Floral at Zakimi Castle

August 2nd, 2007 at 17:28 · Filed Under Environment, Flowers and Plants, Gardening, Karate, Okinawa, Philosophy, Photography, Training Journal · 1 Comment 

I took a day off training and decided to have a walk at the ruins of Zakimi Castle. After all, there was no training in the afternoon and I needed some rest and to take my mind off training so that I could recover from my learning curve.

I noticed some beautiful flowers and plants along the way so I took some pictures of them to share here.

Too bad I have no idea the name of the plants. If anyone knows, please share here using the comments. Thanks.

The bud of this Cycad is really huge. Cycad is one of my favorite plant. I used to have a few at home but they did not flourishe. Whenever new bud (small) is growing, it got chewed up by caterpillars. I gave away some and left one in a pot when we remodeled our garden last month.

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African Violet

June 4th, 2007 at 12:25 · Filed Under Flowers and Plants, Gardening, Photography · Comment 

African Violet or Sainpaulia is native to Tanzania and adjacent southeastern Kenya in eastern tropical Africa, with a concentration of species in the Nguru mountains of Tanzania. They range in flower colour from white, pink, violet, yellow, and some even green, and the flowers may be either single (five petals) or double (more than five, with some or all of the stamens converted into extra petals). Flowers are not always a solid colour, but can also be found in the “fantasy” variety where the petals have strips of colours going down them.

Saintpaulias can be propagated by leaf cuttings or seed. I will try to propagate some this weekend if I can find some time for it. Here is the Florist Gloxinia which I propagated from leaf cuttings.

This is one of the plant which I bought for my home office. Violet is my favorite flower color.

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Fittonia Mini

June 4th, 2007 at 12:07 · Filed Under Flowers and Plants, Gardening, Photography · Comment 

Fittonia Mini or Nerve Plant (Latin: Fittonia verschaffeltii spp) is a low growing spreading plant native to Peru. The plant is difficult to grow in dry weather. It needs no sun or only partial filtered sunlight.

I like plants with small leaves and does not grow large. Fittonia Mini is one of the plants that I bought for my home office.

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Successful propagation of florist gloxinia

July 13th, 2006 at 23:31 · Filed Under Flowers and Plants, Gardening, Photography · 1 Comment 

Florist gloxinia or Sinningia speciosa is tough to propagate.

4 months ago, I tried to make 4 propagation by cutting a fresh leave and inserted the leave with its tuber into a pot of moist soil. Watered to keep the soil moist. After 4 to 6 weeks, the leave turned yellow than brown and died.

Do not throw away the dead leave. Roots could have grown at the tuber in the soil. It will take quite some time to grow into a plant. Only 1 out of 4 propagation was successful.

Here is the photo of the newly propagated plant I took today.

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