Lotus Plant

Somehow the lazy bug crept up on me unaware and I can’t even finish the semi-technical post on auto solar drip system that I “invented” as my first post into balcony gardening.

So I will write on something equally exciting (at least for me) though not much technicalities are required; except perhaps dirty fingers and smelly mud.

The post, ladies and gentlemen would be on lotus plant.

I’m not sure about other Penangites but it’s kinda hard to get your hands on this water plant nowadays; not in the rage I guess.

But I managed to track this plant nursery down; it’s called Seng Huat Nursery at Penang mainland, Jalan Sungai Dua; which sells not only lotus but water lilies as well.

So after getting some needed dimensions and permissions :-), I drove all the way there; lo and behold, I saw one nice looking lotus plant with a cute flower bud (I know this sounds sleazy :-P).

Anyway, I saved (or rather bought) the plant from its watery gloom and brought it back where I duly begun the process of setting it up at the corner of my balcony.

I pulled the plant (plus the mud) from its pot and set it inside a small “balang” (small olden days fish bowl), stuck two NPK tablets for lotus plants into the mud and spread river sand on the top layer to prevent the mud from contaminating the big barrel and turning it into muck. 

Then I propped the whole assembly into the barrel and that’s it. As easy as 1-2-3.

Oh, there are fishes in there as well; which I shall save the story for another day.

After 2 days, the lotus bud bloomed and by the next day, all the petals started dropping off.

So, the bloom is over before it even started. So sad :-S perhaps it is due to transplant shock. I was worried that the plant might die off on me without even saying goodbye.

But then, exactly one week later, there is a new growth from the bowl and now I’ve few new leaves sprouting from the base.

The plant thrives after all. I just hope it will flower one of these days.

Balcony gardening - First post

First of all, I seriously think blogsphere is rather dead or at least dying a slow death. 

Most of the blogs (except those political or fire-hot ones) are abandoned in favour of short meaningless tweets. I mean what can you compress into a 160 characters and making it meaningful at the same time? That itself is another story altogether. 

 

Time is not a good friend of mine lately; with all the added responsibilities gathered over time, and short-attention span (see, I do admit my own shortcomings :-P), I left my blog aside in pursuit of more knowledge (academic + whatnots) and some other more satisfying hobbies. As mentioned in another earlier blog entry, I’m into greeneries now. Malaysia is a tropical climate country with almost constant sun and slightly erratic rain. So what else to do but to spend some time soaking up the Vit-D :-P

Anyway, I will cut my ranting (it mean twigs in Bahasa Malaysia) short (pun intended); and would like to announce the segmentation of my plant-related blog entries into the following labels:

 

1) Herbs and such

2) Fruit plants

3) Misc plants

4) Pest and insecticide

5) Pots, fertilisers and nurseries ;-)

6) Gardening technologies 

7) Others

 

Ps: First entry would be item number six (6) :-) my pride and joy! With all the running around the towns and not to mention slight disagreements along the way :-P