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Growing Dragon Fruit from Seeds

As soon as I saw this in the supermarket I knew I wanted to grow one from seeds! It's the most unusual fruit I've ever seen. They're called Dragon Fruit, aka Pitaya. I haven't found too much information yet about how they work as bonsai but there is a picture of a bonsai pitaya on wikipedia.

It's a long time yet before I'll have to worry about how they do as bonsai, but the good news is that they grow from seeds without too much fuss and they are also full of seeds. Score!

Since my orange pips are doing well I'm going to try growing the dragon fruit from its seeds as well. I'll keep you posted!

23 11 07 - 19:39 - - Bonsai| one comment - § ¶

Orange seedlings growing from pips

Today was a case of 'the Lord giveth, the Lord taketh'. When I checked my seedlings this morning I was sorry to see that my Eucalyptus seedling had toppled over during the night. It hadn't shown any sign of growth for more than a week now so I suppose it was coming. It was still a surprise though because it looked as good as ever last night. The seedling survived for over a month which is the best success I've had with Eucalyptus seeds so far.

While I was sorry to see the passing of the Eucalyptus, I was cheered up to see that another Orange seedling had sprouted from a pip. The speed with which orange seedlings shoot up is really quite amazing. I'm nearly certain I checked on them last night. If I didn't check on them before I went to bed last night I'm absolutely certain that I checked on them yesterday morning because that's the first thing I do every morning. At whatever stage I checked them yesterday there was no sign of any new sprouts

Then this morning there it is, about 1.5cms tall. That's some amount of growth for one day or one night!

22 11 07 - 17:44 - - Bonsai| Leave a comment - § ¶

Orange Seedlings First Picture

It's a little bit blurry but that’s my photography skills for you! Anyway here is the first picture of my Orange seedling which I grew from a pip:

It really has shot up in the last week. It now stands at 17mm.

I planted this pip on October 20. The pip came from an orange I bought in a shop. Actually I bought two oranges but the first one didn't have any pips so I had to go back to buy another.

If you are trying this yourself, all I did was soak the pips in warm water for a couple of hours. I then planted them in a pot of ordinary compost and put this into my hotpress where I had the immersion water heater running at regular intervals to keep them as warm as possible. (more)

18 11 07 - 16:38 - - Bonsai| Leave a comment - § ¶

Eucalyptus and Orange Seedlings update

Just a brief update on how my seedlings are doing. My eucalyptus seedlings have been reduced to one. I had five at one stage. I first watered them on October 13. Within only four days the first one had broken through the soil. After a week I had four who were joined shortly after by a fifth. All did well at first. (more)

11 11 07 - 22:30 - - Bonsai| Leave a comment - § ¶

Growing fig trees from cuttings

Almost exactly a month ago, on October 13 I took two cuttings from my banyan tree to try to start off a couple of new trees.

To test out which was the best method of doing it. I put one of the cuttings in a tumbler of water and I planted the other one in soil.

While I have heard people saying that planting in soil is the best way all I can say is that it didn’t work for me this time. The cutting in soil lost all of its leaves after two weeks and then very obviously died (its shoots went black and mould started growing on it). When I took it from the soil before disposing of it I checked but it hadn’t managed to develop any roots at all. (more)

11 11 07 - 20:24 - - Bonsai| one comment - § ¶

Wiring a bonsai

I made my first attempt at wiring a bonsai tree last Saturday. This is the way that people train bonsai trees to grow them into the wonderful treelike shapes that we see.

When you buy a bonsai you will often see the wire marks on parts of the trunk and branches where the developer has left the wire on too long or too tight. As the tree grows and expands it starts to grow around the wire leaving a rusty looking line around the tree.

This is the case with my seven-year-old ficus retusa which I bought last month. It does not look good to have these wire marks on trees but I am told it is pretty common to find them on store-bought trees which are usually grown in bulk. The marks will fade with time which I look forward to seeing. (more)

09 11 07 - 13:29 - - Bonsai| Leave a comment - § ¶

Tree of a Thousand Stars (Serissa Foetida)

I bought my second bonsai tree today. It’s common name is the Tree of a Thousand Stars which is a very beautiful name inspired by the tiny and numerous white star-like flowers that it produces. It’s Latin name is Serissa Foetida which is a bit more worrying. This is where a classical education would come in handy! Foetida is the Latin word for stinking! It is known by other names as well such as Snow Rose, Chinese Snow Rose, White Rose and Serissa serissoides. (more)

03 11 07 - 12:02 - - Bonsai| Leave a comment - § ¶