A Guest Tree!

We have a few trees near our property that always attract my attention. It might have been planted there by the previous owner of the land. This is not a common tree in our area, maybe just an introduced species. At the start of the dry season in March, it sheds off most of its leaves that photos somehow resemble autumn against the clear blue tropical sky. I always go there because birds love to frolic in its branches, and because there are no leaves, they are very conspicuous for the camera. 

This season i was late going there, although still at the peak of our dry season. I had a different kind of excitement because i saw it in a different way. There are already flowers and young fruits.  The flowers are lovely, yellowish with brown margins.  It now intrigues me and i searched for it when i got home, turned out to be already a common tree elsewhere, Gmelina arborea. It is used for light furnitures and  uses other than timber because of its light weight. And for a bit of important information, in India it is called 'Kumizh tree' and when burnt yields the whitest possible ash. That is the reason this ash is one ingredient in the semi solid white ochre used in drawing the very ancient 'cave paintings' as old as 3,000 to 5,000 years or more, found in the dense forests of Tamilnadu, India. 

a deciduous tree at the start of the dry season in Feb to March

the branches starting to flower and produce fruits, as well as new shoots in April

flowers fallen to the ground

a flower with a mature fruit

For Two Questions Meme: 1. Do you have a particular tree or plant you are so attracted with in your vicinity?

                                       2. Why do you think are your reasons of being particularly attracted to it?

    

    

Invasion of the Reds

January this year is our coldest month, and that only means our temperatures in the city dipped to at least 18°C at 5:30 in the morning! That is way before the sun rises at 6:30am and most people are still in bed. It only happened this year! My blogger friends from the temperate climates will laugh at this, but that is the lowest we got, courtesy of the winds coming from the deep winter of Siberia and China. While you are braving the negative zero temperatures, we are already blessed when this temperature range visits us. The most amusing thing is that it only happened once, only that moment, and most of this month we get around 25°C. We are already at the start of the dry season, and by next month we will again be in our 30's again. Oh how lovely it would be if the lower 20Cs will be with us for at least a few months! That will be heaven.

And analogous to the color descriptions, we are of course getting all the warm colors: the reds, orange, red-orange and yellows. I am posting the crown of thorns or Euphorbia milii. Above shows the young flowers in the foreground and the more mature open ones at the back.

 This plant is not taken care of at home, they are just left at the edges for their thorns not to be accidentally touched by any animal, including humans. Moreover, the sap is poisonous! Being neglected didn't deter them to produce lovely blooms. We have 4 varieties, above is the solid red.

 This is another variety with slightly white specks, and majority of the color is pinkish.

Another variety is the red with more pronounced white specks or variegation. I don't have any preference for their colors though. But insects and bees also visit them.

This is their mature stem, and those thorns are really hard. It is really dangerous when placed in a busy location. This characteristics physically relegated them to the sidelines.

For the Two Questions Meme:
1.  Are you intimidated by their thorns?
2. Will you still be planting this plant despite the dangers?

   



http://www.selfsagacity.com/p/thursday-two-questions.html

Do you know your coffee enough?

Who doesn't want a cup of coffee! Everybody wants a cup, and most often another few cups per day. I guess this is one of the most famous drinks of all time. In the last few years, a lot of coffee shops sprouted here in the country, triggered by the foreign coffee shops you are most familiar with.

In the past there are no coffee shops here, as purely coffee shops. Coffee is just in restaurants, offered as drinks, together with other recipes. But that doesn't mean we don't have it. It has been here for centuries, mostly introduced during the colonization period by the Spaniards. History says it is brought here in 1784, and my province was the first biggest producer. It produced the traditional coffee blend we locally call "Barako", and is now being promoted by one of the biggest coffee shops here "Figaro". I guess 'kapeng barako' can very well be an intellectual property right as Geographic Indication.

My father being a heavy coffee drinker planted a lot of coffee plants in our property. So we basically are coffee drinkers starting from childhood. As kids we also had our share of harvesting and processing coffee beans. But when father died, the trees are not cared for anymore, and we don't process our own coffee too. The small harvests are now sold as dry beans, to the assembler wholesalers who buy from small producers.

A young coffee tree, 'Arabica' variety

A blooming coffee tree will not pass unnoticed. The scent is so mildly sweet specially in the mornings. And the white blooms are so beautiful.

young immature berries line every branch and every leaf axils

 When properly tended and fertilized,  every branch is laden with fruits.

 A neglected tree in our property showing very few fruits in a plant, not all branches have fruits.

 This is the 'Liberica' variety famous in the country as 'kapeng barako', planted and popularized in my province. 'Barako' is a local term for male animal, which might be the term given to describe the strength of this coffee. It is said that there are only two countries where this variety is successfully cultivated. The other varieties are Excelsa, Robusta, Arabica. Blends from these varieties make excellent aroma and brew, and the proportion of the variety makes for a particular type of blend. I specifically like more of the Arabica variety, although we were so used to the Liberica variety because Arabica grows in colder conditions.

Sundrying coffee berries in cement structures takes a few days, the length depends on the intensity of the sunlight and temperatures. Cloudy skies lengthens drying and lessens the quality of the dried coffee beans. It should well be taken care well not to catch any drizzles or rain, as moisture will allow fungus infection on the drying pulp. However, this might not give bad effects on the coffee beans as their seed coats are very thick and hard for the fungus to enter. But care is given not to incur unsightly appearance. Modern coffee plantations use electric driers for their harvest.

Further processing of the sundried coffee berries include depulping, cleaning, roasting, grinding before we get the coffee brew most of us normally clamour for! 

These are fallen flowers of 'Liberica' coffee variety, the scent is still soothingly strong even at this stage.

Come, let's have a cup of coffee, everybody is invited!

Now here are my Two Questions for the Thursday Two Questions Meme: 

1. Have you personally seen a coffee plant?

2. Can you relate your cup of coffee to the plant?

  

Wildflowers Parade

I've long wanted to join Wildflower Wednesday of Gail's Clay and Limestone. However, I always forget that it is up only at the last Wednesday of each month. So now that I was able to remember it before the appointed date, i will maximize the chance. And i will be putting most of the wildflowers i took early this month. So please bear with me, this is a parade! I posted the flowers followed by the plant, except for the last three photos!

This is Oxalis corniculata. It has been growing as weeds all around our property and very difficult to get rid off. But the dainty petite yellow flowers when plenty are lovely too. 

This is the luxuriant growth of this weed. Wikipedia says it is also called sleeping beauty or creeping wood sorrel. And it is reported there that the leaves can be eaten too, with tangy taste of lemons. The leaves can be infused into hot water, sweetened, chilled to make as a drink and rich in vitamin C. But there is a warning, that eating the leaves in large quantities for a long time can inhibit calcium absorption. Oh that is quite interesting, but i guess our own kamias or Averrhoa bilimbi also has that characterestics.

 The porter weed or snake weed, Stachetarpheta jamaicensis, is really a weed in our area, both in function and in habit. No one seems to mind it but I and the butterflies. We both love it.

 The luxurious growth at a meadow during my walk for the sunrise shots.

 This newly opened bloom looks so auspicious, but i haven't seen any butterfly alighting on it. It is the flower of the invasive and obnoxious

 The insects, just like me, are also scared of those many sharp thorns. If a bigger animal enters this thicket, i wonder if he will still come healthy! Mimosa diplotricha

Lovely against the blue sky, this grass towers among its neighbors.

In a few days it will be ripe and will spread havoc in the vicinity including our gardens. NOID

This is a small grass, almost just 2 ft in height, but it also glistens against the morning sun. NOID

I am about to look for open pink flowers on that plant at the right, however it might still open a little later. And it seems that two of us wait for the bloom to be ready, this butterfly for the nectar and I for the photo.

This is not a wildflower anymore, but a collection of wild fruits. They look like miniature tamarind, with a mimosa-like leaves. I am sure this is also a legume, just that i don't know the ID. Those fruits sway gracefully with the wind. I am late for their flowers.

I would like to join this post also to Two Questions Thursday Meme, for the first time. Here are my two questions:

          1. Will i attempt to eradicate all these weeds in our garden these dry season, hoping they will not show 

              up next year rainy season?

          2. Or should I remove most of them and just leave the first weed, the least obnoxious among them? 

               Whew!!!