…I was in Barbados and it was day 3 into our 35 day trip to the Caribbean. We took the bus from Christ Church to the capital city, Bridgetown.
Meat donut. Your choice of sausage or minced meat. We got the coconut.
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On Daffodils
Yesterday afternoon I was offered some bulbs for free, but I had to pass. I had a deadline for my next book to-be today, and I have a much bigger one in two weeks. When would I have time to plant bulbs? Never-mind the fact that it is already December and the top crust of the soil is already a little bit frozen.
Adding to these excuses is the fact that I have not had a chance to make plans for the space. Chances are good that I will have to dig up anything we put in. Oh, and have I mentioned that our yard slopes significantly? Once we dig the whole thing up in the spring, we will also have to shift the soil around in an attempt to level it out a bit. Raised beds might be in order to make up for the steepest slopes.
I told Davin about the bulbs and that I was going to have to turn them down. He was disappointed. I had introduced the prospect of spring flowers to enjoy 3 or 4 months from now, and he couldn’t let the dream go.
Thirty minutes later I found myself pressing the “ORDER” button on $88 dollars worth of assorted spring bulbs with the promise that he will do most of the planting. Planting that will probably happen while snow is falling from the sky.
A few of those bulbs were daffodils. Not the daffodils in these pictures, but still daffodils. Pretty little daffodils. I don’t know who I am sometimes anymore. Not in a bad way. But more in a “I could not have predicted this, kind of way. I’ve become a person who likes begonias. And daffodils.
Leave a commentPainted Leaves
Behold, the beautiful leaves of this Rex Begonia I bought last winter. It’s flowering!
The trick to growing this particular begonia is shade and humidity. My time hiking through forests in Dominica really drove that point home in a clear way. I often found begonias growing in surprisingly dim spots underneath thick tree canopy and near to a water source where the humidity was high. Rex Begonias are known for demanding more of both.
When I first bought this plant I had a difficult time finding that balance. I got the humidity part right but gave it too much light. Rexs without enough humidity end up with crispy leaf edges. And when the light is too bright, they lose their vibrant color.
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Even Good Change Can Be Hard
A few days ago we packed up the old place, packed up the roof garden and all of my plants, and moved. It was hell. A special thanks to friends who helped us get the remaining vestiges of our stuff out. That was no small feat and I am super, super grateful.
As of right now we are living in the midst of chaos. Piles of boxes lay everywhere. We can’t find anything, although I did find the kettle yesterday! Baby steps and small victories. I’m calling this stage the Where is Everything? Phase. The basement is like a set from the television show Hoarders. Regardless, for the first time in my adult life I have a basement. Hooray for a place to throw the stuff I can’t deal with right now and the location of my future seed-starting set-up!
This morning I woke up from a bad dream. In it, I had gone back to the old place to visit a neighbour and there was a television crew out on the roof giving it an extremely fancy, bourgeoisie makeover. In typical dream-like fashion everything was twisted. So while I should have had direct access to the roof, in the dream I couldn’t get anywhere near it to ask what was going on. And as I walked around looking for ways to gain access, it only got further and further away. The next thing I knew I was lugging my bike around heavy security lines and the makeover wasn’t just my old roof but the whole neighbourhood.
As the size of the production grew, so did my anxiety level. I was becoming a frantic person running around muttering aloud, “That used to be my garden. What are they doing to my garden?”
Finally, I found someone who would tell me what was happening. They were filming a makeover show, but they were also super fancifying the space to be a meeting place for a Catholic Bishop that was coming to town. Huh? All I can say for that portion is that last night was Halloween and one of the movies I watched (John Carpenter’s “Vampires”) must have melded with my dream.
Needless to say, I am beginning to suffer some emotional fallout from that tornado-like move. It was fast and furious, leaving me with a sense of displacement and some vestiges of separation anxiety from my old and familiar garden. And yet, I am also very excited to be embarking on gardening in a brand new location with a new set of positives and challenges to maneuver within.
Onward and upward.
Leave a commentAir Potato
I was introduced to this “potato that grows above the ground” on an organic farm tour in Dominica. It was one of the plants we were most excited about, but because we only got the Patois name (and it turns out I heard that wrong, too), were never able to identify it. Davin and I spent hours searching various spellings, and even guessed at what it could be (a yam) with no luck.
And then just like that Davin found it! Dioscorea bulbifera, aka “air potato” is an African yam (of course) that produces potato-like bulbils along the vining stems. There’s quite a bit of controversy around the plant because not all varieties are considered edible. Many uncultivated forms are very bitter if not poisonous, and there is some debate about how to prepare it to make it safe.
The plant is currently considered an invasive threat in warmer parts of the United States. It’s a very fast-growing vine that can grow up high into large trees and disperse itself easily via the bulbils.
For all of these reasons, the air potato is one weird edible that I would advise against growing.
Leave a commentComing February 2012
New from Gayla Trail. Easy Growing: Organic Herbs and Edible Flowers from Small Spaces.
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Grow Great Grub: Organic Food from Small Spaces. The essential encouraging guide from Gayla Trail.
