End of May 2014. The heat and humidity have arrived after a prolonged cool, dry spring... This suits some of the herbs better than others.
The curry leaf plant which had not been doing well for a very long time - not sure why - has been sprouting new growth which is now maturing and settling down nicely - phew! I thought I had nearly lost the plant at one point...
The pandan and the gingers which are much happier in the warm weather are also now looking much healthier. My old pandan plants had grown rather old and over grown so I cut off a few healthier shoots, re-rooted them and planted them out. They are now beginning to become more dark green which is a more healthy colour. When the weather is particularly hot and the sun shines on them, there are lovely wafts of pandan aroma!
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| Pandan leaves |
The gingers which always suffer in the cold (especially with the rather windy conditions on the balcony) were cut back and are now re-growing nicely...
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| Galangal growing in the bright orange sack. There is normal ginger just beginning to sprout behind it but it's not visible |
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| Bunga Kantan or Torch ginger - looking nice and healthy after re-growing. Needs lots of water! |
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| My mom brought some turmeric from Singapore (I wanted to compare it to what we get here) and it sprouted on it's own so I threw away the old plants I had which were looking very scraggly, and the new ones are doing very well. |
My citrus plants continue to make good progress but no fruits appearing... sadly they take a LOOONG time to reach fruit bearing age when grown from seed... I didn't realise that when I started...
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| Thai lime plant in the foreground which is several years old... Calamansi lime plant in the background. The butterflies love to lay their eggs on the emerging new shoots which then get chomped up by the tiny hnugry caterpillars... I have to keep inspecting them carefully whenever I spot half eaten leaves! Grrr.... |
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| Kaffir lime or limau purut - originally had 3 plants in this pot but 2 of the plants suddenly dried up and died! Sniff... I hope this last one survives... might have been too much water when we had endless rain for a few week recently. Have enjoyed using the leaves from this - so much flavour! |
Laksa leaves, lemon basil and culander are surviving but very prone to pest infestation and need to be sprayed regularly with water to keep them at bay without the use of pesticides.... I also tried to plant a mini-herb garden in a large pot but again this is not doing so well and gets lots of aphids...
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| Laksa leaves - looking healthy now |
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| Culander or sawtooth coriander - love the smell of these leaves! |
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| mini herb garden in a pot with gangly spring onions and coriander, lemon basil, laksa leaves and sawtooth coriander. |
The wild pepper plant is also now looking much healthier since the weather warmed up but it survived the winter temperatures quite well...
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| Whenever I look at this, I think of making otak-otak... |
The colourful chillies are now healthy but when through a bout of being attacked by aphids and it turned out that they were not draining well... repotting and daily spraying have brought them back to health...
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| Cone shaped chillies |
The recently acquired mints are doing well - better than my original plant! They need to be watered daily with the current hot, sunny spell but generally enjoy the bright light. Also attacked by aphids which are kept away by regular water spraying...
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| L-R: Spearmint, Chocolate mint (I think) and Peppermint |
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| Cuban Oregano mint still doing well although I have moved it into the shade given it's furry, succulent leaves |
The lemongrass is also thriving although it looks like a complete mess and I've tried to hide it away in a corner because it's rather unsightly. I love having fresh lemongrass to hand so I will tolerate the chaos! The pot is too small and in the hot weather, I have to water it daily so that the plants don't wilt.
The plants which are not doing so well... Oregano, rosemary and verbena...
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| Oregano - looking scraggly with smaller leaves |
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| Rosemary - not doing too badly and gives off delicious wafts when brushed against |
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| Verbena - not sure why it's not doing too well, it was looking much better when the weather was cooler so it could be that! |
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