Hydrangeas in S Carolina

 

Mum loved hydrangeas. I never understood her craziness over the flower in New Delhi till I saw them in Davids Garden in London and in Andy's layout in Cleveland Forest. As I went for my jog everyday up and down the hills, I couldn't help but admire the pristine white hydrangeas in most gardens. Just the uniform white flower in boring similarity in all gardens.  I particularly liked the huge hedge of them in one garden on the way to the kids school. 

A bank of white hydrangeas!

Then the senior guy who lived in the corner massive house decided to do up his garden. A whole team was called in to landscape his garden and last year I watched the whole garden being ripped apart including trimming of the massive oaks. I loved watching them work putting in a crazy paving path and lawns were unrolled in carpets of emerald, green. Of course I had to jog past as it was on the way to Mr Fig tree loaded with figs that I gobbled up by the hands full, beating Mr and Mrs Cardinal to the biggest and the best figs.

Look at them up close. They are breathtaking!

David's hydrangeas are a pale Robin egg blue. I sank a pile of old nails near its roots and the blue grew darker! He's not too fond of them but agreed to buying one, for a cheap one pound, in a local market for me. The plant is 10 times its size now growing in his compost like soil. And I sink iron bits around its soil to enjoy the changing flower colour.

Its Avocado year!

 Its avocado year!

Yes after so many barren years, the avocados in the farm have fruited. FOUR trees in all, one of which or maybe more were Dads germinated in his famous broken buckets! He had those tin buckets which split at the bottom and instead of throwing them out, he filled them with compost and pushed Rose apple and Avocado seeds in them. The seeds germinated and remained in the bucket not growing beyond 3 feet height.

Then along came my farm and all his famous buckets were planted in the farm. Each tree has different leaves and differently shaped fruit. He even had a purple African variety which sadly I did not get. However I recognise the provenance of  the four trees on my property.

The last of the avocados from one tree.

The first tree which fruited had round fruit. They were perfectly spherical and not very large. Those were the first fruit we harvested as we found some fallen off the tree, lying in the grass beneath. The 

leaves of this tree are dark green and large and flappy.

The next tree had pear shaped small fruit like the Haas variety Andy buys in the US from COSTCO. These fruit I took to Goa and my Goa friends bought them and sang their praises for weeks after they ate them. They remained green when ripe and just got soft. It was so heartening that we took them out correctly in time for them to ripen. That is the biggest worry for a fruit farmer. Have you taken out the fruit immature? Then your harvest is wasted.

Arpans stash have ripened in a week.

A smaller tree got a rash of fruit but sadly most of them fell off when there was a storm. It was really sad that only five fruit hung on and grew to maturity.  It was sad, but we realised a fruit farmer can never be sure of the harvest as the trees are open to the elements. Happened with our mango crop last year, but luckily we grow a lot of Mallika with thick stalks even though the fruit are large.

 

The fourth and last tree - Sunday harvest is a ritual.

The fourth and last tree was bent double with the weight of the fruit on it. I had got Sundar to chop a V branch from the Jamun tree and prop up the branches which were almost touching the ground with the weight of the fruit. However the fruit took much longer to mature. I carried home a apple and peach picker from the UK, a gift from a gardener on my group. JP brought the picker to David's house, and we picked apples off the neighbour's tree, which they don't mind. 

The Goa gardeners were begging for the fruit, but before I could advertise all 4 kgs were gone.  Infact I bought a new weighing scale as the older one had done its time. We have an Indian fruit picker off Amazon and this British picker which is also good. I like these simple tools which make harvesting easy and there's no need of extra labour like Dad had to employ.

This year has been a good year for both Lychees and avocados. Hopefully it remains for next year as well. Nothing like good harvests for us organic fruit farmers.

Dragon Fruit on the farm

 

The caretaker in Hoskote got a couple of Dragon fruit cuttings from a nearby farm. Then in typical fashion he pulled out a few kucchas from the side of the land and built a pendal. He knew I would not allow him to pull out the kucchas, as they marked the boundary. 

Anyway, I left the pendal as he built it and we started feeding the cactus looking plant with a lot of compost and chicken waste. Until then, I found dragon fruit tasteless and fine in a salad or fruit salad. Not eaten alone.  

The plant spiralled up especially in the rains and we were so very happy seeing it begin to flop over the pendal as can be seen in the picture. Last year we got two or three fruit. But this year there are many all over the plant.

Fruiting Dragon fruit in Hoskote

What was interesting to see was the flowers were huge and exactly like the Star of Bethlem-  white waxy flower! The flower barely lasted one night and then hung downwards and dried up. One can see the dried petals of the flower in the picture. From the base the fruit begin to grow.

The petals of the flower dry up like straw and hang downwards. We don't remove it, Just let it dry along with the growing fruit. Slowly the fruit grow larger and turn their signature pink colour. Once they turn a deep pink we harvest. So far, I have not sold any of the fruit. They are deliciously sweet and I cannot let any be eaten apart from us. Maybe once Steve leaves. For now we are enjoying them as they are totally organic and shop bought does not compare.

Hahahaha!

SOME TIMES LIARS CAN BE EXPOSED!!

My farm is still mine dear Rashme and Michelle Cherian , Mathew Cherian  the tattle tales!!!

Hahaha!Im so glad you fell for my bluff!

I would NEVER sell what I dearly love!! 

Her grubby paws were slapped off!

Davids stress buster!

Davids stress buster -- his garden!

 The garden when David first bought the house.

"Mum! We've bought our forever house in Woking, a leafy suburb of Surrey. Just 20 minutes from London. You'' have a lot of work to do in the garden," said David. Little did I dream that the house would be so neglected, smelling disgustingly of dog but the garden was an utter nightmare! A huge cypress dominated the large rectangular garden and that was the first ting David wanted out.

David bought a petrol  lawn mower that he taught me to use.and I spent many hours making the lawn look like a beautiful green carpet rather than the jungle when I first saw it !The only thing that saved me was I knew the UK had no snakes so there was no fear of that. However taking no chances, I wore tall gum boots while mowing! 

Roses blooming from the Elm Nursery

David being the sweet and gentle son that he is took me to the Elm Nursery down the road. "Choose whatever plant you want Mum and we'll  plant it before you go."I needed no second bidding and chose the above beauty. As long as I stayed all the waste milk of curd of the babies was put to the rose and it. It still blooms and blooms its plate sized fragrant roses a decade later.

 

The old apple trees in the garden also fruited but one could see the trees were old and gnarled and needed a lot of nurturing. Infact we found the apples which grew from the neighbour's garden into Davids house had sweeter and many more apples!

 

The garden today

Then David being the perfectionist got a landscaper to redo the whole place and look at what he has achieved over the years! How we both love that garden and I take small plants from India to plant there. The Cheese plant and the curry leaf, Mummy"s white ginger, all flourish but indoors. After all they are tropical. The garden has been populated with hundreds of flowering and leafy plants which give it a typical English garden look. "Dad just loves his garden and he looks after it all on is own,"says Natalie. Spending hours on his days off I firmly believe that he should teach the kids to come out and help like my Dad did and so I could run my farm with little effort for over 35 years.

My yearly lunch for my London Bangalore pals.

For years we get tgther for lunch with David helping me have a good time. Then all of them go home with a bag of organic apples from his garden. Its wonderful to visit and have them all over and I cook my desi khaana which they all enjoy.

Atalaya Castle -- Huntingdon Beach

 

Atalaya Castle -- Huntingdon Beach

Every time I visit the boys they make sure I see some place new so I can write about it-- so this is my latest in Terra Green.

Pg 1

Pg 2

Pg 3

The laburnum in Hoskote

The laburnum ( Cassia Fistula) in Hoskote
 

The Laburnum near the gate of Bella Vista.

As kids I absolutely loved Grandpa Micks Laburnum in the Baroda garden. What a tree that was right at the front gate of his garden and adjacent to the front balcony that we hung out in. I remember Mum telling me to read My Cousin Rachel by Daphne du Maurier. What a book and that's where the toxic seeds of this glorious laburnum makes for interesting reading. Mum loved Du Maurier and Georgette Heyer romances and I was named after a heroine in one of Georgette Heyer's books -- "The Quiet Gentleman." Mum would always say the difference in your name is it is not  spelled the usual British way --Marion, or Marian, but the French way -- Marianne.

The tree that's growing just within the gate and behind the beautiful chapdi walls. It seems to be growing all over the land and outside, self seeding itself. No matter how many times I try to dig out a young plant to take to fellow gardeners longing for the tree, it just dies on me. The tree is blooming all over the village and I see kids picking the flowers and not knowing the danger of its poison.

Toxicity: All parts of the Laburnum tree, especially the seeds, are poisonous.

Symptoms of Poisoning: Ingestion can lead to severe symptoms such as nausea, vomiting, stomach pain, sweating, and in extreme cases, respiratory distress.

Precaution: It is advisable to wear gloves when handling the seeds or pods and to ensure they are stored out of reach of children and animals.

  

I do not  want to touch or collect the seeds, but it seems thats the only way forward.