My garden in the Fall 2012

More snapshots  - this time from the Fall 2012, of my San Diego garden. 5 years ago!!!

My life has been a non-stop whirlwind of activities and events since the school year began. Hence, the lapse in blog postings......I thought I start by showing what has been happening in my garden.

My original pandanus plant from Well Sweep Farm in New Jersey!! See the baby pandanus plants at its base. I remember the owner of the nursery telling how subceptible the pandanus was to the cold.They had at one resorted to buying back plants from their customers to restart/ strengthen their stock of pandanus. I had this pandanus plant for over 10 years, taking it inside during the winter and letting it enjoy sunny warm days outside.This plant and its babies would survive until 2014 when it succumbed to an irrigation accident. We had gone away for a trip and my irrigation had failed..... Unfortunately, it was a scorching summer. No amount of watering could revive my beloved pandan.

Black Jack Fig has been a staple of my San Diego garden for many years. To me, it is one of the most delicious of the figs.

Dragon fruit flowering! This did not happen too often!

 Dragon Fruit

Turmeric is flower

Figs

The Pandan Experiment

I have not been in synch with Mother Nature of late......She blessed me with 3 Torch Ginger ( Bunga Kantan) seedlings and I forgot to bring in the  seedlings one night when the temperature drop. I spent weeks trying to nurse the seedlings back to no avail, losing them one by one.....I took it hard. For years I had been looking for this beautiful, fragrant and delicious flower plant to complete my Malaysian herb garden. This year I found a source for the seeds and rhizome and a wonderful blog friend, Autumn Belle of My Nice Garden who cheered me on as each seedling came up and commensurate with me through the pain of losing my little ones :(

Lesson learnt.

November has been cold, stormy and rainy. I was not taking any more chances. 2 days ago I brought in my precious screwpine pandanus plant, another tropical plant that is sensitive to the cold. The nursery that I bought it from, had to, at one point of time, go back to its customer to buy back some pandanus seedlings, when it lost it mother plant to frost! I have tried over the years to grow this fragrant but never succeeded until this plant. My current pandan plant is 3 years old. Barely growing the first 2 years. I grow it in a pot inside the house during winter and spring. As the weather warms up during summer, I  take it outside, hook it up to the irrigation system and let it enjoy the sunshine and heat. This summer it took off, grown in size and had many baby plants.  I separated some of the baby plants from the mother, potting them up for my new garden in Temecula. 

Mother Pandanus Plant by a bright window indoors