A garden with fragrance is what I am aiming for. Next year, I hope to have next-door neighbors coming out of their houses to smell the sweet fragrance of flowers in my garden. Incidentally, I planted some sweet alyssum seeds sent by my niece in the US a couple of months ago and here are the plants:
Sweet alyssum
They have grown to about a foot in height yet I don’t see any sign of fragrance. Somebody please tell me – are these really fragrant flowers or am I missing something?
I hope to have at least 3 to 4 rose plants in bloom next year. The cuttings that I planted have been successful this year.
Rose plants from cuttings – fragrance next year
Incidentally, I suggest you take a look at the delightful roses in Steve’s blog too. I’m hoping my roses next year will at least measure up to them.
Of the five different varieties of hostas I’m growing in my garden, I found one to have a sweet fragrance.
Fragrant white hosta
When the flowering season is over, I’ll propagate some of these by root division and plant some at other locations in my garden.
I bought two plumeria plants last week – visited a plumeria grower in my city and had an informative discussion on growing plumerias in this environment. I grew up in India with several of these trees with fragrant flowers (in Mumbai) and am trying to recreate those memories! Of course, I need to bring these inside the house in winter – I hear that the plumerias go dormant, but start sprouting leaves again in spring.
Plumerias – left: possibly pink or dark color; right: white with gold at center
The slightly rounded leaves of the Plumeria, it seems, indicate white flowers with gold or yellow at the center.
To add to fragrance next year, I have planted some ginger plants too, thanks to my friend, Utiyama-san, who offered me four of these plants after root division from his garden.
Ginger
Plants propagated from cuttings of Gardenia and Daphne odora will add to the fragrance.
Gardenia
I started off with my first Bonsai creation this week. I think I did everything right according to the book; but when it came to selecting the plant, I experimented. I used a Myrtle plant that I had propagated from a cutting. Here it is:
Bonsai – the plant I used was a myrtle
I used a 2:1 fine grade akadama: kanumatsuchi soil mix, and inserted two small masses of slow acting fertilizer (oil cake or abura kasu), tamped down the soil and then laid moss, and hooked the plant firmly to the base using two wires of 1.5 mm diameter. I hope to see the flowers soon and taller growth so that I can shape the branches to my liking.
Now here are some veggies I harvested recently:
Clockwise from top – typical day’s harvest; add carrots and basil to typical day’s harvest; basil (great for spaghetti), and mulukhiya (wonderful for soup) Note that the dates are way off – I need to change the camera settings!
The first of my Japanese anemones has bloomed rather earlier than usual:
Here are some other flowers in bloom in my little garden:
Until the next post, here’s wishing readers Happy Gardening!
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