Month: November 2018

Unlike the tailor bird story, this is not very close to my heart. Because I am not very fond of pigeons. The dislike comes from living in apartments where pigeons are a big menace. And I have something against their personal hygiene. They poop where they sit, their nests are made of poop and they seem to revel in the messiness they can create in a short while. I have tried covering windows with nets, but the pigeons managed to come in through some hole in the net. I tried having spikes, but they made their nest inside the spikes!!

And so it is, that one day a pigeon laid two eggs in a tray my balcony. I was looking forward to seeing a small bird in the balcony, and decided not to disturb the bird.

The two tiny hatchlings. Unfortunately, only one survived.

That’s one ugly, but cute at the same time, baby pigeon.

Long story short, it grew up and flew away. After that, whenever a pigeon laid eggs in my balcony, I threw them in the dustbin. Because my balcony was covered in pigeon poop for the 3 weeks that the family stayed. Apologies to all animal lovers, but I DON’T LIKE PIGEONS, especially if they live in my balcony.

Brinjals were planted by the gardener and thrived quite well for the first few months.

And I got a good yield from them as well.

The special things is that there was a pleasant surprise awaiting me when I went for a 3-week vacation and came back. A tailor bird had made its tiny nest in one of the brinjal leaves. How lovely and delicate it looked with the leaf bent carefully and a nest stitched inside it!!

We were not able to lift the leaf and look inside for fear that we might scare away the birds. But we could get a glimpse of two little eggs inside. Daddy and mommy birds took turns brooding them, with a shift change in the morning and evening. After a while, the birds started leaving the nest unattended for longer time periods, and we kind of guessed that the eggs had hatched.

To the delight of my daughter, when we moved the leaf, two tiny beaks would open wide for food. The little birds stayed in the nest for the next for a couple of weeks and then disappeared. I hope to God that they flew away, and was not eaten by stray cats or eagles.

We miss the little birdies and hope they come back again to nest in our brinjal plants!

Green chilly was one of the plants that were planted right at the beginning and they grew well when the garden took shape.

The first yield of green chillies were so bountiful that I had to distribute them to all my neighbors.

I have very low spice tolerance, and these chillies are perfect for me. Not too hot.

But after a while, the leaves of the chilly plants started curling. There was some bunching of buds on top, and the yield was almost nothing. I was wondering whether to pull them out, and sow seeds again. But then my maid advised me to prune them. She told me to pluck out just the leaves so that new ones will come in.

But after some research, I pruned them severely till there were just stumps left. And few weeks later, they grew back beautifully. So the moral of the story is “Prune chilly plants till they are mere stumps”. Chilly plants are relatively perennial in tropical climates. They will not survive harsh winters and snow, but in warmer climates, they can grow over multiple years.

We Indians love chilly, regardless of any health benefits they might have. But they actually have a few health benefits including lowering cholesterol and making your immune system better.

So go ahead. Grow some chillies!

This is a very very tricky thing to discuss. Everybody has their own philosophy on what can be used and what cannot. I am still very new to this field. So please don’t take the advice I give without testing it out for yourself.

The gardener gave me a product called

Mikboost – Produced by Milkens Bio, it is said to be an excellent plant grown booster derived from natural substances through fermentation process.(whatever that means)

Mikmine – This one is also produced by Milkens Bio, it is specifically for leaf miner. Leaf miner is this Picasso of a bug that makes pretty designs on leaves. Now I don’t mind designer leaves, but these affected leaves wither and die after a while. That’s not cool. And I wanted to get rid of them. Mikmine seems to help since I haven’t had much trouble with leaf miners after that.

I believe in good faith that these are organic pesticides and fertilizers since their website says so. But if you are very fussy about not using anything artificial, here are some things you can do.

1. Neem oil – I use a tablespoon of neem oil in half a liter of water in a spray bottle and spray liberally.  Add a little detergent so that the neem oil spreads in the water and does not float on top.
2. Marigolds – You should try this. Try growing marigolds near your vegetables and the number of pests come down drastically. I was growing some beans once and the leaves were wilting and diseased very soon. For the next batch, I planted marigolds beside it. The leaves are quite healthy and the yield better. Bugs and bees are attracted to the yellow color. The plant also has a very strong smell that repels insects.

Go ahead and try these little pretty flowers. They make your garden bright, and also keep away pests.

3. Banana peels – I was told by an awesome gardener neighbor that the water from banana peels soaked for a day can be used as pesticides. If you soak them for 3 days, you can dilute the water and use it as fertilizer. I’ve tried it once. They don’t stink. In fact, the vessel smells faintly like wine.

4. Neem cakes – Not tried,  though I have a small bag of neem cakes waiting. Will get to it soon and post the results here.