The Indoor Garden(er)

Testing My Will

2012-02-12T10:40:00.003-05:00

When one attends a seed exchange, or any plant sale, it's hard to keep in control. You start wanting everything in sight--it's like eating at a buffet, but for your plant obsession.

After the Washington Gardener seed exchange last weekend, I wandered around the glass house at Green Spring Gardens with the beau, who had biked out there to surprise me. There was an awesome collection of succulents, bromeliads, and tropicals, as well as a nice showing of gesneriads with Streptocarpus predominating. (Those photos will appear in a post on Petal Tones, the blog of the chapter of the Gesneriad Society I belong to, sometime this week.)

It was hard to stop myself from saying "me want!" every time my eyes moved to look at a different plant. The glass house wasn't large--it was probably only twice the size of my bedroom. I snapped a few photos of some plants I liked most.

I have a big heart-on for Cryptanthus, but I haven't seen variegated ones like this and the one below in person before.

I've always wanted a Monstera--now I know exactly which one I want!

I'm a sucker for Cyperus. I need to get me a pond to grow some in!

Schlumbergera's At It Again

2012-02-11T09:22:00.002-05:00

It seems that the other half of the pot of Schlumbergera I got on sale a year ago for $1 decided to blossom. It looks as if it's the same variety as the other half, which flowered in November. It's not quite Christmas, definitely not Thanksgiving, but it's not Easter yet, either. Could this be a Valentine's Cactus? Maybe I've found a new common name to muddy up the works!

Alright, let's not get carried away. It has the same pale peachy petal colouring with the intense pink stigma.

While getting the hydroton and sphagnum for some repotting and terraria projects the other night, I looked up--and saw this towering over me. It's a stretch, but I think Schlumbergera could be a candidate as a cyclanthophobia-inducing flower.

Care-Taking

2012-02-10T15:43:00.002-05:00

When the USDA stopped by my place and confiscated all of the plants I brought back to the country after moving them to Saudi Arabia, I was devastated.

But, thankfully, there was a Gesneriad Society chapter show that I helped out at and purchased plants from, and many friends were quite willing to provide me with cuttings or plants from their collections to get me started again.

But even so, my zeal for gardening withered away with the loss of every single plant I've tended for the past three years. I'm slowly learning to love these new plants, but it's not the same.

Yesterday, however, during the first-ever fertilization/repotting/care-taking event since I moved back to the states, I discovered that a lot of the plants I have are doing quite interesting things. The first of which is this Callisia fragrans, which has some red variegation--and an offshoot from one of the larger cuttings.

I'll be posting a couple other things over the next week, so keep your eye out for fun plant happenings!

A Seedy Haul

2012-02-05T09:00:00.008-05:00

After the seed swap yesterday (and the copious miles biked), I was exhausted and starving. I hadn't really eaten before starting my mostly uphill trek, and at the exchange, even though I brought half of the baked goods, I didn't feel right nomming down on everything there. I ended up having one of everything (more, still, than I felt comfortable taking because of the number of people), but I might have passed out otherwise.

With that setup, here's the list of seed packets I staggered home with (and I thought I was being reasonable in picking so few seeds to take home?):

Key: Bold items were picked up in the three individual rounds of the seed exchange. Underlined items were picked up during the free-for-all. Items acquired through after-exchange exchanging are both bold and underlined. Unaltered items were included in the goodie bag from registration.

Items are alphabetized by their genus and then by their English name. The item presentation is "English name/description (Genus species) [Seed company if known]."

Bunching onion (Allium fistulosum)
Chives (Allium schoenoprasum) [Landreth]
Dill (Anethum graveolens)
Sedano da Taglio leaf celery (Apium graveolens) [WinterSown.org]
Columbine mix (Aquilegia vulgaris) [WinterSown.org]
Columbine mix (Aquilegia vulgaris) [WinterSown.org]
Napa cabbage (Brassica rapa)
Rapa da Broccoletti broccoli raab (Brassica rapa) [WinterSown.org]
Long Yellow Hungarian Wax pepper (Capsicum annuum)
California Wonder Orange sweet pepper (Capsicum annuum) [Botanical Interests]
Pimiento pepper (Capsicum annuum)
Alaska shasta daisy (Chrysanthemum x superbum*) [WinterSown.org]
Clematis (Clematis glaucophylla)
Larkspur (Consolida ajacis)
Wisconsin SMR 58 Pickling cucumber (Cucumis sativus) [Plant Hart's Seeds]
Boston Marrow squash (Cucurbita maxima)
Small Sugar Pie pumpkin (Cucurbita pepo) [Plant Hart's Seeds]
Lemongrass (Cymbopogon sp.)
Habranthus rain lily (Habranthus tubispathus+)
Witch Cottage woad (Isatis tinctoria)
Garden Babies Butterhead lettuce (Lactuca sativa) [Renee's Garden]
Lettuce Mix (Lactuca sativa)
Lily (Lilium formosanum)
Salad Leaf basil (Ocimum basilicum) [Renee's Garden]
Sweet basil (Ocimum basilicum)
Toscano basil (Ocimum basilicum) [WinterSown.org]
Double red poppy (Papaver paeoniflorum?) [WinterSown.org]
Parsley (Petroselinum crispum) [Thompson & Morgan]
Tendergreen bush bean (Phaseolus vulgaris) [WinterSown.org]
Sugar Ann snap peas (Pisum sativum) [Plant Hart's Seeds]
Miyashige White daikon radish (Raphanus sativus) [Botanical Interests]
Dr. Carolyn tomato (Solanum lycopersicum) [WinterSown.org]
Fourth of July hybrid tomato (Solanum lycopersicum) [Burpee]
Large Red Cherry tomato (Solanum lycopersicum) [WinterSown.org]
Rio Grande tomato (Solanum lycopersicum) [WinterSown.org]
Rutgers tomato (Solanum lycopersicum) [WinterSown.org]
Yucca (Yucca sp.)
Zephyranthes rain lily (Zephyranthes drummondii)

* The Plant List says that this is the accepted name for Shasta daisies, not Leucanthemum x superbum as written pretty much everywhere else.
+ The Plant List says that this is the accepted name, instead of Habranthus texanus written on the little orange envelope.

Can you tell I intend on making my own kimchi from veggies grown in my own garden, wherever that might be? A gardener I met at the exchange may have space he would like to share with me--I look forward to chatting with him about it!

Seed Exchange In Story Form

2012-02-04T20:17:00.000-05:00

Today, I biked out to Virginia for the annual Washington Gardener seed exchange. I would have gone to the one in Maryland last weekend, but I was selling my home-cooked goodies at the DC Grey Market (quite successfully, but I haven't posted about that yet!).

I live-tweeted a lot of the exchange--the presentations were engaging and informative! There were a lot of gardeners at the event who had their phones out, typing away (though none as furiously as I was!). Below is a Storify timeline (slightly adapted to make responses easier to figure out) of the tweets that led up to, that occurred during, and that happened after the seed exchange today. Not everything is there in its entirety, but pretty much.

Open For Business

2012-01-17T12:50:00.000-05:00

Sort of. It's only slightly on the DL.

You who have followed my blog for any length of time know that I like to cook. I recently started a new blog, The House Husband, to kind of separate that hobby from my indoor/general gardening obsession--at least, online, so that it makes more sense to visit The Indoor Garden(er). The House Husband joins Bagging The Baggage and Agritate in my new series of blogs to help separate content into more digestible streams--I started feeling like The Indoor Garden(er) was too much of a random catch-all, that I had lost focus, and that I might be confusing people with the content I post under the assumption that it's going to be garden-related on the basis of the blog title, description, and general content. I can't say I've been consistent posting on any of these new locations, but I do of course intend to be. I'm still working on getting into some sort of routine after moving back to DC, but without any actual steady schedule (read: work), I've found it difficult to corral my own activities.

Part of that difficulty is the myriad choices I can make: Go freelance full-time? Try for an office job? Quit the rat race and join the food industry? I've attempted some combination of all of the above since I returned to the US in August--I've freelanced a bit, I've searched for full-time office jobs, and I spent a few months in the food industry (and technically, I'm still in it as Whisked!'s bakery assistant, but work is infrequent at the moment now that the markets are over for the season). The lack of direction has made it difficult for me, generally--it's hard to hammer something down when you're aiming at many separate nails all at once (like Whack-A-Mole, except a bit more frantic and with more life-affecting consequences).

But, eventually, the effort will yield something. I have some freelance opportunities, and I'm pursuing the food industry angle a bit more proactively now, too. I registered for the DC Grey Market on 28 January. The Grey Market is a place where unregistered food businesses can go to sell their product--shoppers buy a ticket ahead of time and acknowledge that they understand the food they'll buy at the market was prepared in a non-health-inspected kitchen or somesuch, and we vendors get the opportunity to sell our products we make in our home kitchens.

It's difficult to be a small food business in DC (probably in a lot of places, I'd imagine), but I know so many people in the area who have succeeded, and it's been something of a simmering dream of mine--I think it's actually a genetic predisposition. Everyone in my family (and, it seems, my beau's, too) has dreamed of opening some sort of food establishment. While I was a child, my dad had a crab truck for a few years--he went to the docks every weekend, bought a ton of crabs, cooked them in the truck and sold them on the side of the road. This was definitely before the lunch-food-truck craze of the past few years, but then, a half-bushel of crabs is totally not an appropriate meal for an office setting, eh?

What I'm doing, however, is slightly different--I love interacting with the customer, and I'm thinking a farmers' market would be a wonderful place to get myself into in the future. So I'm testing the Grey Market. I'm bringing a bunch of different items, to see what people are interested in and whether it seems as if I could make anything of a profit. I'm calling myself "The Experimental Oven," for various reasons: I work under a trial-and-error scientific method; I like to be creative; I'm not baking, exclusively: I have a variety of products I plan on making; I never follow a recipe exactly, even if I'm doing it for the first time; and there's always something that makes each batch of what I make special, whether I ran out of milk and had to use a substitute or whether I accidentally had the temperature at 425 instead of 325 and had to reduce the bake time. I'm going to have to become a little more consistent if I want to start selling product to customers on a regular basis, but part of the name also implies that because everything I make is small-batch artisan foods, there will be some variation from week to week as I play around with the recipes.

What I consider to be a less-complicated but also less financially thrilling is doing wholesale orders for cafes or somesuch. I have a few ins that I could surely follow to make some of my specialty scones, biscotti, or random packaged goods such as hummus, pimiento cheese, or what-have-you. But wholesale is large-batch, low-cost: I'd have to make a ton of product to make the same amount of money I might at a market, because of the resale aspect, although the steady, more-certain income has its appeal.

After I try this Grey Market thing, I have to see whether I make enough money (after ingredient costs and other expenses) to consider doing it on a regular basis. I have to take into account rent for registered commercial kitchen space, the incorporation fees for the business, transportation, vendor fees, and insurance. There are probably other large expenses I'm forgetting at the moment (perhaps a stand mixer?), but there are a lot of start-up costs and a ton of things to hammer out if this is to become a reality. At least I'll soon have a logo--I had a meeting last night with blogger/foodie/friend FoodNewsie, who designed DC State Fair's first advertising back in 2010. He's working on a logo design for The Experimental Oven. I'm a logo virgin--I've never had one, and I'm totally excited about this!

My Metro Adventure

2011-12-21T14:51:00.001-05:00

Yesterday, I posted this without any text or explanation. I was using it as a quick repository to share with reporters. I was on an Orange line train (sometime before 9:39, which is when I wrote an e-mail to my beau) heading to Rosslyn for an interview when a part of a brake in the train ahead of mine hit the electrified third rail. It caused a bunch of smoke, gigantic sparks/flames, and a bit of panic in the train. Most people were pretty damn chill--it was actually fun in some ways, because we were just sitting around joking and ribbing on Metro.

There are plenty of articles from news sources out there, so I'm just going to focus on my own fun experience.

First, I'll start with transcriptions of a couple e-mails I wrote to my beau detailing a few of the more fun experiences.

Tuesday, December 20, 2011 9:39 AM
Subject: Fire on my train
Message: Yay

Tuesday, December 20, 2011 10:15 AM
Subject: 40 minutes later...
Message: The train stopped. It started getting smoky. The door to the next car opened and a wryly smiling man said "The next car's on fire." We started walking toward the last car while one woman freaked out, we were all milling and joking. Then we finally decided to open the door (keep in mind that the driver has not yet contacted us, so we were unsure what to do) and walk back to L'Enfant. But four people were walking back toward the train, telling us Metro employees said to get back into the train because the air quality was too poor outside the train. So instead, we are sitting here in a smoky train inhaling all these fumes for an unknown amount of time. The driver came on the speakers and said "Help is on the way." We're like, "Um, it's been 40 minutes. Why aren't they HERE?"

And he just came back on and said that help is on the way--still. Anyway. Maybe eventually I'll get to my interview.

Tuesday, December 20, 2011 10:50 AM
Subject: "If we're anywhere near a platform, we'll get you off the train."
Message: Serious? They don't know where we are???

Lol these people on the train with me are awesome. We are joking and laughing.

Tuesday, December 20, 2011 11:08 AM
Subject: I just videotaped our channel 4 news live interview
Message:

Tuesday, December 20, 2011 11:25 AM
Subject: Oh no!
Message: I've been told I must take my stilettos off when I get to the ladder in 30 minutes. Damnit!

And now some photos!

Milling around wondering what to do--no word from the train conductor, emergency buttons weren't working, and we weren't sure whether it was safe to leave the train or not. Not that that stopped some people (read below).

I ended up wrangling open an emergency door (some didn't work) and tried to walk back to the platform, but I was told by returning train riders that Metro employees told them to get back on the train--the air quality was too poor in the tunnel and it was safer on the train. For 2 hours, we breathed the smoky air (some doors were open, remember?) and as we lined up to evacuate hours later, I asked why the track lights had just gone out--I was told by a fire fighter that they were operating on batteries that last only 2 hours. The electrified third rail had shorted out and the power was turned off when our train hit the other part on the rail. There was no actual danger, really, from the get-go--we should have left.

Anyway, we milled around for a while. I ate my bagel and drank my coffee. 30 or 40 minutes into the ordeal, the conductor finally came on to say that Metro was looking into what happened and that we should stay calm. Once he stopped his five-second spurt of lip-flapping, the train riders around me went up in a roar about how frustrating that was--waiting so long for any contact with Metro or our conductor, and all we got was "We're looking into what happened, stay calm"?

A little after 11, fire fighters came around to tell us they were starting to evacuate the train. I was in the last car with passengers, so it took a while. I tried taking pictures of people walking down the tunnel.

This one was a bit better.

For the number of emergency-response vehicles blocking traffic around the Smithsonian metro exit, we surely didn't have the help we would have expected down in the tunnel. I admit, the four or five fire fighters down there with us were great--they were just as frustrated with Metro as we were (they couldn't get the emergency doors open, either).

Next up, videos.

This video is an example of the awesome people in the train car with me. We were joking left and right, keeping it together without losing our composure. The set up for this joke is that Metro had already reported to news organizations that all passengers had been evacuated. We were postulating ways they'd deal with us. The most popular theory was that they would just seal up the tunnel with us inside and deny that the Orange line ever existed.

This is our live interview with News 4. When we learned that Metro was lying about us being down here, putting their spin on the incident (calling it an "obstruction" rather than an "equipment malfunction and crazy sparky-flame-smoke") and trying to look better than their actions would paint them, we called news organizations to let them know that we were, in fact, still trapped underground.

When we finally got out of the train, there were almost as many fire fighters, police officers, news crews, and Metro employees as there were train passengers. It took them 2.5 hours to get in line and find flashlights to guide us out, it seemed--we weren't told they were doing anything else.

Stink Flower Part 2

2011-12-07T20:18:00.000-05:00

My Stapelia grandiflora bloomed today! Around 11 AM, I noticed that one petal had popped out of the balloon--while doing something on the other side of the plant shelf a few minutes later, I heard a little *pop* and saw that the entire flower had blossomed.

This excites me greatly. I wonder if I can self-fertilize the bloom? I do so like to start things from seed, not that I expect any children to be very different from their parent.

Stink Blossom

2011-12-03T13:15:00.000-05:00

I have had this Stapelia (either gigantea or grandiflora) since early September and it has been in bud for a few weeks now, and it's looking about ready to burst! It's even made a couple of friends--you can see about three other buds coming along right behind the main one, and there's another starting on some new vegetative growth on the other side of the plant. Although I've had a few buds before, through various complications, I have never had a Stapelia bloom on me. I'm hopeful for this one!

Kudzu Up The Wazoo

2011-11-27T10:23:00.001-05:00

While walking around for a few hours the other week with my horticulturalist friend, we ran across this (open for a larger version):

It's an entire hillside and several trees completely covered by frost-damaged kudzu (Pueraria montana). Of course, kudzu is edible: kudzu jam, kudzu perfume, kudzu syrup, kudzu in salad, kudzu in quiche, stuffed kudzu leaves--I can think of a bajillion different uses! I wouldn't eat it, however. One never knows what's been sprayed when on these invasive plants in public areas. It's really not uncommon to eat it, I don't think--I find a ton of recipes when I search "kudzu recipes" on Google.

The kudzu was everywhere along the embankment at Walter C. Pierce Community Park, which, I have gathered, used to be a more vibrant gathering spot with a community garden and such. I like it now anyhow--I use it often to cut across Rock Creek Park. There's a dog park area, a basketball court, a playground, and a large grassy field, and it's just down the road from the parcours in Woodley Park (an outdoor fitness area that I always think might be fun to use but never get around to actually using). Walter Pierce Park is just south of the National Zoo--if you look behind the trees on the right, you can see a greenhouse structure on what I'm pretty sure is the Zoo's property.

About 15 years ago, an article was published about a group arguing with the Zoo about allowing a historic property to go untended in a successful effort to block the construction of a mulching facility. There's a sentence at the end that the hubbub group turned its attention to battle the Zoo's use of herbicide to fight the kudzu growing at the park--it's unclear whether they won that battle or not, because kudzu is so frakkin' tenacious, the Zoo's use of herbicide may not have had a real impact anyway. Fifteen years later, it seems that the historic building is still standing--as is the kudzu.

It's Schlumbergera Time

2011-11-25T16:38:00.003-05:00

The Schlumbergera NOID (I won't even try to look for an identification, but if anyone here has strong feelings about what it is, I'd be more than happy to know what I'm growing!) I got very early this year for the boy bloomed a lot this fall, although only on one side, it seems (perhaps the side that got the mid-afternoon light while on the front steps throughout the summer?). The blooms are pretty cool--not what I was really expecting, a faint, almost translucent peach colour with the bright pink stigma. And no, despite my efforts, the plant does not seem to take well to self-fertilization, unfortunately!

A Thoughtful(?) Mother

2011-11-10T17:01:00.008-05:00

The last time I was actively looking for a new job, before taking the one in Saudi Arabia, my mother sent me a few clippings of jobs, for example, at the Winchester Star, her local newspaper. Now that I'm back in the states and in the market for employment again, she's started sending clippings again--with little notes of encouragement (or evil-doer monologues revealing in great detail her nefarious plot, complete with maniacal laughter?).

I'd love to be an Arboretum Assistant (and, in fact, there was a similar position listed recently for the National Arboretum here in DC, but I think it became available in that short period between when I had decided to work in Saudi Arabia and when I decided to come back), but sorry, mom, I'm not moving out to the Virginia mountains without the boy! She'll just have to stop inside DC the next time she drives past.

A Touch Of Pink

2011-11-08T08:42:00.004-05:00

I have a bunch of leaf variegation in my plant collection, particularly red and purple, so it's a delight but not terribly surprising when a plant that lost its variegation regains it.

This, however, is something a bit different. Leaves from a Pachyphytum NOID I received as a "welcome back" cutting started rooting, and I was all like "Whoa, dude, you're pink."

The potted cutting and its excess leaves I left on top of the soil to root.

And root they did, but I didn't really expect the whole pink situation! You can even see some little nubbins of what may be growing points around the base of the leaf as well.

I've read around the Internets and seen Pachyphytum with pink roots, as well as mention of the same with Kolanchoe, although I haven't found any sort of even semiauthoritative source that describes the pigmentation and why it's useful for the plant.

A New Garden Buds

2011-10-20T13:14:00.000-04:00

That post title is totally clever. You'll see why.

After returning from Saudi Arabia and having my plants appropriated and destroyed by USDA customs officials after they tracked me down to my new locale, I basically had zero plants. Luckily, there was the Gesneriad Society chapter show and sale, where I got a bunch of cuttings and rooted plants to replenish what I had lost, and a few plant friends shipped, handed, clipped, or otherwise provided plants to me. You know who you are. You know I heart you. I think, however, my beau may try to track you down and murder you in your sleep (a period during which my fluorescent lights come on and wake him up on a fairly regular basis).

Here's a photo of the shelving unit with its new plants, fluorescent bulbs, and slightly new layout.

The shelving unit is in our living room, acting like a wall from the entryway, but it allows me to easily access both sides of the shelving unit to care for all the tiny little plants. I've only killed a few since acquiring them: something labeled "S. conspicua" that I believe could be Saintpaulia inconspicua (although that doesn't matter, 'cause it dead) and an Achimenes that may be going dormant as suggested by my horticulturalist friend who only saw it at the final stages, after the fungal hyphae withered away a little. I think I killed that one all on my own merit, but there's some green something or other--so the rhizome thing may allow me to revive it a little! I'm letting it dry out right now, and we'll see how it goes.

And here are the new buds in the new garden from an old(ish) plant!

I bought this Schlumbergera for $1 at the local Giant grocery store sometime around mid-February (I think I told my beau that it was "a nice Valentine's Day plant he so nicely told me to get for myself after the fact" or something to that effect), when it was out of bud. It's in the same horrid peat potting mix in the same pot I bought it in--because 1) I left it at the boy's, 2) I shortly thereafter started planning a relocation, and 3) I don't really need a third reason.

Anyhow, the boy put the Schlumbergera out on the stoop with his Epiprenmum aureum, Chlorophytum comosum, and my Aechmea fasciata, Alternanthera dentata, and a potted planting of Narcissus that ended up staying with him. Most of the plants thrived--he watered them, it rained, they grew. Although I don't have a photo of the Schlumbergera from the winter, I don't recall it being very large. And it's not very large now, either. I don't think it grew much if it grew at all--except for these buds I just noticed! I don't know what colour they will be, but most little end-of-chain phylloclades have a single bud on them right now. I look forward to seeing them open--and pollinating them! Not that I really need hundreds of little baby Schlumbergera running around terrorizing my Plectranthus collection, but I do like the plant-sex practice.

Growing Streptocarpus

2011-09-28T15:07:00.001-04:00

During the National Capital Area Chapter (NCAC) of The Gesneriad Society's semiannual show and sale two weeks ago, I got the chance to hear Dale Martens talk about taking care of and propagating Streptocarpus. Dale is a gesneriad hybridizer--if you see anything named with "Dale's ..." or "Heartland's ..." or "Texas ...," it might have been hybridized by her!

She was a right raucous woman--I laughed through her Streptocarpus seminar (and not like I laugh when I watch movies like "Machine Girl," but like I laugh when an intelligent, talented person presents something in a unique and engaging way).

I wrote a big long post on Petal Tones, NCAC's blog accompaniment to their monthly-ish newsletter. I'm planning on a couple more posts as well: my experience entering the show for the first time; clerking for the first time (and clerking for judges who were judging one of my own entries); and the other seminar I was able to attend, by Brian Connor on propagating gesneriads).

New Digs

2011-09-27T18:28:00.003-04:00

It has been one month and three days since I returned to the US, and I have only just set up a plant-growing area today. Oddly enough, the way it worked out, there's more space in the living room in the apartment I now share with my beau; I sold the TV last week, so I moved the "TV stand" into the kitchen to store cooking supplies, rearranged the three bicycles in the hallway, and rotated the couch and recliner so now we even have some empty floor space!

But this isn't about furniture placement. It's about plant placement. Unfortunately, where I wanted to put the grow shelf (which would have kept the previous living room arrangement almost undisturbed except for the "TV stand") was in the direct path of the only air-conditioning unit in the apartment. I didn't want all that air blowing directly on my plants. Where they are now isn't exactly far away from the window unit, but they don't get direct drafts that I can feel.

The top-top shelf holds one shop light that will shine on the second shelf, where seed starting will occur; the third shelf is the only one with fluorescent bulbs at the moment, so most of the plants are there, with the humidity grow chamber (a clear plastic storage tub from Target) on the fourth shelf to catch any excess rays; the fifth shelf will hold propagation material (potted-up seedlings, rooting stolons, leaf cuttings, etc.) for sharing, planting, and such. The bottom shelf has a bunch of random supplies: sphagnum, peat, vermiculite, little pots, and the like.

Soon, I'll have all the fixtures full of fluorescent T-12 tubes (on a timer from 7 AM to 7 PM) and the shelves full of fun and funky plants that are completely reasonable to grow in a basement apartment! (I'm trying this new thing whereby I grow plants that do reasonably well in my environment. It's not a new concept to me, but it's amazing how rewarding it is to see a plant thrive instead of just survive!)

Gesneriads On Broadway

2011-09-21T19:34:00.005-04:00

This past weekend was the National Capital Area Chapter of The Gesneriad Society's semiannual show and sale, the theme being "Gesneriads on Broadway." Behnke's, in Beltsville, played the most amazing host for the show (and yeah, they're also a prize sponsor for DC State Fair!).

It was a really great experience for me--I was there most of Saturday and Sunday, volunteering, hanging out, learning about gesneriads, and, of course, buying plants!

I brought three entries to be judged: a monochrome print, a terrarium, and a dish garden. The plant material came from Kyoko's plants at Al's Orchid Greenhouse two weeks before the show (seeing as how I didn't have anything good enough from Saudi Arabia [and the USDA read my blog and confiscated my plants last week, anyway, so it's a good time to have a plant show and sale--I needed to rebuild my collection]), and the photo was of Chirita 'Dreamtime' from earlier this year--grayscaled and cropped. It printed a lot less in focus than the digital version made it seem (I mean, I knew it was out of focus, but the print version was much worse).

I got a "healthy but mislabeled plants and no design concept" for my dish garden, a second-place ribbon for my photo, and a third-place ribbon for my terrarium--as well as People's Choice, which came with a $25 gift certificate to Behnke's! I plan on posting my experiences on Petal Tones, NCAC's blog version of the monthly-ish newsletter I used to co-edit, so I won't go into too much detail about it--but I have a few fun stories to share!

But let's get to the new plants:

6 Saintpaulia:
- 'Newtown Grape Suzette'
- (#)'Northern Attitude' leaf
- 'Mystic Mermaid'
- Saintpaulia confusa
- (*)NOID, normal-size rosette, purple flowers with white edging, dark green almost purplish leaves
- (*)NOID, miniature rosette, purple flowers with white edging, purplish leaves

Optimara 'Little Ottawa'

(+)Columnea colombiana

2 Streptocarpus
- 'Bristol's Moose Stash'
- 'Christmas Morning'

Achimenes 'Tiny Red'

Smithicodonia 'Heartland's Joy'

(+)Codonatanthus 'Sunset'

(+)Nematanthus 'Cheerio'

(+)Smithiantha 'Pat's Pet Donkey'

9 Chirita:
- (#)Small-leafed tight rosette-shaped Chirita from Kyoko (2 different ones)
- C. angustifolia (+)leaf and (#)plant
- 'Rachel'
- 'Gotham'
- 'Stardust' (+)leaf sections (2) and (#)leaves (4)
- C. sinensis

(#)Hoya curtisii

Sinningia defoliata

(#)Umm... A vine of some sort. From one of the artistic displays. I need to ask Jim what it is.

(#)A plant that looks like Ledebouria socialis but almost certainly isn't.

(*)Mimosa pudica

(*)Coprosma

(*)Aeonium tabuliforme (Really doesn't look like tabuliforme, but that's what the label most likely meant to say. Definitely Aeoniumish; I don't necessarily care about the species yet.)

(*)Basil

(*)Lavender

(*)Rosemary

(*)Scilla siberica (15 bulbs)

(*)Plectranthus glabratus

(*)Mum (Behnke's had a sale: spend $25, get a free mum. Mine didn't fit in Kyoko's car [what with her two free mums!], so I gave it to Barbara, who had given me the 4 Chirita 'Stardust' leaves earlier)

Key:
(*) Bought from Behnke's using gift card/coupon/and a little bit of money
(+) Received during propagation workshop
(#) Received through various means (people sharing or just walking around asking "Does anyone want this long-ass-Latin-name?" during clean-up)

Going To See A Show

2011-09-17T08:00:00.001-04:00

I'm using Blogger's new iPhone app while on the train to hit the National Capital Area Chapter of The Gesneriad Society's semiannual show and sale that starts today. I entered a photo, a dish garden, and a terrarium (actually it is a glass butter dish! I was going for the "Gosh, that's cute" reaction).

I am volunteering as well--as a clerk (I will write judges' comments on the forms) and at the sales tables.

I'm looking forward to an awesome show!

Canning Like Whoa

2011-09-15T21:57:00.004-04:00

I recently started canning. It was something I always intended but never got around to. My relocation to DC and complete lack of employment has given me the chance to finally try my hand at it.

Over the past five days, I have canned (in no particular order):

Canned product	Estimated value
Peaches in syrup, 12 pints	$1.76 per = $21.12
Apple butter, 2 pints	$1.25 per = $2.50
Apple jelly, 2.5 pints	$5.12 per = $12.80
Superspicetastic habanero jelly, 2.5 pints	$4.67 per = $11.68
Superspicetastic habanero jam, 0.5 pints (the leftover after straining the juice for the jelly)	$4.67 per = $2.33
Peach marmalade, 2.5 pints	$4.96 per = $12.40
Boozy blackberry jam, 3.5 pints	$4.16 per = $14.56
Pear-ginger-lime marmalade, 2.5 pints	$4.96 per = $12.40
Roasted apple-rhubarb puree, 4 pints	$1.28 per = $5.12
Pear compote, 2.5 pints	$4.96 per = $12.40
Roasted pear-parsnip puree, 3.5 pints	$1.28 per = $4.48
Hot salsa, 3.5 pints	$1.99 per = $6.97
Dried Asian pear chunks, 3 cups	$2.33 per cup = $6.99
"Sun dried" tomatoes, 2 cups	$3.99 per cup = $7.98
Total generic value of canned products: $133.73

The estimates of most of the products come from average price per ounce from Giant grocery store's Peapod service. Prices of products from other websites are linked--pear compote and habanero jam are just kind of winged. Which pretty much means the funky-freshness and organicality of my products aren't reflected in the prices. I'd probably add a couple of bucks on top of most items, ratcheting up the market value of these products to about $160 or so, I'd wager--farmers' market value would be even higher, likely around $200.

That's not a terrible price. And I had a bunch of apples and pears that weren't used in these products.

Now let's check out the expenses:

Water bath canning kit (comes with rack, lid tightener thing, jar clamp, magnetic lid stick thing, and tongs): $35 (Target)
48 pint jars with lids and screw tops: $25 (on sale at Ace Hardware)
1 case each of peaches, pears, and apples: $100 (Black Rock Orchard)
Blackberries: $25 (on sale at Giant 'cause there were tons of moldy ones)
Ball Instant Pectin x2: $8 (Ace Hardware)
Limes, ginger, sugar, onion, bell peppers: $18 (Giant)
Tomatoes: $14 (Dupont Circle Farmers' Market)
Habaneros: $4 (Petworth Farmers' Market)

Total cost for canned products: $229

Not included in the expense report are spices (that were already available or used in cent-quantities) and the hour value of my work (about 22 hours over 4 days could add up to several hundred or several thousand dollars, depending on how much I think my time is worth). Certain items, such as the jars and water bath canning kit, will not have to be repurchased, so future expenses will not include them. Taking those out, the total is about $169 for the stuff I made. Which, I guess if you factor in the organicosity and supercoolness of the recipes, it's totally worth it to me. As long as I can buy in bulk for cheaper produce (I really took a hit on those "on sale" blackberries from the supermarket), I'd say this is a pretty good use of my money.

Now I just need to figure out what the heck to do with all of these goodies!

Success

2011-08-27T13:06:00.003-04:00

Originally posted on The Expat Garden(er)

It has been a few days since I landed back in Washington, DC. My smuggling attempt was successful--all of the plants, cuttings, and seeds I brought made it through just fine. Now I just have to see whether they'll root. Some don't look quite happy, especially Radrumnia x Tolumnia 'Charlie' and my Dendrobium loddigesii.

This blog will be nixed as I switch back over to The Indoor Garden(er) in the coming weeks. I'll be importing these posts to that blog and probably reformatting it to look and feel more like this one.

Repatriation

2011-08-21T03:32:00.003-04:00

Originally posted on The Expat Garden(er)

So. It has come to this: I am returning home. Much sooner than I had anticipated. But a long-distance relationship is terribly difficult, and it is more important to me than any professional opportunity could be.

Thus, my plants are caught in a sticky situation.

Try getting a phytosanitary certificate from the Saudi Ministry of Agriculture at all, let alone during Ramadan. Not going to happen. So I am going to attempt a sneak.

These two baggies contain about 35 plants--can you believe it? Bulbs, leaf cuttings, bareroot plants--the works. I also have most of the few dozen seed packets I recently purchased (some of the ones I sowed had too few seeds to really split them up, but I can get more if I'd like).

Let's hope customs doesn't ask questions...

Pretty Plants: Adenium sp.

2011-08-07T11:36:00.002-04:00

Originally posted on The Expat Garden(er)

Unknown Adendium sp. in the landscaping near my apartment at KAUST.

Announcing A New Blog

2011-08-03T16:25:00.003-04:00

Originally posted on The Expat Garden(er)

In my previous life, I occasionally shared posts that were unrelated to plants. They were about volunteer events (often related to plants, or at least sustainability, which sometimes go hand in hand), travel (sometimes related to plants), food (almost always had plants in it somewhere), and my weight-loss journey and physical activities (completely unrelated to plants).

I am making a greater distinction about the content included on this blog, however. And so soon, I'm breaking away from that. But just this once. I wanted to share my new venture: my exercise log, Bagging The Baggage.

In the tumult in the past year, I reached my goal weight on Weight Watchers, then proceeded to balloon out and gain 20 pounds back while preparing for the move to and actually living in Saudi Arabia. It has been an incredible struggle to get back down to 200 pounds, and I haven't been able to stay under it (except when I had Doha-belly and could barely eat for a week), let alone reach my goal of 185 pounds again. The emotional stresses and lack of a community of support surrounding healthy eating and physical activity make it difficult for me to maintain the physique I had achieved just this past March. Then, I had a personal trainer once a week, semiregular Weight Watchers meetings, parkour bootcamps three times a week, and a whole heck of a lot of friends and acquaintances with various health- and activity-related goings-on that encouraged me to be conscious of my choices. Here, I haven't built such a structure of people in my life, and I find it difficult to maintain what I once did on a regular basis.

To encourage myself to formulate some sort of routine, I will keep a log on Bagging The Baggage of any physical activity that is more than a usual commute--gym, classes, group bicycle rides, and the like. I also plan on doing exercise videos, logs of the machines and equipment I use, and showcasing areas that I may do other exercises (for example: parkour). Hopefully, this will help keep me more accountable than just to myself--because I know that doesn't work for me.

Seed Crazy

2011-07-29T08:35:00.003-04:00

Originally posted on The Expat Garden(er)

I came to Saudi Arabia with a few dozen plants, but I left behind more than 100 others. I'm used to having groups of different plants with various care requirements and forms, not just a few scattered plants. I have had very little problem bringing any type of plant material into Saudi Arabia via airplane, but what about through mail order? I don't think I want a live plant waiting around for inspection, so I tested out an eBay seed order. Then made a few more orders. Part of being a plant addict.

Most of the seeds I ordered are succulent-types that I think will do well here, inside or out: Stapelia, Agave, Aloe, Duvalia, and the like. Others are just for fun.

Actinidia deliciosa

Agave filifera

Agave schidigera 'Durango Delight'

Agave stricta var. rubra

Agave victoriae-reginae

Agave mix

Aloe fosteri

Aloe vaombe

Anigozanthos manglesii

Aristolochia pilosa

Aristolochia ringens

Caralluma retrospiciens

Cereus forbesii var. spiralis

Clematis hirsutissima

Cordyline australis

Dianthus barbatus 'Sooty'

Dicentra eximia

Dinteranthus vanzijlii

Dioscorea elephantipes

Drosera mix (possibly but almost certainly not including all of the following: D. aliciae, D. anglica, D. auriculata, D. binata, D. brevifolia, D. burkeana, D. burmanni, D. capensis, D. capillaris, D. coaicaulis, D. collinsiae, D. curvispata, D. deilsiana, D. filiformis, D. formosa, D. intermedia, D. natalensis, D. nidiformis, D. rotundifolia, and D. villosa [I was not about to convincingly verify the validity of some of these species names {coaicaulis, curvispata, and formosa}])

Duvalia 'Woodbridge' (I cannot confirm this name.)

Dyckia fosteriana

Dyckia marnier-lapostollei (I apparently ordered this in duplicate, from different sources. Clearly I want this one bad!)

Dyckia mix

Echeveria agavoides

Edithcolea grandis

Gibbaeum mix (possibly but not necessarily including G. album, G. comptonii, G. dispar, G. haaglenii, G. heathii, G. nuciforme, G. pubescens subsp. shandii, and G. velutinum)

Hechtia sp. 'Tehuacan' (a best guess at presentation--seed originally acquired in Tehuacan, species unknown)

Hechtia texensis

Hechtia mix (possibly but almost certainly not including all of the following: H. argentea, Hechtia sp. 'Colima,' Hechtia sp. 'El Mate,' Hechtia sp. 'Cuernavaca,' Hechtia sp. 'Miahuatlan,' Hechtia sp. 'Nizanda,' Hechtia 'Nova Oaxaca,' Hechtia sp. 'Pena Blanco,' Hechtia sp. 'Perote,' Hechtia 'Rio Zapotitlan,' Hechtia sp. 'Tehuacan,' and H. texensis [I'm not sure how to confirm these any better than with the collection site names])

Houttuynia cordata

Huernia leachii x Huernia keniensis

Huernia hystrix

Juncus filiformis

Laurus nobilis

Leuchtenbergia principis

Lycium chinense

Manfreda maculosa

Musa sikkimensis 'Manipur'

Musa sikkimensis 'Red Flash'

Ocimum basilicum 'Mrs. Burns Lemon Basil'

Passiflora edulis

Phormium tenax variegated

Phormium mix (possibly but not necessarily including P. colensoi and P. tenax)

Pittosporum tenuifolium

Mini Sinningia (unknown parentage)

Stapelia gettleffi (According to The Plant List, Stapelia gettleffii is just a synonym of Gonostemon gettleffii. But tell the rest of the world that, eh?)

Stapelia mix

Strelitzia nicolai

Viola sororia 'Freckles'

Extra seed packets in packages:

Agave colorata

Agave guiengola

Ariocarpus fissuratus (Extra information on this seed packet was provided as "var. gracilis TERLINGUA." I can't confirm the variety, but Terlingua is the town in Texas that this was probably collected from.)

Hechtia sp. 'Miahuatlan'

Standards

2011-07-22T03:30:00.004-04:00

Originally posted on The Expat Garden(er)

Standards are different here in the Kingdom. Tiny, bulbous, shiny black insects can burrow and tunnel in your huge glass jar of chili powder; little beetley insects can camp out in unopened plastic bags of pasta from the supermarket; and plant labels can have obviously incorrect names on them.

Not that that's any different from the states, however. Exotic Angel, anyone?

But seriously, this Aloe variegata, which I purchased at Tamimi supermarket on campus for 20 riyal to remind me the one (lovingly purchased for me in New York City) I killed, is labeled as Mammillaria spinosissima, which is a cactus. I wanted to chalk it up to just being put in the incorrect pot--there are cacti available for sale right next to the mislabeld Aloe, after all. But another was labeled as Cupressus (you know, cypress!) and had a flower glued onto it. I don't necessarily expect the imported workers to know what label they're sticking on a plant or why the heck it's wrong to glue a fake flower that looks nothing like an Aloe flower (or Cupressus flower, for that matter), but someone in the operation probably should. Then again, saying that, it seems like I assume I have some sort of high ground to stand on, but the same ignorant, shady stuff happens back home, too.

It's much more common, and for some reason less offensive, to me that these fake flowers are glued to various prickly cacti. It may be because I usually don't have an inclination to buy these, anyhow. With my care habits, I usually end up rotting these babies out in weeks.