Goldie's Garden

Zinnias

December 15, 2011 by J. Martinez

The Zinnias progressed nicely throughout the season and just recently bit the dust in late November. While they may not have been much to look at in the beginning, these flowers sure grew into their beauty for the last few months. They had a good run and we will be ready for next years Zinnia planting. The seeds came in a huge pack and we have tons more. Something tells me we’ll have an overload of pink, red, and orange Zinnias in 2012!

The season is pretty much over at this point with a few stragglers hanging on for dear life. I stopped watering and tending back in November and figured I’d see how the plants do on their own. The Okinawa weather is slowly but surely starting to get chilly. Every time I thought the Zinnias had stopped growing… a new one would pop up bigger and much prettier than the last.

A very simple flower and not too needy. A bit of water and sunshine and they did their thing like nature intended. The soil we planted in was a clay based soil… which the label was in kanji (bought at the DIY store in Okinawa, Japan) so I had no idea until it was too late. To remedy the problem I added grass mulch from the lawn mower. It may or may not have helped. I read online that adding organic material and/or mulch, etc can eventually work its way into the soil and make it less compact. The clay soil made it nearly impossible for water to sink into. The water would just sit on top of the soil. Which at first glance made me think I was over watering when in fact the flowers were drying out because the water was unable to penetrate the hardened clay dirt.

A few weeks after adding the mulch and spraying with a (safe) chemical pest killer I noticed mushrooms growing in the pot. Apparently a little fungi didn’t hurt at all, and before I knew it the Zinnias were growing like crazy. Note to self: research the effects of fungi/soil/flower growth.

: ©J.Martinez

: ©J. Martinez

: ©J. Martinez

: ©J.Martinez

: ©J.Martinez

: ©J.Martinez

: ©J.Martinez

: ©J.Martinez

: ©J. Martinez

: ©J. Martinez

: ©J.Martinez

: ©J.Martinez

: ©J.Martinez

: ©J.Martinez

: ©J.Martinez

: ©J.Martinez

: ©J.Martinez

: ©J. Martinez

: ©J.Martinez

Buckeye Butterfly (wingedbeauty.com)
Painting Zinnias in September (greenwillowstudio.wordpress.com)
Annual, Perennial, and Biennial Flowers (proflowers.com)
It’s so wet that…. (gcvhorticulture.wordpress.com)
Zinnias (frted.wordpress.com)
Which Flowers Can Grow in Pots? (proflowers.com)
The magic of mulch (seattletimes.nwsource.com)

Posted in Okinawa Garden | Tagged Mulch, Okinawa, Organic matter, Soil, Sowing, Zinnia | 1 Comment »

The Ugly Duckling Cosmo

October 24, 2011 by J. Martinez

For the most part the flowers have been dainty all year and then out of nowhere comes the one pot that looked different. The stem was fat and tree trunk like. It was much darker than the other plants of it’s kind. It was the last to bloom.

Not a day after I thought our Cosmo growing season was coming to an end come the biggest and most beautiful blooms of the year. So awesome in fact this flower gets a post all to itself.

Shot on iPhone 3GS

Posted in Okinawa Garden | Tagged Cosmo, Enchantment Mix, Flower, Large, pink | Leave a Comment »

Enchantment Mix Cosmos

October 24, 2011 by J. Martinez

2011©Jennifer Martinez

The Enchantment Mix Cosmos took off faster than any other we planted this year. A beautiful addition to a struggling garden. I misread the Burpee seed packet: 4′ (feet) but I thought it said 4″ (inches) so I planted them in our smallest pots. It didn’t take long to realize that these babies had out grown their intended size within the first few weeks after planting. Oops. Oh well, they are still our most healthy flowers to date.

The smaller pots stunted the growth of our Cosmos for the most part, however they have been our most productive plant this season. I read online that Cosmos are generally wild growing flowers. That is so true. My initial plan was to keep them against our side wall that leads up to our front porch. The area gets good morning sun and shade in the mid afternoon. It was good for about 2 months, however once the flowers started blooming and the stems continued to grow taller and taller (2-4 feet) the tops started leaning. I mean REALLY leaning. I’m talking V8 style lean. Drove myself nuts trying to decide what I did wrong. So a bit more research online and I understood the problem.

As a garden newbie and former black thumb, I assume that since these plants were tall they would benefit from the wall they rested upon. WRONG. Basically the opposite is true. What our tall and lanky Cosmos needed was more sunshine and wind. That’s right, wind.

It scared me at first honestly, because I just knew that I’d regret moving the pots based on something I read online. But thank you to the random person on a random forum that lead me to find the saviors of our beloved babies. Wind and sun. What the wind does is make the stems stronger and thicker to be able to support blooms. Exercise… it’s like Cosmo Calisthenics:)

So we moved the pots to the edge of the yard where they now enjoy full sun and wind all day. Okinawa has no shortage of wind and rain so we’re in luck. Speaking of rain, the Cosmos can go without water for longer than most other plants. As long as they get a bit of aqua now and again they will do their own thing. Not drought resistant though, because they will curl up and die after a week. Mostly the blooms last 4 days before a new one takes it’s place.

From spring to autumn (that is if Okinawa had 4 seasons…) here is the gallery. Click any image to enlarge.

How to beautify your garden’s borders (telegraph.co.uk)
Growing Together Part I (greeneyedgoldie.wordpress.com)

Posted in Okinawa Garden | Tagged Burpee, Cosmo, Enchantment Mix, Flower, Garden, Home and Garden, Okinawa, Plant, Pots and Containers, Seed, sow, Wind | 1 Comment »

Time to go Carpet of Snow :(

September 28, 2011 by J. Martinez

2011©Jennifer Martinez

We’re back online and trying to catch up on all the progress we’ve made in our Okinawa garden. We haven’t given up on our gardening duties but I’ve been too busy to blog. Although to mark our success and failures we took plenty of pictures. We will NOT make the same mistakes next planting season.

If I knew when & where we went wrong, we may have may have actually had a Carpet of Snow.

What I know:

1.We did follow instructions to keep the plant in half sun/half shade.

2.The Alyssum grew fast and started to become very full. Which makes sense because they are ground cover/spreading plants. The flowers that did bloom were tiny and looked like a much smaller version of the picture on the Burpee seed packet.

3. At one point I pulled a dying piece out during thinning and may have damaged root. (Not to mention I waited a month too long to thin.) However this was only in one of the 3 pots.

4. We had a series of over water / under water indecisiveness… thanks to internet searches.

5. The pretty, bright green petals that once were… quickly dried, curled, and shriveled up until falling off completely.

6. Taking matters into my own hands I decided I’d add more soil mixed with Miracle Gro Blood Meal. Now I had no clue what it needed to survive so I gave it a shot. This unopened bag of organic matter was just staring me in the face.

Conclusions or lack there of … we’ll call my best guess

Theory 1: Unknowingly sentencing the Alyssum to death by over crowding pots that were too small to begin with.

Theory 2: Planting a few months too late. The Okinawa heat is NO JOKE! We are much closer to the equator than North America, where this flower is said to bloom very well with little effort. So this leads me to believe that if we had given the Alyssum an earlier start closer to March/April instead of June/July they may have thrived.

Theory 3: Alyssum do not do well with organic matter Blood Meal. (Note to self: research the effects of this product on this plant)

After countless attempts to bring back a struggling plant… I gave up.

Time to let nature take it’s course and see what happens. While the plant is still green, it’s dried up and very unhappy. No blooms, no foliage, no leaves, no petals; just a maze of little twiggy green stems. Looking more like an ugly weed.

However I’ve noticed that there are beautiful weeds that fool me into watering them! Weeds really do get a bad wrap. Although since I’ve quit maintaining the Alyssum pots, I’ve noticed that weeds are starting to grow freely. (Notice the clovers and other strange growth in the last few pictures below) Really we could play the which plant does not belong game.

Either way the Alyssum adventure is over for us. At least until next year.

PS. My little helper turned 4 and now could care less about our garden most days. She waters her feet and likes to cut the Zinnias and Cosmos. Which are coming up on the blogroll in the next few posts.

Resist the Urge (greeneyedgoldie.wordpress.com)
My Garden in July (adnelg.wordpress.com)
The Strong Survive? We Shall See (greeneyedgoldie.wordpress.com)

So let’s take a look at the Alyssum from start to finish:

2011©Jennifer Martinez

: 2011©Jennifer Martinez

2011©Jennifer Martinez

2011©Jennifer Martinez - iPhone 3GS - Diptic App

2011©Jennifer Martinez

2011©Jennifer Martinez

Posted in Okinawa Garden | Tagged Alyssum, Flower, Flower pot, flowers, Garden, growing, Home and Garden, Japan, Okinawa, Plant, planting, Pots and Containers, Seed, Soil, watering, Weed | 3 Comments »

Slackin’ on Bloggin’

August 22, 2011 by J. Martinez

Since we took our vacation last month… I have been seriously slackin’ on life, especially the garden blogging. While of course I have excuses a mile long (my own homework, kids, end of summer, kids, baseball season, plus being the dreaded “team mom”, and oh yeah kids.) I love them, but it’s time for school to start up again ASAP! Next week buddy… back to a schedule. It’s so funny how antsy everyone gets the week before school lets out… and the week before it starts again.

The garden has been through a 4 day vacation, the longest typhoon on Okinawa in decades, countless days of drought, brutal heat, and yet is doing better than it was before. Improving due to the fact that I realized soon enough that I was underwatering. Yup. I was starving the poor babies. Our plants have been through disastrous starvation, bug attacks, and even sunburns in just 4 weeks time. We’ll get to the details in my next few posts. It’s so much to catch up on in a single post, so I will break it down by individual flowers to help show how much progress has been made in the last month. Not to mention the fatal mistakes I’ve made. All is not lost, in fact through it all I may not be the black thumb I claimed to be. Green Thumb…here I come!

Posted in Okinawa Garden | Leave a Comment »

Old, abandoned buildings: Cool or creepy?

August 1, 2011 by J. Martinez

Creepy or Cool… I say totally INSANELY Friggin AWESOME! I absolutely love old creepy, cool, dirty, abandoned, ancient buildings of all sorts. Right up my alley!

Takara Haunted Royal Hotel in a rainy mist

Yes, I’m new to WordPress Blogging, so I’m not sure why but these “article ideas” started popping up today and although it has NOTHING to do with our garden… I absolutely could not resist posting.

So thanks WordPress for giving me a reason to post pics of one of the most spooky places in Okinawa, Japan… The Haunted Takara (Royal) Hotel. Located outside the Nakagusuku Castle Ruin.

The castle is over 700 years old. Next to it sits the half finished hotel. Construction was stopped abruptly 30+ years ago due to the strange occurences and beyond reason deaths of numerous workers. I’m thinking this is one site that will remain unfinished and untouched. With the exception of the mark of so many fantastic graffiti artists:)

***I haven’t been inside but there are many photos online of other bloggers that have been inside. ***

Posted in Okinawa, Japan, Travel | Tagged castle ruin, creepy, ghost stories, haunted, haunted hotel, haunting, old buildings, paranormal, royal hotel, travel | 4 Comments »

Return from Oura Wan

August 1, 2011 by J. Martinez

Home to our garden after a 4 day, 3 night vacation to Oura Wan Beach on Camp Schwab. Worried? Yes, but not enough to let it spoil our trip. If our soon to blooms died while we were away, then it wouldn’t be our first flower funeral.

The difference here is that I’m genuinely attached to our new plants like babies. However, right now they are more like troubled teenagers, they don’t know which way to grow… they’re just growing. And as the parent, I made plenty of mistakes. Mistakes I shall remedy the next time around.

The difference between my flowers and my actual children: the perennials will start over next year, the kids will live with our mistakes forever… {insert going insane, pulling my hair out smiley face here :0}