fruited until now and it is almost 6 months old plant and i was once thinking of pulling the plug for this guy but somehow my laziness helped his guy to survive). After few rounds of cake tea (handful of neem cake, ground nut cake, sesame oil cake and cotton seed oil cake soaked in water for 3-4 days with occasional stirring) along with Panchgavvya seem to have helped the White Kanthari plant and seeing a few small ones. Kanthari chilli is widely used in Kerala which is small but very spicy chilli. It is supposed to control Cholestrol as well. Waiting for the chillis to ripe to save some seeds. Had decent harvest of Bull Horn capcisum (seeds from Auroville) which is taking a break from fruiting.
On the herb and flower front, have volunteer Sweet Basil (Vibuthi pachilai) growing on its own along with Little Gem variety of basil that has got smallish leaves but very aromatic (seeds from Annadana) growing well. Have 4 plants of Marigold which is growing well but yet to flower. Excess nitrogen, i dont know. Leaving it to nature.
Pomegranates have started to bloom profusely but only one turned into fruit. But squirrels ate the only one left. Let us see if i can get a hand on pomegranate in future.
Thats the update for September 2014, Terrace Garden and see you all in the next months blog with updates and new plants. :)
September is interesting month from my perspective as it is the time to start sowing the seeds and wait in bated breath for them to fruit/flower. All the while i have been ignoring flowers and herbs but realize now that they are needed for pest control and pollination as well. Flowers like cosmos and hollyhocks attract lot of butterflies and i have experienced few times with quite a few butterflies hovering around the cosmos plant i had pre summer but lost due to mealy bugs and intense summer.
Back to vegetables, this month has been mostly root veggies. The root veggie Colacasia (cheppankizhangu) is my all time favourite for growing due to pest free and needs very little care except for regular watering and of course harvesting. This colacasia grew himself which i thought would have been from compost bin after being discarded as rotten. All root vegetables needs a well drained soil and i personally feel a soilless medium is better (mix of coco peat and compost should do). In addition to colacasia i also planted a few Turmeric rhizomes graciously donated by my Bangalore friend. I have planned to use the Turmeric plant for the pongal festival. :). In addition to this my Bangalore friend also send few rhizomes of Himalayan turmeric which is currently in a 5 litre plant bucket. This 5 Lt paint bucket has been having very good diversity. A volunteer tomato plant, a brinjal and Elephant foot yam (Senaikizhangu) all came by itself. :)
As a fan of greens, i loved those greens which has long growing season along with cut and grow varieties. Celosia Spinach is one such variety which has green and purple colored leaves and goes easily from seeds. Seeds were donated by my friend from Delhi who attended the "Seed Diversity" festival in Delhi early this year. I heard that there is also a white version of this variety which is called as Pannai Keerai as this grows wild across the farms/pannai. I was checking with my friends for seeds and Usha ji graciously sent across the seeds. But to my surprise i had a plant growing in the pot where i seeded Sukkan Keerai and the plant growing in it i assumed to be Sukkan. But to my surprise i found that to be Panna Keerai after seeing the white spikes of flowers. Thanks nature. :) . Also growing Water Spinach (called Kang Kong in South Asia). Seeds as usual courtesy from Bangalore friend and found the germination and maintainence to be hassle free. It grows from cuttings as well and was successful in rooting one cutting. The surprising part is out of the all Water Spinach plants one plant seem to be vining while others are erect plants. Not sure if there is a vining variety of water spinach. I am not complaining. Had few attempts growing New Zealand spinach. The germination was not great and whatever left post transplant not everything survived albeit one. Keeping fingers crossed. Apart from drumstick (chedi murungai, 3 nos) growing for greens have volunteer Manathakkali growing wild from one of the 20 lt paint bucket and i left it to grow. Thavasi murungai which was struggling to grow has suddenly picked and started to look better. Swiss chard and Kale is doing well now. The green ponnankanni patch is affected by pests and i need to prune them to get fresh leaves pest free.
In addition to this had quite a few volunteer tomatoes and snake gourds growing in 20 lt containers. I started growing Vathala Valli Kizhangu also called Air Potato last month. The rhizome of this was given by Anoop sir and after moving this to a large drum it has started to do well. I wanted to grow Bavani Kathiri for a long time but didnt get hands to seeds. However there was a volunteer eggplant growing and found that to be Bavani and left few brinjal to save seeds. Nowadays lots of volunteer plants growing helping me to spend less time in seeding and bringing them up. Thai long brinjal after pest attack seem to be doing OK and first set of long brinjal is coming up shortly. Salkethi okra (long podded ones) after doing exceptionally well initially had attach Yellow Mosaic virus and i am taking a risk of leaving them though it has started fruiting. Taking a risk here. I grew white Kanthari chilli (seeds from theyoungfarmer.com) which was doing pathetically bad but managed to survive the harsh summer. It has never fruited until now and it is almost 6 months old plant and i was once thinking of pulling the plug for this guy but somehow my laziness helped his guy to survive). After few rounds of cake tea (handful of neem cake, ground nut cake, sesame oil cake and cotton seed oil cake soaked in water for 3-4 days with occasional stirring) along with Panchgavvya seem to have helped the White Kanthari plant and seeing a few small ones. Kanthari chilli is widely used in Kerala which is small but very spicy chilli. It is supposed to control Cholestrol as well. Waiting for the chillis to ripe to save some seeds. Had decent harvest of Bull Horn capcisum (seeds from Auroville) which is taking a break from fruiting.
On the herb and flower front, have volunteer Sweet Basil (Vibuthi pachilai) growing on its own along with Little Gem variety of basil that has got smallish leaves but very aromatic (seeds from Annadana) growing well. Have 4 plants of Marigold which is growing well but yet to flower. Excess nitrogen, i dont know. Leaving it to nature.
Pomegranates have started to bloom profusely but only one turned into fruit. But squirrels ate the only one left. Let us see if i can get a hand on pomegranate in future.
Thats the update for September 2014, Terrace Garden and see you all in the next months blog with updates and new plants. :)
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