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Vanda Orchid

My First Orchid

Thursday July 27, 2000.

		First off I want to say that yesterday was my grandmother Scylla's birthday. She passed away a few years ago before I really got to know who she was. A few of my traits that I can trace back to her are the plant growing fever and the ability to make something out of nothing. Even when she lived in an apartment building she grew potatoes on her balcony. Every Christmas she would place her plants together into a triangular shape and then decorate it with ornaments like a tree. Here's a small tribute I did about her and her potatoes. That crazy trip to the video store actually provided a second strange occurance. On the way back I discovered two baby sparrows huddled together on top of a planter on the sidewalk. It's one of those city planters that are made of concrete and covered in tiny pebbles. This happens to me every year. I find a baby bird abandoned and hurt sitting on the side walk and tweating for it's parent. I stood there several minutes contemplating my dilemma. Do I take them in and try to nurture them to health despite the fact that I have a cat? Do I put them on my deck and make a little box for them where they will be protected from the street but could be subjected to the occassional cat or raccoon? Do I do nothing and hope that the parent bird knows where they are and is still feeding them? I chose the last option. Every year this happens to me and every year I try to do something to no avail. I'm probably doing more harm then good since my success rate has been minimal over the years. Well yesterday when i went out to look for them they were gone. Someone said he saw them around and that they can fly minimally. Later that day we found one of them in my garden sitting on the red current bush. Apparently the parents know where they are and are feeding them. I made the right decision and I'm very happy about that.

Wed. July 26, 2000.

		I had the strangest garden related experience to date last night. I was walking past my garden on the side of the building, on my way to rent a movie for the evening, when I saw a large, plastic urn-style planter stuffed behind the red current bush in my garden. It had annuals in it. I wished I had my digital camera on me but I thought I'd take a picture when I got back. Well when I got back, the planter was gone. As I approached my porch, I saw that a HUGE chunk had been ripped off of a bush and there was a big beer bottle (a 40 ouncer) and a plastic bottle of vodka sitting on top of some plants and crushing them. Two large flower stem had been ripped off the astilbe and several other plants had been trampled on and crushed. The only explanation I have for this is that there were two "shady characters" (male and female) hanging out and rough-housing on the corner when I left and they were acting pretty drunk. Could they be the people who dropped off the planter and then took it on their way when they were done hanging about? Of course the destruction next to the porch can only be the result of said person or persons drinking copious amounts of beer, and then feeling the immediate need to urinate, trampled on the plants to that nice private place, well protected from street view that I lovingly refer to as the "bathroom garden". Need I say more? I don't want to incite big city paranoia in anyone but crazy things happen occassionally around here. Basically having a very publicly accessible garden has provided a nice place for people to hang out and drink 40s of beer. I've often thought that maybe there should be a bench put in there. Lately I've been thinking more and more about making some signs that mark the plant names. That should give it that Public Gardens feel. I've always been a fan of those identification markers. I was the type of kid that actually read those signs. One final public garden complaint. Lately people have been ripping off my day lilies. Literally ripping off entire stems. It could be worse. I've heard that some public gardens have to chain down rare plants because people will come in and steal them. I don't have any rare plants so it shouldn't become a problem any time soon. In better news the lilies from my friend's wedding have bloomed two very large, white, trumpet-shaped flowers. Someone is going to rip those off for sure.

Monday July 24, 2000.

		Now that it is nearly the end of July, and a little late to start growing most vegetables, I have some serious regrets. I should have grown peppers this year. I should have planted more tomato plants. One is not enough. I don't even know what kind of tomato I'm growing (although it looks like it might be plum) because it was a mystery plant that just popped up in my *Rubber Tree (ficus elastica)* pot. My mom told me she's growing jalapeño peppers on her balcony and I was very jealous. I love jalapeños. It's not entirely due to my own laziness that i'm finding myself in this dilemma. I'm sure I have more than enough plants to care for right now. In fact I know I have way too many plants to take care of. But I'm greedy and I always want more. On a brighter note, I have recently put all of my succulents and cacti outside on the deck. They're all together in one area and they look great. If I only had the option of growing succulents and cacti I'd still be very happy. In celebration of this even I bought myself a new cactus, an *echinopsis* of some sort. It had one of those dyed strawflowers hot glued to the tip which I promptly removed. Who do they think they're fooling? I can see the glue. This year it has been unseasonably wet. It has only recently begun to let up on the rain. Waiting until now to put the cacti out was a good idea I think. As a result of moving so many indoor plants out, I had lots of room to shift plants around. I ended up spending almost all of Saturday moving plants, repotting plants, and other maintenance. All of my indoor plants look so much better now. With so many plants to take care of during the growing season, my indoor plants begin to suffer some neglect. Now I have all this extra space inside and I have to stop myself from thinking that I have room for more plants. All of those succulents have to come back in eventually. On Friday night I went to visit Claire (who is a regular contributor to this site), at her mom's house. What an amazing balcony! It was huge, and had lots of trees and a greenhouse! A greenhouse! I want one so bad. Of course it was evening when I arrived so I haven't seen it in the daytime yet but I'm sure it's just as good in the light of day. Or maybe even better. That was the kind of deck I aspire to. Lastly I want to publicly thank Beate for bringing me some fine vegetables from her garden and a neat box set of Flash cards by Rand McNally from 1961 featuring animals, birds and trees. previous entry