Make your own liquid enzyme fertilizer..

I was very keen to make my own compost..as most people quote, compost is the gardener's gold..but living in a neighbourhood, I understand that making compost in your house compound may bring up unbearable stench and this may cause unpleasantness to your neighbours. I brought this thing up when discussing gardening matters to my friend, Dean..Like me, he is very keen about  gardening and has collected many useful infos about gardening but since he is living in a rented apartment, space is very limited..Back to the main point..Dean brought up about making liquid enzyme fertilizer..Since I was very cautious about stench that may be produced from breaking down of organic materials, he suggested that I used orange or lemon peels instead..It can give a pleasant, citrusy smell.. Upon reaching home from my work yesterday, I made a big pot orange juice and keep aside the orange peels..This is how my liquid enzyme fertilizer looked like:

My precious liquid enzyme fertlizer..

This liquid enzyme usage is not restricted on becoming fertilizer only. It can be used to clean your floors, cars, to wash veggies and fruits,etc..Here is the "recipe"

Liquid Enzyme Fertilizer Recipe

100gm of brown sugar (or any unprocessed sugar such as molasses or gula merah/gula melaka)-I used brown sugar

300gm of orange peels (or any fruit peels of your preference such as jackfruit, orange, etc)

1 l of tap water

Airtight container

How to:

-Mix water with sugar to dissolve..then pour it down the bottle using funnel

-Add the orange peels

-Give the bottle a good shake

-Labelled the bottle . Dun forget to put the date on so that you know when it is ready to be used!

This bottle should be left for at least 3 months or more..You would want to open the cap once a day for the first month to let out the "oxygen" from the bottle..If there is any whitish layer formed on the top layer of the content, just tighten the cap to prevent any air from entering and give the bottle a good shake..The enzyme will be ready when it turns dark in colour.. You can filter the solution using any thin cloth such as muslin, diaper cloth or plain ol' t-shirt..For veggies or any plants, dilute 1 part to  20 part of water . Dean told me that he had made this fertilizer once and used it on a lime plant that bore him no fruit at all for the last 10 years..The plant then started to grow flowers and eventually lots of limes!! Can't wait for mine to turn to enzyme to give me lush green veggies to munch on..Will update you on their progress, ok?

" Happy, Gardening, Folks!!"

Ms Pinkie Rabbit's edible garden current updates..

Hello folks!! My obsession towards gardening remained strong and this is the longest hobby that I maintained continuously  so far (according to Mr Warhammer) besides baking..Before this I had ventured into many things from on-line business, beading, sewing, cup cakes and many more..but those passions did not survive very long.. This morning, me and my twin sister took a little trip to Sungai Buloh to visit a nursery there and ended up buying a kaffir lime tomyam chilli plant, 10 packs of soils and more babba pots..Will post about the plants soon. Enough about that, let's take a tour to my edible garden, folks!!

Before going for a tour in my garden, these are starter pot made from newspapers..You can google how to do this thru' youtube..

Chinese celery (daun sup) germinated from the seeds..They are very temperamental and took about 4-5 weeks to germinate..I did not put much hope on this as they looked very fragile..will update you soon on its growth..

Another break from the tour..found this book in MPH..eventhough it is for western farming but I found their tips on propagation and types of soil very useful..

My chives flowers  had already blossoming and showed me her beautiful snowy flowers. I planned to let them dry out a little and catch their seeds in plastic bags for more chives in the future..

New Jade Pak Choy sowed close to each other waiting for me to thin them down so that they can thrive well

I got this polystyrene container  from my acetonitrile (used for my lab works) boxes, I cut out some of the insides and are now accompanying my babas and ceramic pots in my garden..I utilized it to grow more kangkung since my last success with kangkong..The seeds were purchased from Mr Iskandar from tanamsendiri.com..

Extra Dwarf Pak Choy sowed in the same container with Chives..making full use of the tight container space I have

Another pot of chives with pak choy..

My thriving galangal..I dd not give much attention to them but they are doing very well..

Newly planted onion leaves..

I was baffled by the condition of these bak choy..Thay are very slow growers..These bak choy are 3 month-old!Bak Choy really posed a challenge to me..I was amazed when others had claimed that their bak choys are ready to be harvested after 1 month..grrrrr..nonetheless, I patiently watered and fed them chicken manure every 2 weeks..

Another 2 bak choy plants in another small pots.. Thay are doing well compared to the one in the large pot..I wonder why.. hmmmm...

This little fellow germinated from the seeds of the oval capsicum I mentioned in the previous post..can't wait for it to grow and transplant to a bigger pot..

These are the stalks from the harvested pot which grow for the second time,,The tallest one was the one surviving from my experiment of sowing them under the shade..Looks like kangkung enjoys germinating under full sunshine..

These are chinese celery that was grown from the stalk..Some has already wilted away..Only 2 survived and I did not have the heart to throw them away..so sad..:(

My coriander thriving happily under the full sunlight now that I have moved them from under the shade..

4 out of 8 tomato plants..I read from my gardening book that 2 or 3 tomato plants are enough to feed the whole family but they are so precious to be discarded..so I finally decided to keep them..

I was fascinated in making my own compost but Mr Warhammer warned me that since we are living very close to the neighbors, the stench will disturb them..how I wish I have my own land to turn to my very own garden where I can really work on REAL gardening..making my own compost, bigger beds for my veggies and herbs..But for now, I have to make do with what I have (sigh....)

"Happy Gardening, Folks!!"

 

My 1st harvest of kangkung..

It has been raining heavily for the past weeks which made me moved all my okra to a new spot under the porch..The rainy days however, brought good news to my water convolvulus (or kangkung) and kesom..they grew very well in this rainy season..so after seeing a few leaves turning yellow..I finally summoned the courage and decided to harvest them for the very first time..

My pot of  kangkung..

I know this is not much..but it was good enough for me...I also harvested a stalk of onion leaves together..

My earlier sowed bak choy did not survive very well, though..just keeping my fingers crossed for them to survive.. the veggies sowed together in the long pot on the other hand are doing very well under the porch..

My chinese celery..I noticed that they cannot have too much water..one stalk has already died on me..

My baby bak choy..I have already plucked some so that they will have ample of space to grow..

Some of these are bak choy extra dwarf..

Bamboo dance spinach..they are slow growers compared to bak choy at first, but suddenly undergoing a growth spurt!

I was feeling under the weather these few days..so not much gardening activity around the house until today..I managed to pluck dead leaves and sowed more kangkung seeds and butterhead lettuce..but all are kept under the protective shade of my porch..The weather was unpredictable these days!!

   "Happy Gardening, folks !!"

More updates on my edible garden..

Things are going rather slow  around my edible garden recently..There were several days of heavy downpours that totally destroyed my chinese celery that were grown from the stumps. What a heartache!! I vow to myself that after this, all the baby plants and recently sowed plants will be moved under the porch where they can also enjoy plenty of sun lights and at the same time protected from the vicious rain. There were also additional pots,  added to my edible garden since I have already used up all the pots that were given by my MIL. Enough of the blabbing, check these out, folks!!

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After the rain had mercilessly destroyed my chinese celery, I planted another 8 stumps and put them under the shade.

I bought 7 small pots for seeds sowing from TESCO for about RM0.70 each..This time I labelled the pots carefully to avoid confusion

The pakchoy (New Jade),Extra Dwarf Pakchoy  and Bamboo Dance Spinach all sowed in the same  pot..I made a mistake of sowing too much in 1 hole. Will just sprinkle the seeds evenly next  time..(making a mental note to myself)

My disarray onion leaves ..waiting to be harvested..blame it on the rain!

These are New Jade Pak Choy in 2 different size pot. I noticed that pak choy grown in bigger pot will grow up much faster than the smaller pot..

Tomato plants, they are such a slow grower..waiting patiently for them to grow bigger before removing them to a bigger pot

Kangkong is my champ..They are so easy to grow and they looked cute! Think there will be another 2 weeks before they can be harvested

My roselle plant. Out of 5 seeds harvested, 3 had emerged and growing at a very fast rate..Next to them, I discovered that the coriander has also germinated (pics not shown). Can't wait to taste the ribena-like juice from the flowers!

Okra or lady's fingers plant that has been removed to a bigger pot..

My chilli plant..growing stronger each day..

My Kesom plant, adding more leaves and has been given a new home!

 New member in my edible garden..the rosemary plant..I bought this from COLD STORAGE for about RM 5.90..I then transferred it to a new pot upon reaching home..plan to use them to marinate my roasted chicken tomorrow..yummy

 My mum also gave me another pot full of chives but I harvested all the chives and arranged the younger ones properly to make some way for my growing bakchoy and spinach..Now, I will spend almost half-an hour every evening to water and inspect the plants..Feels like I can look at them for hours without being bored! See you next time..

         "Happy Gardening, Folks!!"

Gardening crafty..

Heyo folks!! This is just a quick cap on what  I did during last weekend. Yup, I did some gardening and added a few more plants in my edible garden. I also asked Mr Warhammer to do some crafty  work for my garden  (well, sort of..).. 

       I realized that I wanted to germinate the plants from the seeds first, then only I transferred the "chosen ones"   to a bigger pot. So, since I did  not have a small pot at the moment, I cut the top part of an empty and thoroughly washed  2 l cooking oil bottle so that they formed  a small pot. The next part was done by Mr Warhammer. He drilled 4 holes to the bottom of the bottle so that water will not be stagnant inside the bottle during watering. I also did the same to another small container. I then added half of the black soil (purchased from TESCO) and another half part with gardening soil. This is how it looks like:

For the small container, I planted chinese celery seeds ( or daun sup in Malay) and  tomato seeds. The tomato seeds were the left overs tomato from the last cooking and I dried them  up under the sun for 2 days. In the big container, I sowed tomato seeds bought from the packet seeds sold in TESCO I did this experiment to see which one will germinate faster and  formed a healthier plant later. I also planted dried seeds from the kasturi lime (limau kasturi) into another  big pot with the hope that  the next time whenever I need a cold jug of lemonade, I don't have to buy the lime from the market again!!
      I also planned to plant some kesom leaf plant (sorry, I don't know the name in English) but it's a fragrant leaf added to the asam pedas or laksa. I pulled out all the leaves and left the stalk. I then immersed the bottom part of the stalk with water and I'm waiting for the roots to grow Once they grow, the kesom stalk can be planted straightaway into the pot.

Waiting patiently for the roots of the kesom stalk to grow..

Yesterday, I read over the internet that the chinese celery can also be planted from the stalk. So, I immediately cut 2 inches of the stalk together with the root part and planted it straight to the ground. Will add up the pics later..So, that's all for now folks!! Will update you on their progress soon  !!!

                     "Happy Gardening, Folks!!"