Ahhh bright cheery Dahlias

I decided that the balcony needs perking up with a little of colour, and what better flower to do so than the bold and brash Dahlia. The colourful flowers also remind me of the hill stations in Malaysia like Fraser's Hill and Penang Hill. Since Dahlia is synonymous with cooler climes, it is hard to obtain tubers over here in Malaysia. So the only other option would be to start it from seeds. Now, the big issue with Dahlias is that they don't breed true from seed. Hell no, they tend to be way way off from their parent plants, save for a few cultivars, especially the singles and the pompom ones. Even so, a bad looking Dahlia would still add colour to the garden, especially if grown en-massed to provide colour to borders or a patch in the garden. Another drawback of starting Dahlias from seeds is that the flowers do not reach its maximum potential size in the first year, except for singles. Hence you will get smaller flowers the first year, and only if you regrow then from the tubers that were formed in the first year, would you see the potential maximum size of the Dahlia blooms.

Dahlias - Adding a touch of colour to the balcony.

Desperate for colours, I went and bought seeds from one of the locally available brand. The label says Dahlia Exhibition Double. Due to the nature of Dahlia crosses, I would be happy if I can get all semi-doubles. The worst case scenario would be getting all singles. Keeping my everything crossed, I sowed them in March. The balcony is 13 floors up, so the drying breeze should help keep the plants free of fungal diseases.

Dahlia seedling - 9 days post sowing

The seeds germinated within 3 - 5 days. My experience with sowing pompom and mignon Dahlia seeds indicate that by 1 week if they do not germinate, they will not. So this batch of seeds did quite well. Out of 12 seeds, 9 germinated. 2 of them were small and flat seeds - probably empty inside. So it wasn't too bad.

Did the usual fungicide cover to prevent damping off, and then fertilisation with weak fertiliser solutions weekly to boost the growth of the plants. In April, the plants were off to a healthy start, and I began topping the plants to encourage bushy growth. I pinched the main shoot and then pinched the laterals again, as I wanted them to provide as many blooms as possible. Also, I prefer to look at the colour and form first to decide if I want to keep the plant for subsequent planting. With a lot of fertilisation and

Dahlia seedling 5th April - after the first topping with strong laterals

watering, they grew pretty fast and me being lazy, decided not to take them or tie them up, but allow them to grow and flop around to form a thick bushy mat so that they can support each other.

Dahlias peeking out from the balcony

In June (3 months from sowing, the flowering begins). It is exciting as you will never know what colour or form that you might get, though it is usually very disappointing with seeds of fully double dahlias. The first one was an interesting yellow semi-double dahlia with a hint of mauve at the back of the petals. It complemented the snapdragons that were already blooming on the balcony. It was a coincidence that most of the snapdragons were yellow or a mixture of yellow with red or mauve. Next was a double (slightly split ended petals) orange with yellow base and purple back. Then there was a purple-red single that has a tendency to produce misshapen flowers. This was followed by a good sized chilli red bloom, a small, orange coloured one and also one which is a nicely shaped lilac purple bloom. So now I just have to wait for the other three more plants to bloom.

Identification parade No. 1

Identification parade No. 2

Balcony gardening - Peppermint

After moving into a high rise unit, I had to content with growing stuff on the balcony. Now, the balcony of the unit isn't that big. Nay, I should say, it is that small. One of the plants that I started off from cuttings was peppermint. Bought myself a pack of peppermint from Genting Garden, made peppermint tea out of most of it, and saved a few stems. All the plants grown on the balcony were potted in polybags that were either 4" diameter or one with 6" diameter. I prepared two bags of soil in the polybag that gave me a final opening of approx 6" diam. and stuck the cuttings in it.

5th March - In the beginning, they were just sad looking stems/shoots in the bag.

After a while, they started to grow, and grow and grow. Hmm, sounds a bit like the magic beanstalk. Well, I was pretty happy that they grew so well.

The peppermint grew and grew...

A closer look at the peppermints

Then I noticed that the peppermints were sending runners everywhere. One was so long that it reached the left end of the balcony (the peppermints are right in the middle). And another on the right side was trying to beat the record of the first runner! Thank goodness they are in a container on a balcony. Imagine the trouble of trying to remove it had it been growing on the ground.

Jostling with the Dahlias for space - you can see the reddish runners going off the balcony

The periodic harvesting and distribution to friends and colleagues only served to make it grow even faster, like the Hydra chopped of its head and sprouting more to replace the decapitated one. In retrospect, one small polybag would have been enough, unless you adore peppermint so much (read - nuts over peppermint). Having grown spearmint and applemints before, this has got to be the easiest mint to grow; as long as it gets ample moisture, it will run wild and go out of hand. Someone pass me the shears please! It is now smothering my poor dahlias.

Running wild and almost jumping off from the 13th floor.

At this moment, they had grown beyond the balcony parapet and dangle down to the floor below. It makes me want to shout out "Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down your...peppermint!" every time I take a look at it.

Arghhhh...Nooo!!! Welcome to the dark side...

Got to resist...got to resist...got to...download Chrome. Not that I dislike Chrome (hell it is 100 times better than that whatchamacallit explorer browser thingy), but I feel that Firefox is good enough. And whenever I see friends having Chrome on their computer, I would always question their choice of using Chrome. Then it happened. I was converted to the other side...Chrome user. But, but I only use it for one and only one thing....to play Angry Birds on my computer, offline. Yeah...no thanks to Angry Birds, I am a Chrome user. Which brings us to the next question... There must be some serious S&M thingy going on with the creators of Angry Birds. Yeah like its just a normal game of seeking revenge on the green pigs who stole your eggs. How can it not be...kinky, when the joy of the game is to catapult the birds at breakneck speeds to smash, hit or explode in the faces of pigs that get crushed, blasted or shattered by bits and pieces of debris. Tsk tsk tsk...sounds more kinky than combining Monster Lady with Blond Ambition Tour virgin and the wacko King of Pop all rolled into one. The normal players, however derive pleasure just from getting all so many stars for all the stages, by beating their fingers numb. Hmm, perhaps this is the rise of S&M in the near future???