Butterfly Pea [Clitoria Ternatea]

Butterfly pea flower, commonly grown for the flower which produces blue colouring or dye for food not so much for the pea pod and the all famous scientific name which is also used for the female private part due to the similarity of the design of the flower. This beautiful and useful flower can be grown anywhere and sometimes it takes over a huge area in the wild, creeping over fences and other man made objects. In order to grow this plant, dry the pod and get the seeds, it takes less than 3 months for it to mature and flower. They grow healthy and best grown with something for it to climb and creep on. This flower attracts a lot of tiny birds and bees, pick the flower once it starts to close and dry them in the hot sun if you want to produce some nice blue dye.

Old cucumber

Old cucumber, thats what we call it here and some think its simply ordinary cucumber we have and left to aged thus called old cucumber. This is best or most famous used locally to boil soup and the plants looks like cucumber plant. This was grown from my compost bin and I sort of let it be for a few weeks and it managed to produce a few cucumber.

Winter melon [Grown in pot]

This little experiment simply prove, most plants are very hardy and resilient, they simply survive and thrive given the right conditions even inside a small pot. 2018 first big harvest and this little potted winter melon plant started roughly 6 months ago from a tiny seed and I simply recycled some abandoned wood to make a little cage for it to creep on. Only one fruit made it while the rest simply dried up and dropped off the vine. Only fed with home made compost and no artificial fertilizer or pesticides. The leaves is being attacked but the fruit seem to have none insect bite mark compared to other fruits or vegetables I have.

Big Red Strawberry Farm Cameron Highland

Cameron highland, one of Malaysia’s biggest highland vegetable farm which is highly controversial due to the method and land used for massive commercial farming while some claims they are organic, some claims they are pesticide free and much more. Just showing you some of the farms here and not debating on their code of conduct which you can read more online. This highland takes 4 hours drive from the capital city, KL and this little place has massive farmland which supplies nearby cities and towns their daily fresh produce.

Big red strawberry farm is partially a tourist spot and they do farm strawberries for sale and some vegetables too.  All farmed in tiny pots and in hydroponic system with direct feeding tubes system. The strawberries smells great but its sour, probably only good to be cooked with syrup or made into desserts.

 

Hornet Nest

Another nest showed up yesterday on the branch of my coffee plant, hornets do make nest here and there once a while. They sting and not deadly, just a little bump but don’t risk it by poking the nest. Usually I start a small fire to drive them away before removing the nest, by placing it further away or that little jungle nearby. You cant stop them by no point  killing them either, they are just part of the ecosystem I guess. It’s nice to watch them go about building and tendering their nest actually.

Roselle [Hibiscus Sabdariffa]

Most of us who tried this bright red drink which taste like berry would not believe it came from this dried hibiscus flower called roselle. Its very easy to grow, just get one of the fruit and dry it to harvest the seed. It takes a few months to grow up to 1 meter or more which the entire plant will be filled with flowers. The fruit will form and you can harvest it and dry it. The dried flower can be kept for years and you can make drinks by boiling it in water which re-hydrate it and edible too.

Sugar apple Fruiting Season

It has been pretty warm and sunny since June towards July, most of my sugar apple been flowering and fruiting with an average 10 to 15 fruits per tree. Its growing healthy and most had reached 3 to 5 meter height. Sugar apple is hard to find in the market lately, this is one sweet fruit and most bird and squirrel come daily eyeing for one ripe and soft one to take a bite.

Meanwhile, many clever birds got it first, well, its good to share.

Bountiful of Jackfruit

After 3 years of growing a few jackfruit trees while some destroyed by termites, most trees has matured and started to fruit with close to 20 fruit per tree. I was late to wrap up the young fruits and most got damaged by bugs and started rotting from inside out. The not ripe fruit is totally eaten internally by worms like maggots and most fall to the ground and being removed. Hopefully the rest survive the journey and ripen soon.

 

BAR Formula Compost Farm Visit

A group of us had the opportunity to visit BAR Formula compost factory and farm over the weekend, also being treated with a great farm to table meal. The entire farm is created to test and show how compost can be used to replace commercial fertiliser. These chinese mustard green (sawi) are grown with compost and these huge bags are the commercial shipping bags for delivery to other farms.

Further up a huge area with dried and dead corn plants which is unsightly  and one would assume its a plot of failed produce. However, its not and these are their natural way of cultivating healthy bacteria from the ground.

Next, we are shown the nursery in which they germinate the seedlings and grow them in nets to avoid the harmful bugs since they don’t use pesticides.

Other area are harvested dwarf bitter gourd grown together with chilli another method used here by attracting bugs which feed on each other which helps to reduce crop damages. Ageing adult plants are used as sun shading while young seedling are started at the bottom to creep over the older plants.

There are also compost made of paddy field waste.

Lakes are made to collect rainwater to water the plants.

There were many more trees around the compound such as lime, lemon, soursop, papaya and others. They fertilise all of them with their company compost produce and they amazing and healthy results is clearly seen.

So much more to show and tell, its good to know more companies and farmers are moving towards compost grown produce and its much more transparent nowadays how our food are being produced. I will be updating more on this amazing farm in time to come and they are expanding their range of produce soon.

Fence Farming v2.0

This is the end result of converting unused fences around the neighbourhood into a simple farm. Passion fruit has been one of the most successful of all, with little to not much care once planted around the fence. This luscious growth from a few passion fruit plant scattered along a 3 meter stretch started creeping up the fence and fruit within 4 to 5 months time. The fruit it ready harvest now, last count, around 50 to 60 fruits so far.