Last harvest for 2011

Am not sure what this plant is... 

Shall have to look the references up one day...

I supposed the fruits must be quite tasty as the birds do come for them...

Update: Thanks to Debra for suggesting that this could be 'bittersweet'. Did a search on the net and indeed, this plant belongs to the bittersweet family. The bittersweet in Debra's write-out looks like a climber but not this one in our garden. I think this plant we have is called Japanese Spindle. It is not a climber but an ever green shrub with shiny leaves.

Harvested some round daikons today for my suweeto haato to make a new year dish with carrots...

Also harvested the butter scotch pumpkins... 

All six of them, including the one that was harvested some time ago...

In total, they weighed about 4.9 kilograms...

As we retire for the night, my missus is about to put one pumpkin into a dutch oven and placing the dutch oven inside our wood-stove...

We are experimenting to see if the pumpkin gets cooked with the remaining heat from the wood-stove... 

Plus, harvested the last of the sweet potatoes...

The purple-flesh murasaki sweet potatoes were the most productive of the four types... 

All in all, they weighed in at about 15.2 kilograms...

Very good by my standards...

Our favorite sweet potato however, is the orange-flesh An-no...

They are super sweet, almost like honey...

Rather unfortunately, productivity was low...

We could manage only about 2.9 kilograms of this delicious sweet potato...

And to close the 2011 chapter is this little camellia...

Ok folks, looking forward to the new year when we get up next morning...

Seemania... the Liebster award...

Returned home today after spending two weeks in Malaysia...

The temperature there was about 30 degrees, and here, about 2 degrees... wheeaaa... 

Prior to leaving, my missus had brought back a pot of orange-colored eye catching flowers...

'Seemania', she blurted out to an ignorant me...

From the net, found out that 'this is a small genus of herbaceous plants native to South America. The family, Gesneriaceae, is a large plant family of herbaceous perennials and shrubs. It is native to the tropics mostly, in Africa, Asia, North America and South America'.

Also found out its other name, 'Bolivian sunset', and that it is a 'low-growing herbaceous perennial that spreads rapidly by rhizomes' and that it has 'showy orange flowers in winter'. The plant apparently grows well in shady, moist sites.

Hmm, good... shall try to plant them at the slopes and hope that they may spread all over... fat hopes? :)

Ok, this is just a one-photo post and I must express my thanks to Tanya of Lovely Greens...

About two weeks ago, she had graciously recommended my blog for the 'Liebster Award'.

Am very honored with this gesture from Tanya...

But then, I was just about to leave Japan for Penang for about two weeks, hence this belated response to the award...

It was the first time that I saw this word 'Liebster', so I did a check on it...

Apparently, it is a German word meaning 'favorite' or 'dearest'.

And to paraphrase Tanya... 'A Liebster Award is given out by bloggers to other blogs that they enjoy reading'.

The rules are... 'once you receive it you must pass it on to five other blogs that you enjoy and also give a mention to the person who awarded you in the first place'.

Tanya, 'rediscovering' her roots as a country girl, blogs on a wide range of topics from the Isle of Man... I particularly enjoy reading about her hand in making soap, wine, and the cute looking crafts, etc... drop by her blog and check it out...

The five blogs I am passing on to are (not in any particular order): 

Matron: An intimate account of a passionate veggie grower... 

Andrea in this lifetime: Nature photography, plants and ornamental species and other interesting animal encounters from travels... Andrea actually had done a post on the seemania way back in 2009... 

Life in Kawagoe: offers an interesting window into a Japanese family life from the eyes of the father of the house... 

Desert Colors: I am often surprised by the beauty of the photos shown in this blog... 

Kebun Malay-Kadazan girls: a good blog to look up on the adventures in chemical free veggie gardening...

Merry Christmas to y'all...

Greens, beans, roots, etc...

Am very happy with the goings-on at the potager... 

We have a lot of spinach this season... 

and they are flourishing... we harvest and eat them whole, roots included...

Planted this sole celery in April...

Didn't get to eat much of it...
with the cold coming in, it is growing really well...

Tried to germinate fava beans from seeds...
From eight seeds, six germinated successfully...

Our lettuce self-seeded...
We have about a dozen of them, thriving...
They are a constant part of our breakfast fare...

Bought three broccoli seedlings from the store...
All are doing well...

Sowed two types of radish seeds last September...
The round and long type...
They taste really good either fresh or cooked...

We love our carrots a lot...
Sowed the seeds in two plots...
Harvested the first carrot this morning for breakfast...
Wooh, heavenly...

Strawberries... just about everybody's favorite...
Seedlings were all sourced from the mother plants...
Looking forward to the fruits next spring...

Am growing this green just for my suweeto haato...
The ta-sai is one of her favorite leafy greens... have been harvesting them for a while now... we mostly stir-fried them with black beans...

Bought two seedlings of parsley...
Had them planted as companions to the strawberry patch... we harvest them a little at time to use as garnish for our breakfast pizza-toasts...

And finally, while still far away from harvesting, red onions, another 'must-have' order from my missus...
Sowed the seeds last October and they are still rather tiny...
Need to let the seedlings grow up to the size of chopsticks before I can transplant them for good...

Note: While this post is not really totally about harvesting, I am taking the liberty to link this post to Harvest Monday hosted by Daphne... hope she doesn't mind...

Butter scotch pumpkin, Hawk's claws chillies, etc...

Was trying to dig out an azalea plant to make space for the 'Southern Cross'...   

Slipped, fell over and hit my head on the concrete steps... 

Next thing I knew was the sound of my own heavy breathing...

My missus came over to look me up...

Lucky thing, it was only a minor cut on the right side of the head...

Lesson learned: be careful and wear the safety helmet while working... 

(I often do so, actually, and today was one of the few instances that I didn't...)

Anyway, am happy to be able to do some harvesting...
My missus bought a butter scotch pumpkin last year from the farmers' market...
We like the taste of it and kept some seeds...
Am delighted that the plants produced 6 large pumpkins...
This one weighs about 900 grams... not too bad...

Similarly, we kept some seeds from the winter melon that we bought from the farmers' market last year...
We manage only one fruit, however... 1.7 kilograms...

The first time I ever planted potatoes years ago, we harvested over 11 kilograms from one kilogram of seeds...

Subsequent plantings were rather measly...

This time, only 3 kilograms from one kilogram of seeds...

Reason? I did not fully dry the cut-up seeds before I planted them, so most of them rotted...

Chillies this season... not too bad although it could be better... 

These finger-sized ones are called 'Taka no tsume', aka 'Hawk's claws'...

They are spicy and they taste good...

I got some okra seeds from my younger brother in Malaysia last year...

And I must say that they have adapted very well to our potager...

These are the last of the harvests for this season... 

Compared to the Japanese okras, these are gigantic...

Some of them were about 30 centimeters long...

And they were tender, super delicious and combine very well with curries... 

Will certainly grow them again next spring...

The Autumn Giraffe, among others...

Autumn days at Shikoku have been super pleasant... 
Cool, dry, and simply heavenly to be outdoors...

Took a shot of our potager today...
The marigolds are still blooming, as are the zinnias...

This dwarf of a flower is called 'wild chrysamthemum'　（野菊）in Japanese... 
They grow so well in our garden, without any attention from us...

The Japanese folks call this flower 'Hototogizu' (ホトトギス）, which is the name of a bird belonging to the cuckoo family... Apparently, the spots of this lily-family flower is similar to the spots on the chest of the bird...

Think this is called Larkdaisy or Porcupine flower.
The Japanese name is Murasaki Rushan （ムラサキルーシャン） or Ringo Azami（リンゴアザミ）...
Leaves emit apple-like smell when rubbed...

This chrysanthemum is endemic to the island of Honshu in Japan... 

It's scientific name is Chrysanthemum pacificum Nakai but I prefer the common name Isogiku (イソギク) meaning, Rocky Shore Chrysanthemum...

 

We enjoy looking at this wild flower in our morning walks... 

Took back home a specimen of this 'Aki no kirin so' （秋の麒麟草）, literally, Autumn Giraffe flower...

Am linking this post to GBBD, which is hosted by May Dreams Gardens...

Berries from the Inumaki/Kusamaki tree...

Was visiting the University of Victoria at Vancouver Island, Canada, a couple of years ago when I first witnessed birds eating these berries... 

I actually went over to the trees and tried one...

Sweet, it was...

Years down the road, was really happy to discover that we have those Inumaki or Kusamaki trees (native to China and Southern Japan) in our property...

Five of them are females, and I managed to harvest 1.3 kilos of these delicious berries from them...
The round, green portion is apparently inedible, and there is a small seed inside the berries...

The Inumaki trees and the Mountain Peach tree had been 'over-growing' in our garden for a while...
They were blocking the sun from our goldfish pond...
And my suweeto haato had been urging me to trim them down...

Finally got to doing it today...

And, whoaa, what an amateurish a job it turned out to be, I said to myself...

Well, at least we got the sun in, and the view of the mountains from our house improved markedly...

China root berries, strawberries, pineapple sage, etc...

There has been just so much rain this year...

Not to say that I am complaining... 

It is just marvelous for the plants, in fact...

This is a picture of the berries of a climber plant called 'China root'...

They grow wildly in our property... 

The young shoots can be eaten as a vegetable (pictures next spring?)... 

Some folks use the berries to make wine but apparently they do not taste good... 

For the time being, we just plan to enjoy their beauty...

I bought two types of raspberry plants from the store some years ago... 

And they do give very good fruits...

Only thing I really have to do is to fertilize them more...

I had thought that this specie fruits only in spring but we found it fruiting this season...

Hmmm, lovely, of course... 

We had taken the liberty to name this beauty 'Princess Pink'... 

My suweeto haato found it growing semi-wild in the hills...

We took back some cuttings and this beauty of a rose has been thriving very well in our potager...

This white chrysanthemum is also grown by my missus... 

As with the above mentioned rose, this cutie has adapted very well to our environment...  

And finally, the pineapple sage... 

Apparently, the name comes from the pineapple-like fragrance that the flowers leaves emit when crushed... 

Purple corn... purple eggplant...

Hosted a student from Peru who kindly brought some purple corn for me all the way from the hinterland of Lake Titicaca...
He has since left for home but his kindness lingers on at our potager...
Edgar, thank you very much, if you are reading this...

Tried planting some seeds last summer...
The corn plants have this purple 'veins' in the stems and leaves...
Cute... I thought to myself...

They grew and grew... stopping at about almost 3 meters?
Happy and happy I was...
But, happiness was short-lived as the typhoons came by...
All the plants broke into two...  except one...
And this is the lone, precious-precious fruit from the 'harvest'...

Luckily, I had saved some seeds for a second round of planting, which I did last July...
I had always believed that plants, like humans, have some kind of 'thinking' mechanism in them...

This second batch of purple corn plants 'decided' to start flowering at about 2 meters or less...
A response to the upcoming cold season, perhaps?
Happiness returns... as the ears begin to appear...

My suweeto haato had not been very fond of eggplants...
Until one day, she came home with a bunch of long and lanky eggplants after visiting her youngest sister in Kyushu...
Somehow, her taste buds changed from then on... and eggplant dishes began to show up on my dinner plates...

Meanwhile, I had only grown eggplant once before and I was not very successful with it...
Why, for they are heavy feeders...
And I am not a very good feeder of fertilizers to my plants...

Now, late last summer, I accompanied my suweeto haato on one of her daily (well, almost) walks in the hills...

There is this plot of land midway up the hill, that is being used as a landfill for some construction firm...
We often see a medium sized truck hauling all sorts of debris up there to be dumped as landfill...

The unobstructed view of the Japan Inland Sea from there is really beautiful...
We imagine that after a certain amount of landfill, some big shot company president will come over and build his fifth summer holiday villa or something like that...

Anyway, while walking pass the landfill, a little plant caught my eye...
And I knew it was an eggplant seedling, growing 'wild' amongst the debris...
I dug it up and just then, I discovered a second seedling...
Took them home, knowing that it was a little too late to start planting eggplants...

Three months or so passed... and woah... it is harvest time for purple eggplants...

Ok, please allow me to dedicate this post to Connie Nakamura...
She has just moved to Japan from Saipan and is planning to try her hand at vegetable gardening...

I am much humbled to be at the receiving end of what she had to say of me (or my potager blog?)... and it is indeed an honor to be requested by her to act as her 'mentor'...

For a 'student' of gardening, I still am...

Yet, it will be my pleasure to be part of this exciting adventure in life...

May your garden blooms a thousand blooms....
And fruits, a thousand fruits...  :)

Bountiful peanut harvest...

Had been fooling around growing peanuts in the potager for about three years...

The last two years had seen harvests that were, hmmm, pitiful... to say the least...

Today, the leaves showed some signs of yellowing... 

So, decided to do some harvesting... 

Was thrilled to see the scales tipping at 3.3 kilograms...

Immediately called my third sis in Malaysia...

Advised me to put the peanuts out to dry...

The roots too, she suggested to dry...

And make peanut root chicken soup later on...

While harvesting the peanuts, discovered a radish root 'hiding' within...

Topping off the rainy and cloudy weekend, a neighbor brought over some 'yuzu' citrus for us... nice...

Cosmos from a friendly neighbor...

Saturday today started off cloudy...
The potager was wet from the heavy rain yesterday...

Could not really work on the wet soil...

So, filed the teeth of the chain saw to get ready for the upcoming wood collecting season for our wood stove...

And changed the rotor-blade of the grass cutter machine...
Many of the blades were chipped due to inadvertent hits on rocks and pebbles while cutting the grass...

Later part of the morning, began to work on the slopes...
Am using wood recycled from the stone masons to make 'terraces' along the slopes...

Was pleasantly surprised to receive some cosmos flowers from a neighbor the other day...
Along with the chrysanthemum, the cosmos is probably the most representative of flowers in Japan for the month of October...

Am linking this post to the Garden Bloggers Bloom Day for the first time...