SO GREEN. I LIKE

DIRT! THE MOVIE

Excursion into the realms of soil, the number 1 lifegiver on Earth...It's fundamentally important ecological functions, our poor understanding of it as well as our destructive relationship with it. They are so essential to life and thus to us, that our survival is directly dependent on their understanding and protection!

AWESOME ROOFTOP GARDEN

Honestly, nothing beats Singapore in being green. I am very sure it isn't the greenest country in the world as yet but it sure is trying it's very best being as you go as forty something in age as a nation. I am at the polyclinic today for a dental appointment and just look at this beautiful rooftop garden landscape. 

What a wonderful use of space. The dental clinic is on the third floor and it overlooks the rooftop. I am a firm believer of anything should be green and plants and my country obviously thinks the same. 

Also, this proves it is awesome to be a citizen. I wonder what it costs to be a foreigner going to a private dentist. I don't think I have ever seen them charging a non-citizen more. Let's see how much my bill comes up to later. My usual cleaning and polishing at the private dentist usually comes up to somewhere around sgd70.

THE URBAN APARTMENT GARDEN

We stumbled upon this on Pinterest. We love this and it looks great.

It reads: Great idea for urban living.... Use gallon bottles/jugs and cultivate what you want.. ideal for anyone who lives in an apartment and cannot afford to have his own garden.

But do you know that this is not too awesome in the long run. It is harmful when soil is exposed to sunlight like this because it encourages bacteria to thrive.

OUR HERBS WHEN WE ARE TRAVELING

Check out Herb Substitutes here.

With Till traveling, S does not even want to stay in the lonely apartment. Partially also because she has not moved in. S bought these herbs a while back. From left to right, we have basil, thai basil, rosemary and mint. These herbs require a lot of water for their aromatic leaves. She has to water them twice a day on a regular day. So with Till traveling, he put the pots in the tub filled with water. They were almost wilting when S came back to check on them a week later.

S went to the supermarket and picked up some used coffee grounds at the cafe next door. Something has been eating the mint, a bug or perhaps even a lizard. It is gone now, probably had a little diarrhoea after the aromatics. But the mint is left with munched up leaves. It is rejuvenating itself now and growing new leaves, but it is terrible to witness nonetheless. Seeing the state of the mint, a little coffee ground might just give it a bit of a lift.

The bathroom smells of coffee, not a bad welcoming smell but hopefully this will give the herbs a boost before their next watering when Till returns on Thursday morning as S will be in KL from tomorrow. Sigh.

ROOTING A ROSEMARY PLANT FROM OUR MARKET ROSEMARY SPRIGS

It may take several weeks, but stem cuttings of rosemary can root in water. Let's see if we can have any cool rosemary plants from our Tekka market leftovers rosemary.

Good idea to root cuttings from the rosemary plant. Once they get a good growth of healthy roots — six to eight roots per cutting, 1 to 1 1/2 inch long — put them in a container in good potting soil. If they’re going to be outdoors, I don’t recommend a clay pot because in this heat, clay dries out very quickly; plastic containers may hold the moisture longer. Place them in a protected spot out of direct sun until they become acclimated to their new environment. If you have enough cuttings and the roots seem big enough, you could try to plant cuttings directly into a prepared bed in the garden. Wherever you put them, make sure they have good drainage, and get adequate moisture while they are acclimating to their new home.

If the big plant already looks like it’s dying, it may be too late to save it – rosemary is notoriously hard to transplant. But here’s one thing you could try: cut the branches back, which may allow the plant to put more energy into establishing new roots instead of maintaining a lot of top growth. This may not work, but it’s worth a try.

This is a good place to describe the process of propagating plants from cuttings. Start by cutting off 2 – 3 inches of the tender top growth of an established plant. Remove the leaves from the bottom end of the cutting, and dip the stem in a rooting hormone powder (such as Rootone). Place the cuttings in a damp rooting medium that drains well, and make sure the medium doesn’t dry out.

With rosemary cuttings, roots should form in about three weeks, and can be planted into individual pots. Pinch out the top of the cutting to encourage branch development.

Or, stick a few cuttings of new growth in a glass of water and wait for the roots to appear. Strip the leaves that will be below the water line, and change the water frequently. In fact, it’s a good idea to change the water every day. When roots develop, plant the cuttings in potting soil.

PLANTS FOR OUR FUTURE ROOF GARDEN

T loves gardening and Suz just wants a edible garden. Here are some information we extracted from an article. 

It introduced five common culinary herbs that are used very frequently in Southeast Asian cooking. They include the laksa plant, pandan plant, curry tree, sawtooth coriander and spearmint.

These culinary herbs can be easily bought from our local nurseries at very affordable prices as small potted plants which serve as excellent starting material for one to begin growing them at home. They save us all the time from raising some of them from seeds or cuttings.

If one is growing these culinary herbs in a highrise environment, bear in mind that they need to be grown in a location that receives direct sunshine for 4 to 6 hours daily. Ample sunshine is required by plants to develop the necessary aroma and flavour as well as to ensure a compact growth habit.

Plants may get infected by disease or infested by pests but it is not recommended to use any agro-chemicals on them because they are meant for eating. Problematic plants can be discarded right away so the problem would not have the opportunity to spread to surrounding plants. A new pot of the same herb can be bought from the nursery to replace the one that has been discarded.

The Butterfly Pea vine is just good for fences. We might even use this vine to cover the part of that external staircase up to the roof garden. We would grow this vine to up the privacy of our wonderful roof terrace. Apart from that, we will also make infusions out from the beautiful purple flowers. It is supposed to be an super antioxidant.

Ronnie whom we work with gave us a Frangipani branch which her mom is going to plant. We will then use other branches for our future Frangipanis. That is, if it does root from that branch.

The Frangipani is not edible but the tree and its branches form a beautiful structure and the flowers are super sweet smelling. Reminds us of holidays in Bali and Thailand.

WE ARE GOING TO GROW BUTTERFLY PEAS FROM OUR SEEDS FROM BANGKOK

We recently collected some butterfly pea pods from our work trip to Bangkok. We have always love the purple flowers and it is a wonderfully beautiful creeping plant we remember from our childhood. We stumbled upon a blog which talked about it and we are only too excited to learn we can eat the soft pods too.


From http://gorightinmygarden.blogspot.sg/


Locally we call it Bunga Talang/Telang. Otherwise its called butterfly pea or blue pea vine (Clitoria ternatea). Mine was given by a blogger friend and was grown in a flower bed near a chain fence for easy climbing. Its such an unassuming little plants until they bloom with the violet/blue flowers. Usually the flower petals are single with white or yellow markings in the centre but mine is a doubled-layered.

though I wish I could have the white flower variety which is seldom seen or maybe the soil composition that produces the white flowers instead of blue?

very petite vines with small but showy blooms, self-seeded but will grow lanky, so have to trim the vines to make them bushy

I just noticed that my butterfly peas (bunga talang) plant has lots of small flat pod fruits on it.

So this morning, I picked all the bigger peas - maybe will cook them in a stir-fry mixed veggie? Usually they are grown for their blue flowers to make dye or food colouring but havent heard of eating those peas but I guess they must be edible since their flowers are edible too. You can dry the flowers and make blue tea just like the Thais with added sugar or honey or make blue jelly or blue ice-cream! The Thais grow the butterfly pea flowers commercially. But more familiar locally are the blue rice (nasi kerabu).

The lovely flowers are a food source which attract butterflies, thats why they are called butterfly peas

Their peas reminded me of the sweet peas I usually bought in packets at the supermarket though sweet peas are broader

The seed pods dried on the plant and kept for future planting - I dont have to worry about running out of seeds because Ive seen a few new seedlings already sprouting nearby the parent plant, since they are also self-seeded

GROW SOME SALAD FROM YOUR CARROT SCRAPS

We have blogged about this before but we thought we would remind all you wonderful readers out there to save your carrot scraps.

We always throw away the carrot tops. But do you know that if you partially submerge the carrot tops in water and leave it in a sunny place, it will start to grow carrot leaves. You can use this carrot leaves just like parsley. Or add them to your bowl of salad. How is that for maximizing your carrots? It not only gives you vitamin A, but also another boost of vitamin C a few days later.

The above is about 4 days old. It is growing a bit slowly, but it is growing nonetheless. It is pretty fun for us to watch it sprout more greens every morning when we have our tea or coffee. Our folks got back from their holiday and the mom was delighted to see the cute colors sprouting on the kitchen top.

WHAT TO DO WHEN YOUR FLOWERS ARE WILTING

We have some tips and tricks to prolong the beauty of a bouquet. Apart from the generic, sugar or vinegar or paracetamol dissolved in the vase, what would you do when your flowers are actually starting to wilt? We usually cut off the wilting flowers and float them on a bowl of water or submerge the (cut short) flowers in the vase. It will be a bit gross when the flowers start to decompose in the vase, but you can aways dispose them then, rather then a few days earlier.

What would you do when you have wilting flowers the next time? Do you know that the submerged orchids arrangement above is for sale? Nice.

A WONDERFUL MAGNETIC MINI TERRARIUM

Remember those magnetic herb and spice containers? This crafter made them into some really cute and attractive terrariums. She cut out the perspex on the see-through cover and put in peddles with some dried moss and an air plant. That is right. An air plant is a succulent and it needs minimal watering. You'd only need to mist is every week, well, depending on the state of your humidity at home. Too much moisture and there goes your terrarium. We suppose the moss would help to retain some of the moisture.

These mini DIY Wall Terrariums from Ruffle are just about the cutest little things I have ever seen! I am hosting a bachelorette cocktail party in June, and these just might have to be the favors that I hand out to the ladies. They look so easy to make, but create quite the aesthetic.

OUR LITTLE WARRIORS, THE LADYBIRDS : THEIR GROWING STAGES

Read about our little warriors here.

GROWING EDIBLES FROM YOUR KITCHEN 'SCRAPS' : OUR GARLIC CHIVE

This garlic took slightly more than a month to 'sprout'. We cannot wait to savour the chive. It is probably going to take another few weeks before the rest of the cloves start sprouting.

This was what it was a month ago.

Notice how the roots have grown.  Nothing happened to the carrot top. It started to mould and we threw it away. Nothing is happening to the onion yet. :-(

OUR LITTLE WARRIORS, THE LADYBIRDS

Some of our plants are infected with aphids. These little buggers are vicious and they reproduce quicker than rabbits. We have tried diluted detergent on them but it didn't work. Just when we were losing hope, we saw some ladybirds in a bush on the way to the supermarket. We started collecting the ladybirds. We brought them home and placed them on the infected plants. Not all of them stayed. Some of the ladies didn't like this indoor garden to be their habitat so they left via the window. We now have a few ladybird warriors and they are doing us proud. This is a picture we took of one of our warriors ambushing an aphid. Watching them is like watching a 'live' documentary in your own home.

Here is another one of our warriors. Ladybirds feed on aphids, mites and everything pesty and not your greens. They are not poisonous to humans and do not post as a pest in your home. With the dam being so cold already, these warriors will soon start to move really slowly.

Some of our warriors are also reproducing and here is a baby ladybird on the leaf. 

We love seeing a sight like this, black versus white. The black bugs are the ladybird babies and the white ones are the aphids.

Here are some facts from Wiki :

Most coccinellids are beneficial to gardeners in general, as they feed on aphids, scale insects, mealybugs, and mites throughout the winter. As in many insects, ladybugs in temperate regions enter diapause during the winter, so they often are among the first insects to appear in the spring. Some species (e.g., Hippodamia convergens) gather into groups and move to higher land, such as a mountain, to enter diapause. 

Predatory ladybugs are usually found on plants where aphids or scale insects are, and they lay their eggs near their prey, to increase the likelihood the larvae will find the prey easily. Ladybugs are cosmopolitan in distribution, as are their prey.

Ladybugs also require a source of pollen for food and are attracted to specific types of plants. The most popular ones are any type of mustard plant, as well as other early blooming nectar and pollen sources, like buckwheat, coriander, red or crimson clover, and legumes like vetches, and also early aphid sources, such as bronze fennel, dill, coriander, caraway, angelica, tansy, yarrow, of the wild carrot family, Apiaceae. Other plants that also attract ladybugs include coreopsis, cosmos (especially the white ones), dandelions and scented geraniums.

Ladybugs are sensitive to most synthetic insecticides. If food sources are limited, oviposition is reduced. A larva uses its sharp jaws to crush an aphid's body and sucks out the aphid's juices.

A LITTLE COMFORT FROM OUR GARDEN

We were craving for some Asian flavours. Basically a big bowl of soupy noodles.

This is what we did :

• We prepared a bed of flat rice noodles
• Layered it with a bed of pumpkin shoots and mizuna from our balcony garden
• And topped it with chicken pan-fried with fish sauce and sesame oil

There really is nothing quite as fresh as greens cut freshly from your garden. Look how green they are.

We made our broth with a blend of :

• ginger
• lemongrass
• garlic
• chilis
• kefir lime powder
• fresh lime juice
• fish sauce
• chicken stock
• coconut cream

The hot steaming broth cooks the greens quite instantly. Some people think it is an instant soup. Or that soups should be rather instant to make. Not the ones in our bowls. Soups are extracts of flavours. If soups are that quick and easy, restaurants might as well serve it to you like water.

We then sprinkled our home-grown parsley and Thai basil leaves. Wicked! It is not often that we cook this dish because certain fresh ingredients which are not easily available. We made more and freezed a tub for other days in need of comfort.

OUR FIDGETY SUSTAINABLE GARDEN, "COUGH" BALCONY

We have been enjoying our harvest little by little. As we stay rather close to nature, some of our plants have been infected by aphids. Yes, those buggers! We are trying our best to get rid of them but these little buggers are hardy! Or rather, they reproduce like crazy. We reckon as long as we yield our harvest, we have already gotten our money's worth.

We took the table from a house throwing out stuff. The table is in good condition, only that the child had drawn all over it. We thought just need a table, period. It didn't need to look good. It needs to withstand the rain though. So, we have a free table for our plants, which we will throw out when it is finally "rain-damaged".

This is our pumpkin plant. We are not waiting for any fruits to come out of it. We will be harvesting the leaves this week. We have tried steaming the leaves (yes, even the bigger ones, not just shoots) and drizzling it with some olive oil, salt and pepper. They tasted great, a bit like spinach.

Some of the pumpkin leaves are growing in our salvaged gift crate. We love it. This is why aphids do nothing to our morale. Summer is pretty much over here in the dam and the plants will not survive in the cold. So we are eating them either way.

MAKING A HOME, LACKING OF POSTS

We have been busy sorting out our home It is looking pretty cozy. We are putting furniture and plants in different places ad then moving them around just to see what works better. This is our stolmen system. We are in love with it. It creates a great spaces within a room.

As fidgety as we try to be, we are not letting the light from this lamp go to waste at night. Here is our miniature turf. Just another way to make use of your tin cans. Here are other ways we posted before.

HOW DARE YOU CATERPILLAR!!!

We found this juicy caterpillar in the making on our salad leaves!

We were watering and admiring our luscious salad leaves which we are going to harvest towards the end of this week and we found that.

We swear we have been looking after our plants. We only noticed the half eaten leaves this morning. Bugger!

Look at this little bugger frolicking on our fidgety fingers. Irritating. It is going into the escargot tank before we decide what to do with it.

We proceeded to spraying the plants with diluted washing up liquid. Not sure how it works on buggers like this but do you know..

Aphids breathe through their skin. Spraying with diluted washing up liquid clogs up their skin and causes them to literally suffocate.

A GIFT CRATE AS A PLANTER

We were given some food products by Washy's family. The filmsy wooden crate was going into the paper recycling bin (yes, because it is considered as pulp) when we decided to make it into a planter for our exploding pumpkin shoots.

We started them off as these cute little seedlings.

And they have literally exploded in growth over a few days.

We had no choice but to take some of them out. We planted the sprouting seeds in the egg trays in the planter. They seem to be relatively happy. Mr Washy was annoying desperate to eat those shoots even when we told him they are not ready. We had no choice but to stir fry a few to shut him up. They tasted bitter as they were not ready!!! Mr Washy, please go to the corner now.