Tree in a pot

My mom recently won an indigenous tree in a competition (cool prize, hey?). Its a Milletia grandis or umSimbithi in Zulu. Its endemic to KwaZulu-Natal and grows near the coast, flowering at Christmas with a mass of purple flowers. Unfortunately, it has now become quite rare in the wild as its wood is very hard and prized for walking and fighting sticks as well as agricultural implements.

As luck would have it, there was a baby tree growing in the bag which I quickly appropriated and am now growing in a pot. Hopefully it will be happy and I’ll move it to a larger pot as the tree matures.

Cape Beauty

I have noticed this flower fairly often in the Cape. With its tight buds and sturdy stem, it seems quite different from what one might encounter in Durban. I’m new to the Cape. Does anyone know this plant? Is it indigenous?

Mauritian Tomatoes

My neighbour is Mauritian and his dad recently visited from the island with the best tasting tomatoes in the world. They planted the seeds which germinated and he generously handed some seedlings over the fence. They look like healthy, happy tomato plants but I guess the real test is when we get to munch down on the fruit. Will keep you posted on their progress and invite those of you lucky enough to live in Durban around for the taste test.

Rocket in your pocket

Or at least in a pocket-sized tray in your garden.

A couple of months back, a friend dropped off some cupcakes in a broken catering tray, which he said I should just throw away. Being incredibly thrifty, and sure that I’d have a use for it later, I kept the tray in my garage. My mom always has a steady stream of rocket from her permaculture garden and, inspired by this and the ridiculous prices they charge for rocket at the supermarket, I set about creating a mini-rocket farm. Firstly, I fixed the tray with some gaffer tape then hammered some drainage holes into the base of it. I added soil, made some furrows, dropped the rocket seeds into them, covered and watered. Within a week the seeds had sprouted and we’ve been eating fresh rocket in our salads ever since!

The beauty of this experiment is that we could have grown the rocket in a space as big as the tray. This is the ideal sort of food gardening for people living in flats or duplexes and you get such enjoying from eating the food you grow.

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Tree fern and friend

Last year we bought a tree fern in a pot for the patio (they’re imported into the UK) – and they’re sold for anything between £20 to £40 “per foot”. I think we paid about £60 for ours. It had a happy summer until the fronds slowly died as it got colder towards the end of the year, until, after the first frost, we wrapped it in winter fleece and it stood looking forlorn and rather ghostly for months. We unwrapped it in late March this year and gave it a haircut (trimmed off the dead leaves). Before long, numerous tightly wrapped spirals re-appeared, that at first resemble little furry creatures curled up in hibernation (the spirals have soft brown hair on their backs). Right now, the fern is once again in full summer glory and casts a lovely shadow over the garden bench. We went on holiday to the Devon coast last May and pinched a shred of a plant that was growing in a crevice on a wall, and planted it in the same pot as the tree fern for company. They are contented companions – the little Devon plant (we have no idea what it is) became established and thrived and has this year rewarded us with a shower of yellow starry flowers.

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