In the garden today

I have been neglecting this blog for months...... 

It has been summer, it has been hot, it has been humid, it has been................ everything.......... I have barely existed! 

Finally 'winter' is here - I'm living again! 

The worst growth of summer is over and it's finally possible to do yard work in the middle of the day without being roasted in the sun. 

I brought my camera yesterday and captured a few things in the area of the garden where I was working. 

Out of Africa - almost - LOL. Yes, it's coffee beans. We have a few coffee plants in our garden and they have berries now.  Actually coffee beans are not beans at all, they are berries. The coffee 'bean' inside the berry is the seed of the coffee plant and is also the 'beans' we roast for coffee. These beans are soon ready to be harvested. 

Coffee plants in our garden.

This 'little' fellow is one of the inhabitants in our garden. They are 'outside-spiders', never seen them inside. I had definitely freaked out if I had seen one inside! As far as I know they are harmless. They spin their web and stay there. The web is big, strong and glue-ish. 

Passion fruit, or purple granadilla as it is called in South Africa. 

... and bananas of course! 

When I lived in Norway, I thought a banana was a banana.... I was wrong! There are several varieties and the tastes are different. We have two varieties in our garden; one that has a slight sour taste (which we both love) and one we just call 'normal' bananas (not sure which variety these are). 

Cold and gray....

... it was this morning.

I'm out of bed early, most of the days long before sunrise. Sunrise today was at 06:26. I heard the mosque called for prayer one hour before sunrise. Shortly after the birds begin to wake up. It's a public holiday here today; the Muslims are celebrating EID al-Fitr. I can hear the difference from a business day and public holiday / weekend - less traffic on the road, people who rush to work, or those who rush to the bakery buying bread before their kids have to go to school etc - they don't have to rush today...  

Pristine quietness.

Half an hour after sunrise I went on the porch to take these photos...

Gray... rain in the air....

The birds coming to our trees for their breakfast...

How talkative they are! :)

The palm leaves are shiny wet...

... and while I was admiring the beauty of the palm leaves, I discovered our avocado tree is in full bloom! As I can recall, it had a few flowers last season too, but nothing came out of it... I LOOOVE avocados and hope there will be some this season - at the beginning of next year...

(click on the photo for better view). 

The bottle brush trees are in bloom too...

It was a cold and gray morning...

The fog, rain, birds...

made my day!

Happiness! 

Pristine day...

Solitude.



After the rain....

February has been extremely hot and humid, with temperatures up to 36C / 96.5F along the west coast. I shouldn't whine, but with +32C / 92F halfway on the plateau and add 80-85% humidity... Yes, it is way too hot and humid for me!

Some days ago we had such a nasty, yet such a wonderful days; RAIN - and the temperature fell with about 6 degrees - WONDERFUL!

I love to take photos in our garden. Flowers and leaves look amazing and different in the rain... like they are smiling...  Here I have captured some of the plants after they got wonderful showers.

Our latest addition to our garden; Ixora Coccinea - known as 'Jungle Flame'.
The genus 'Ixora' was named by Linnaeus referring to species originating from India which was dedicated to the god 'Iswara'. The Old Indian for master, lord was turned into 'Ixora'.
(An Illustrated Guide to the Flora of Mauritius & Indian Ocean Islands - Ameenah Gurib Fakim)

Callistemom Citrinus - 'Bottlebrush' flowers

No idea the name of this one.... There are several plants with almost the same flowers...

Glittering and silvery banana leaf...

Caladium Bicolor - lovely colorful leaves.

Even a dry seed pod looks different after the rain...

'Pistache Malgasche' (known as this name by the locals)

It looks like we're in for a sunny day today (Sunday), but perhaps more rain next week. This is what the satellite imagery shows this morning.

If you don't know where Mauritius is situated; the island to the right (in the middle of the blue ocean, see photo). The tiny, tiny dot to the right (on the line) is Rodrigues and to the left of us; Reunion Island (French). As you can see, Madagascar is covered in clouds.

(Synoptic chart from MMS - Mauritius Meteorological Services)

What's blooming in our garden today

It has been too long since I posted on this blog. I've been busy with hundreds of other things and haven't had too much to share.

Yesterday we almost got a 'shock' - lol - our cherry tree is in full bloom! This is something we have been waiting for the last couple of years, and finally, finally.... :) We have no clue what sort of cherries it is. MIL brought cherry seeds from Reunion Island 6-7 years ago and this tree is from one of the seeds. The poor tree hardly survived its first couple of years - it didn't get proper care. MIL then decided to give it to me, because she knew I will take care of it. Through the years I have given it all my love and care and now my effort pays off! :)

Isn't it beautiful?!

When I took these photos this morning, there were lots of bees enjoying the flowers.

The flowers are just awesome, aren't they...

While shooting photos of the cherry tree, I decided to 'walk around the house' shooting other plants in bloom.

I don't know the names of all the trees/plants we have in the garden and therefore can't give you the name of them all.

I don't think I have to explain this one?! Bougainvillea - just amazing!

I don't know the name of this one... I know there is one called 'Queen of the Night', but I don't know if this is the real one.... Too many of them that looks the same...

Pink trumpet vine - is one of the names of this beauty. It's a creeper and it covers part of the railing on our porch. Podranea ricasoliana - originating from South Africa.

I discovered it is prone to rooting when the branches/creepers hit the ground/soil - and starts making new plants.

Any of you who knows the name of this beauty?

Miss Hong Kong!

Jatropha integrimma - native to Cuba, so I wonder what Hong Kong has to do with it?! :)

Lemon tree in bloom.

No clue the name of this one....

It's beautiful, isn't it?

All Mauritians (I believe) know this fruit as 'jamalac', but its original name is syzygium samarangense' . If you click on the link, you will see all the different names it has.

This is not our tree - it's the neigbor's - it's close to the border wall between the two plots.

They are not yet ripe, have to grow a little bit bigger and turn dark pink. 

White oleander... smells heavenly!

Here this plant is called 'Red Ginger' - Alpinia purpurata

No clue.... Anyone?

...and this was all for today! :)

DUH! I forgot to take photos of the orchids! That will be for another post! 

It's winter in Mauritius

Yes, it is winter!

I'm sure you'll be thinking; 'hm... winter in a tropical island, that's not possible'! It is possible, but ofcourse it is not what I'm thinking of when I hear the word 'winter'. The locals say 'winter', but to me - who is used to real winter with snow and darn cold - find it ridiculous! I'd rather say 'the cooler season'.

The 'coldest' months are July & August, when the temperature drops 10 degrees or so; from about 34-35C/93F on the coast / +30-32C/87F inland to +26-27C/80F / +19-21C/68F and during the nights it can go as low as +8C/47F in certain places. Earlier this week we had +14.5C/58F one morning and when the humidity shows 80-90%, it feels so cold! We also get the 'winter-rain', which means rain and sun every second hour or so... At least it feels like that! :) During the 'winter' season we get wind from the Antarctic too - brrrrr! I'm freezing! Love to warm my fingers and body on a hot mug of tea with cardamom! And I'm wearing wool socks and wool sweater! Do you believe me?! :))

We're living halfway up on the plateau and therefore more exposed to rain. This is how it looked like this early morning... gray with rain...

...and when the sun was shining I spotted this amazing rainbow....

Rain! Rain! Rain! Wet! Wet! Wet! We need rain! The reservoir - Mare aux Vacoas - is down at 30% of its full capacity.

Don't know if you have spotted the flowers to the left? The neighbor has a big Datura in their garden, with apricot colored flowers.

Meet 'Henrietta the 2nd'!

She has become kind of 'pet' now. She lives just outside our kitchen window and I have to check every morning if she's still there! It shouldn't be any reason why she shouldn't, because these spiders rarely leave the web for the ground. I have noticed she is most active before noon. I've seen her hunting other insects and today she was busy repairing her web. I think you can see the 'thread' from her belly if you click on the pic to enlarge. Amazing!

You may wonder why on earth I have given the spider a name?! Well, I do not suffer arachnophobia, but I kind of don't like any kind of insects inside our house. Well, spiders are not insects though, but still........ Our first 'Henrietta' was another kind of spider that comes inside looking for small insects to eat. 'Henrietta #1' stayed in our bedroom for some days and it felt a bit more safer after giving it a name - lol! I know it sounds very silly, but that's part of me in a nutshell! :))

Did you miss this comedy/horror film with Jeff Daniels? :)) Hilarious!

An afternoon in the garden

Our garden always seems to be neglected. It is not that we don't like or don't do gardening. The fact is none of us like to work in the garden let's say one hour per day, we prefer to spend at least half a day in the garden to get something done and afterwards have the feeling - and muscle pain - that we have done something! :) Somehow 'one hour per day gardening' seems a bit wasted to me.

Well, Sunday at around noon I decided it was time for some hours in the garden, and this is what came out after 5 hours of weeding, trimming branches and cleaning up.

Three 20-litres (4.4 gallons) buckets full of weed and leaves,

... and two heaps of branches and creepers.

Aren't these flowers beautiful?! Yes, they are! But this plant is a PEST! When the flowers are done, the seeds spread everywhere by the wind. The seeds are similar to dandelion seeds and I know those of you who struggles with dandelion in your garden, knows what I'm talking about!

This is what the birds do to fruits! We have these yummy guavas in our garden. We love them - and so do the birds! In spite the tree is young, the harvest was very good. We shared guavas with a friend, with MIL, and I even made 2-3 glasses of jam. The pink guavas are sweet so no need to add too much sugar when making jam. It can be made without sugar too.

Sunday's harvest; no more guavas on the tree for the birds - or for us - this season.

The neighbor has chou-chou.... known as chayote too. It's a creeper and it loves to climb into our trees on the border! It had climbed into a palm branch and when I pulled the branch off the creeper, one fruit fell down. (Psst.... we're going to have it for dinner!)

We have something rare in our garden.... It is a tree known as 'Pistache Malgache' by the elder generation of Mauritians and as far as we know, there are not many trees left on the island because people don't care about it anymore. The nuts are edible.

Bananas - of course! :) Before I settled here, I thought bananas were bananas. Now I have learnt there are so many varieties of bananas and even the taste is different. We have two different bananas in our garden and here is one of them. Still 'babies'! :)

Flower bud on an aloe vera.

Five hours later; a wonderful feeling of tiredness! :)



Cutting trees

This is not meant as an offense to the locals...

I'm just so surprised as well as amazed how trees are cut here... Being an ex-farmer/forest owner; it is something called esthetics when cutting a tree.... My father taught me the importance of how to cut trees beautifully; the trees should not look like scarecrows after cutting!  Perhaps it is true what hubby says in defence; 'we are used to cut sugar canes, not trees'......................... Looking at the photos, perhaps you will understand what he means...

Our neighbor got somebody to cut down some mango trees.  

The trees had to be cut, because branches went into another neighbor's electrical cable and could have caused some serious damage during cyclones. The trees were even too old to carry fruits...

The tops of the trees before cutting....

The mango trees are all cut down properly, but the owner convinced the tree cutters 'one branch has to be left on the tree, so it doesn't die'.......... Imagine what will happen to this tree during a cyclone with gusts up to 250 km / 155 miles/h - what will happen to the two branches left?!

If not the first tree cutters had messed it up enough... Some days later tree cutters from CEB (Central Electricity Board) 'cleaned up' what was left of the camphor tree on the corner.... Why on earth did they have to leave two branches - one has even dried up?!  They even managed a short circuit in the transformer next door, so we were without electricity for approx 1.5 hours....

I'm not sure how to explain how I feel when seeing trees cut like this; perhaps vandalism is the right word... And it is just like I want to take the axe and cut down the branches that are left...

I shouldn't focus on the negative only, because there is a positive aspect too; it has become much more airy and we get more sunshine into our garden!

I wonder how that's going to be next hot summer; no trees to protect us from the sun...



I can't cook all the time... images from our garden

I love taking my camera to our garden and shoot some photos, when I find something interesting. We don't have many trees, shrubs or perennials in bloom right now, but there are a few.

When we built up our garden, we got a few Canna from MIL's garden. We had them in one corner of the garden, but it seems they didn't feel well there, so we moved them alongside the wall to the neighbor, where they seem to be happier.

Canna x generalis - it originates from the tropical and subtropical regions of America, this plant has been introduced to many tropical countries.

Brunfelsia Uniflora - also called "Yesterday-Today-Tomorrow", because of its characterized two toned scented flowers. Originally from tropical America.

Odontonema Strictum  - "firespike".

Breynia disticha - Tropical snow bush. Originates from the New Hebrides.

Callistemom citrinus - Red bottle brush tree - native to Australia.

Here are the seeds. 

A couple of days ago we discovered this little fellow in our garden... As far as I have observed, these spiders are quite common here. We used to see a lot of them in our lower garden, but sadly they seem to have disappeared. I'm happy to see this one has decided to build its web close to our kitchen window. This one is still a youngster, when fully grown it will be twice the size. I have seen them huge, and they are huge!

I'm unable to find any info about them on the net, perhaps I don't have patience enough - haha! :)