And third, I am having mixed feelings about the care some of my ex-plants are getting. I think I will take some photos, in a few days. Maybe this afternoon, when everyone in town with be at the perenegracion and Missa for San Rafael. And then the barbeque and Talent Show, and dance.
These three photos (above) show most of the plants I still have in my little movable garden.
I love this little plant. It seems to be very prolific. I bought it at the little cacti section at Soriana in Tepic. Soriana is sort of like Wal-Mart, but with a much larger and more creative variety of stuff. Plus Soriana surrounds itself with lots of little shops and food stalls, and it'sfun to shop there.
When I bought this plant for 15 pesos, maybe 1.35US, there were three stems. Everyone who saw the little guy wanted a piece of it, and I quickly ended up with one stem. I know that's not what it's called , but whatever.... And it's grown back quickly, in maybe three months.
I only have four (three photos below) Desert Rose plants left right now, in three different sizes, plus a few babies. But I am getting ready to start some new babies, and we'll see what happens. They are also very popular. Everyone wants one. The blossoms are so gorgeous. And as long at they have direct sun for five or six hours and the dirt is watered regularly they seem to be happy. Cross my fingers.
This Desert Rose (Adenium Obesium) started as a cutting late last spring. This is its first or second blossom.
I like these two spikey plants (Above and below). The.....had eight little cousins, all who have gone on to other gardens.
I feel so lucky to be able to grown the plants I always craved in Zone 5. Like these plants, and Bouganvillea, and Hisbiscus, and Ginger, and many others. The climate is wonderful for plants here. The hillsides and roadways are starting to blossom out, and everything looks so green and lovely.I guess I should miss the Fall Color and the freezing nights of up North, but so far, I don't. I do miss harvesting my carrots, beets, potatoes, and apples for winter. And canning tomatoes and fruit. But that's life at 22 N latitude.
7 comments:
Your plants look really good! I have one of those fan palms in my garden -- at least I think it is the same one (Livistonia, I think it is). It has grown to 12 feet wide! Hopefully, it will stay smaller in a pot.
I'm going to have to get one of those desert roses. I have seen them in the viveros.
I like the buckets, too. I have a hard time finding pots here so I might try that, too.
Love to see all those tropical plants again. My dad grew desert rose, adenium obesum as a hedge in Hawaii. I miss seeing heliconias and gingers too although you see them for sale here occasionally. Why do you have them in pots? Thanks for the photos.
Hi, just a thought here about saving your photos. Your laptop prbobably has the ability to burn CSs/DVDs. Why don't you sort your photos and burn them to CDs? Then you will have them for sure. I like to have backups of my favorite photos; because you never know if/when a website might crash and burn. LOL.
Brenda
Always feel some serious plant envy when I see your tropicals
looking so exuberantly happy on their 'home turf' I grow some of
them here but they never seem as
happy here.
I share your feelings about
getting more pleasure from fewer
plants. Ive only come to this
realization in the past couple years. I used to cover my deck with
dozens & dozens of pots and let
everything jumble together. I liked
it that way then, but now take more
pleasure in a dozen or so really well-grown plants. Any meaning in
that? Who knows.
Hi La Gringo, I just use the buckets because they are cheap, 10 pesos/90 cents, and easy to move with the handles. I smack some holes in the bottoms for drainage. I like that palm too. It needs to be transplanted. All the potted foliage plants that belong to the owner (but they are MY babies) are bursting their plastic pots, so I am in the middle of transplanting them.
Hi Ki, Thanks for the comment. Two reasons for the pots. One is that I move every six or seven months (beause I housesit at this house in the seven summer months, and rent a room, or rent/camp in the winter. So I want to be able to take some plants with me and to easily hand them off to someone else if I think i can't take care of them where I will be living.
The other reason for the pots is this house where I am house sitting is sitting in the middle of a jungle area, and the house is built lot-line to lot-in in all four directions. So there's no place to plant in the dirt. But the owners have planted anyway. They have added, on the neighbors undeveloped land, about 12 bouganvilleas and some handkerchief plants, hibiscus, gingers etc right along the south side of the house. Last summer the owner (or his bud, or someone) sprayed some of the plants down there before I realized what the idiots' were doing.
There is a legal requirement than people keep their house-less lots "clean" .So once a year, just before the rainy season, there is a big push for killing and spraying. Of course, my nearest neighbor has her workers kill plants all over the neighborhood, for her parking convenience, whether or not they are her lots.
Never a boring day around here.
Hi Brenda. thanks for the sugggstion.
This is going to sound really stupid but I haven't figured out how to save more than one photo at a time on a disk. I have a Mac ibookG4 laptop if you have any suggestions. Besides getting a new brain.
I am trying to delete any photos I don't really think I need to keep. Last night I took 250 photos at the town dance event and just saved 14. First time using a flash, and it showed.
Hi Teo,
It's amazing to me how much of my life has been invested in plants and growing things and watching them change and learning about their habits and needs. Just like kids I guess.
I love the crowded jungle look too. But both ways of gardening are nice I guess. It's so amazing how much easier life is when you never have to think about the weather. Same clothes all the time. No jackets, etc etc etc. No socks, mittens, gloves for warmth, hats except for the sun protection. That plants must love it too.
I love your plants and recognize some of them as houseplants that I have or have had at one time or another. It is interesting the lack of concern with chemical-use that you see. It's the same here. Maybe the equipment is shinier and newer, that's all. Good luck for the coming storms! I hope there will not be too much damage.
Hi from Andee
Someone wrote a Comment that seems to have disappeared, about what plants are available in San Miguel de Allende. And asking about on-line info about what plants are available at nurseries in SMA. I can't imagine a nursery in SMA having a website, particularly in English. The plants the Commenter mentioned, roses and dahlias are very popular in Nayarit, Jalisco and Guanajuato states. So I can't imagine that they aren't for sale in one of the more that 10 nurseries in the SMA area. The Commenter also wanted get get bare-root roses. I don't understand wanting them, and don't know if they are available. I am not a personal fan of roses, especially in the climate I live in. But maybe in SMA.....
There are so many plants that will grow here,and in SMA, and so many grow happily and blossom all the time, it's hard to imagine growing roses (for me anyway). But people do it here in Chacala too (where they grow kind of like annuals). It might be a good idea to wait and see what plants, vines, and shrubs you can buy, trade, or get cuttings from once you are living here.
It's a different plant world along the 20th Latitude, in the mountains and along the ocean in Mexico. And unless you are currrently living in Southern Florida you might want wait to make gardening plans until you have a chance to get familiar with the climate and what will grow happily, without the need for chemicals, in SMA.
Anyway. SMA is wonderful for gardener. A great climate for all kinds of plants. Plants blossom year-around and are so gorgeous.
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