Flowers

Don't you just love seeing those lovely blooms? Well I do, looking at those beautiful flowers just relaxes me. 

Besides planting vegetables, I am also planting some flowers. I was at the market the other day and saw this lady selling this wicked looking rose and decided to buy. I have repotted it and fingers crossed that it will grow well and not die out like my last few roses. 

The funky looking rose from the Market.

This is the rose I got my mum for mother's day... it seems to have mutated...

Besides the roses, I have also planted the lily bulbs I managed to get when I was having my holiday in Australia and they seem to be doing well. 

I put a layer of mulch on top to try and keep the soil cool and less moisture being evaporated as the days gets really hot. So far they seem to be growing well. 

A few days ago I fed them with Blood and Bone Meal fertilisers, hope this will give them a boost, after that I have since moved the plants to a spot where they get more sun but only the morning sun. 

After a few weeks it starts to grow

Gets a little taller

Taller again

One of the plants started to have a bud

Cucumber and Capsicums

Sooooo.... I have not blogged for a year?! Seriously I got that lazy didn't I? Hahaha...

So let's start with my first 2014 blog post with what's in my garden. Before that begins, I reckon my blog now and hopefully onwards will be more on tropical gardening, since I have picked up gardening as my hobby so that will be pretty much it. 

My recent trip to Australia and yielded me with good produce, produce meaning I got heaps and heaps of seeds back to Kuching. I tried to get seeds that might be able to withstand the blaring Malaysian Sun. 

The first post will be pretty much on my cucumbers and capsicums. One of the first seed I planted when I got back was my cucumber telegraph improved type. These are supposedly to have dark green skin colour and not a lot of seeds which is great for salads. 

Cucumber Telegraph Improved

These cucumbers were the fastest to germinate. Took about 3 days for the seed to germinate and now the true leaves are appearing. I planted two of these and will keep you guys updated on the progress. 

Next of are my capsicums or bell peppers. The ones I planted are Californian wonder. I never had much luck with capsicums as they keep getting attack by white flies and aphids which eventually killed the plants. This round I hope that it will make it through. A few plants did die as I over fertilised it by mistake and another few seems to be good (fingers crossed). 

This capsicum looks pretty happy... hopefully it makes it through

They seem to be doing good now and I do find a few annoying white flies underneath the leaves and I just squish it with my thumb. Annoying buggers!!! Will keep you guys posted on the capsicum growth too =)

I will stop here for now. Blessed day peeps =D

Hooping the veggie patch!

As September is ending, it is also a sign that the Monsoon season is approaching. Usually by this month, Kuching will get quite a fair amount of rain. Rain is really good but it is not good for my babies, any torrential downpour would just flatten them! So after a few search online I decided to invest and make a better home for my 'veggie patch' well it is more like veggie pots...er....heh....

Protection!!

As I was saying the rain will kill my babies and after a good search I decided to make row hoops over the pots to protect them from the Sun and torrential rain. The Sun is really unforgiving, I thought of letting my babies get some sunlight and by noon it has completely dried up the soil and my poor bell pepper babies leaves started to curl so I quickly watered them and brought them into the shade. No more next time!

Happy and snugly! 

I will built a few more as I make my raised bed soon. Hmmm... what to plant... corns maybe?

Noob farmer.

Recently I have been caught in this craze of planting vegetables. I am not sure why or how but I feel happy and excited when I see those seeds germinate into seedlings and from the seedling to their first leaf growing out. 

I would not deny the fact that it does take a lot of patience in taking care of them, like some veg needs at least twice watering on hot days. Always remember to shade them off from the scorching sun. When you have too much seedlings, thinning process is a must. Also the right soil is also pretty much important. 

So what have I sowed. Not much for now, but here is a list of it.

• Leafy lettuce (heat tolerant as I am living quite near to the equator)
• Bell pepper
• Baby Roma Tomatoes 
• Amaranths
• Pumpkin

My next aim is to plant 

• Carrots
• Rounded egg plant
• Corn

The darn thing is I can't get carrot seeds down here in Kuching... Will try and ask my friends to get em from Australia. 

Here are some photos of my Veggies!

Bell peppers and a few lettuce 

Baby Romas Sprouting... with do some thinning soon

Leafy Lettuce .. some died when I added too much mulch =(

I planted all my veggies in a pot as I don't want to plant them on the ground as they are exposed to many enemies and it is easier to take care of them in this way.