Calamities and Occurrences

I had a long vacation this Christmas Season. I went home early on 20 December, in time for my sister's arrival from another country. I have been thinking of many things to do in gardening, thinking i will finish a lot of chores. However, a lot of unexpected happenings occurred limiting my efficiency and working hours. The morning of Christmas Eve my mother's youngest brother already transitioned to God's Kingdom. We were already there immediately even before the funeral services. It made my mother the sole survivor of her eight siblings, yes 8 siblings. She is now 86 years old. My uncle's interment was just yesterday, 11 days from death. We just slept in our house but were there almost everyday.

The second untimely occurrence was a strong typhoon Nina, whose center passed at the islands beside our town. That makes us also very vulnerable and most of our fruit trees were destroyed. Fortunately, it passed at daytime, so we were able to make some corrections, like removing water from the terrace. All of us helped alleviating destruction in the house, but plants in the garden suffered a lot. My hoyas and hippeastrum were toppled down and thrown away. I immediately retrieved the pots and thrown away plants . They suffered a lot of stress and setbacks.

The results are inadvertently not favorable. My vacation seems too short for me to do all the required tasks for the garden. I even wasn't able to get even just one picture of a butterfly!

 Hippeastrum and caladium pots are scattered on the ground, leaves broken 

 even the hoyas at the background are thrown to distances with broken stems and leaves

hoyas scattered on the ground, far from where their former places

 This scene of scattered plants and debris made me so confused what to do first, where to start in putting things to order.

 Coconut leaves, tree branches and a lot of things were scattered on the streets. It was total chaos. 

Thanks to the immediate response of these young men, equipped with sharp and strong bolos to cut the big trunks and branches on the streets.  Above is a big branch of our mango tree.

 Epipremnum pinnatum attaching on the mango tree trunk fell with the tree. 

Epipremnum pinnatum inflorescences. 

Most of our fruit trees were destroyed. Two coconut trees were uprooted, bananas are weak so they all broke or fell. Papayas are weak too, most trunks are cut to the ground. Our chico tree is laden with lots of fruits, already waiting for a few more days to mature before harvest, but all the fruits fell on the ground. The chickens had a feast on chico fruits two days after the typhoon.

It took 2 days for my nephew and sister to clean the leaves from the roof drains. There still are lots of dirt sticking outside our walls. There still are lots of scattered things, plant debris on the streets and gardens, but they will eventually decay and be part again of the environment. I thought the spiders and insects will not be a part of my garden for a longer time, but they were able to build their webs faster than us. The butterflies are already there flying again when the rains stopped. These creatures are trully incredible. Nature really is awesome, fascinating!

Nature Notes

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