Garden Update 2013

[Farhan Ahmed]

@KBW…..i avoid that for two reasons.
Firstly I am too much afraid of fungus of which I had a bad experience; moreover frequent rains can cause a nightmare. Litter is the biggest cause of plant diseases. Living plants/leaves have a defense mechanism; dead have none as they are decomposed by fungus/bacteria and nematode.
Secondly for neat appearance.

[UMARKHANMARDAN]

Fahan like a gardener who is very curious to explore & enjoy many & many varieties you have so annuals your garden.I am missing Mimulus.next season Inshallah after some 3 yeras i l again plant Mimulus MIstic.Farhan they are not difficult annulas.they florish in shady damp & moist soil.the soil must not be let to dry.Your mimulus are gorgeous.please do post their picture after a week when they will be full the monkey flowers.Good job Farhan.

[Farhan Ahmed]

Yes Umar bhai ,we gardeners sometimes act childish
If i see a unique flower/plant blooming at neighbors i would say in my heart" yeh mujhe bhi chahiye"....lol

[Muhammad Arif Khan]

Very nice. It's always a treat to watch your pics. BTW, I normally leave the dead flowers and leaves in the bed. Nothing goes out, let them recycle

Firstly I am too much afraid of fungus of which I had a bad experience; moreover frequent rains can cause a nightmare. Litter is the biggest cause of plant diseases. Living plants/leaves have a defense mechanism; dead have none as they are decomposed by fungus/bacteria and nematode.
Secondly for neat appearance.[ Farhan}

How about a thick layer of organic mulch recommended by almost every one?

[Farhan Ahmed]

@Sir Arif....indeed sir. There is no denying of the benefits of mulching which is absent in our gardening culture. Mulching is a cure for most problem such as

Prevention from Soil Erosion
Prevention from Rain Spoil(Flopping plants due soil loosening up/dirt on plants)
Moisture retention
Weed Suppression
Warding off Fungus
Improved Fertility
Improved appearance

I tried following mulches, but as i deal with annuals mostly i am frequently playing with the soil.

Newspaper/straw Clippings- Gone in few days
Wood shaving from a carpenter- Gone in a week as Risalpur is heavily termite infested(Saw dust should not be used singly as it creates a high nitrogen area)
Sufaida Leaves (Lacked appearance)

i am looking for bark clippings source, which i think will look good and serve the purpose as well....

[Farhan Ahmed]

Gardening has been not a worldly journey for me but a spiritual one as well. It makes you “Talk” to the God more frequently. We pray to him for our success, for favorable conditions, and thank him when we enjoy the bounties of nature in lush green or vivid colors. In the hustle bustle of life people seem to ignore the grandeur of nature and the signs as mentioned in Quran. We as naturist are keen and close observers, and a little closer to the nature as some others!.....We believe in nature, we trust in it, we fight with it and we enjoy it more than others. A tiny seed hardly visible to an eye is sowed by a gardener with a faith that it will sprout and one day become a giant tree. Nature sometimes tells us how weak we are, sometimes all are efforts fail and we are unable to harness it……To us gardening is God’s mandate to care for the earth. Birth, growth, death and resurrection all are lessons that we are taught in our gardens.

Isn’t it interesting that when we are narrated about the pleasures of afterlife we are told about gardens and how beautiful they will be…….So Gentleman let’s start making the wish list of plants for the Gardens of afterlife if we are blessed enough to be in heaven……:-)

"The best place to seek God is in a garden. You can dig for him there." ~George Bernard Shaw,

To see a world in a grain of sand
and heaven in a wildflower.
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,
and eternity in an hour.
William Blake

Kiss of the sun for pardon.
Song of the birds for mirth.
You're closer to God's heart in a garden
Than any place else on earth.
Dorothy Frances Gurney

The most noteworthy thing about gardeners
is that they are always optimistic,
always enterprising, and never satisfied.
They always look forward to doing something better
than they have ever done before.
Vita Sackville-West

[M Farooq]

Gardening has been not a worldly journey for me but a spiritual one as well. It makes you “Talk” to the God more frequently. We pray to him for our success, for favorable conditions, and thank him when we enjoy the bounties of nature in lush green or vivid colors.

So true! Plants give us a chance to realize that He is indeed "Al musavir- THE designer"- in fact the best designer of all. It is a miracle from God that a single plant is such a complex laboratory that not even a brightest mind can design on its own. Best brains at Harvard or MIT have not been able to create an efficient process better than photosynthesis. And the thousands of fragrances in flowers...all coming out from soil...just amazing.

[KBW]

@KBW…..i avoid that for two reasons.
Firstly I am too much afraid of fungus of which I had a bad experience; moreover frequent rains can cause a nightmare. Litter is the biggest cause of plant diseases. Living plants/leaves have a defense mechanism; dead have none as they are decomposed by fungus/bacteria and nematode.
Secondly for neat appearance.

You are right. It is possible to get fungal attacks if dead leaves / flowers are left behind but in my limited experience, it does not happen very often, specially in outside gardens. However, even if it happens, for me personally (and I might be wrong on this), the advantages of recycling the plant debris are much more than the chances of getting a fungal attack. The fundamental gardening principal for me (and I might be wrong again) has been to replicate nature. I try to do it everytime, to the best of my knowledge and abilities. But you are the best judge of conditions existing in your garden and the remedial measures thereof. I just mentioned a general point.
regards

[KBW]

Gardening has been not a worldly journey for me but a spiritual one as well. It makes you “Talk” to the God more frequently. We pray to him for our success, for favorable conditions, and thank him when we enjoy the bounties of nature in lush green or vivid colors. In the hustle bustle of life people seem to ignore the grandeur of nature and the signs as mentioned in Quran. We as naturist are keen and close observers, and a little closer to the nature as some others!.....We believe in nature, we trust in it, we fight with it and we enjoy it more than others. A tiny seed hardly visible to an eye is sowed by a gardener with a faith that it will sprout and one day become a giant tree. Nature sometimes tells us how weak we are, sometimes all are efforts fail and we are unable to harness it……To us gardening is God’s mandate to care for the earth. Birth, growth, death and resurrection all are lessons that we are taught in our gardens.

Isn’t it interesting that when we are narrated about the pleasures of afterlife we are told about gardens and how beautiful they will be…….So Gentleman let’s start making the wish list of plants for the Gardens of afterlife if we are blessed enough to be in heaven……:-)

Very rightly said and I fully agree. For me personally, the study of ecosystem has been a great eye opener. If one goes to nature with an open mind, one is astonished that how a complex system, which no one is apparantly looking after, is working so perfectly, without any fail. The only imperfection comes when we intrude in that system and try to alter it.

That is where one gets fully convinced with the greatness of the Creater. Thanks for sharing these nice words
regards

[Farhan Ahmed]

@Farooq Sb........Thankyou. Ahhhh photosynthesis. It is really amazing. Plant being only specie able to create food......All praise for Allah.
@KBW Sb.....My pleasure. Ecosystem. I think the perfect garden would infact be an eco-system. Replication of nature. Maybe we are trying to do that in our gardens. Anyhow can we know your good name .....

Farooq Sb and KBW, sir if you haven't ,i recommend watching BBC 80 gardens around the world.

Working in layers in a landscape, Most of my annuals are so to say, ordinary but able enough to create a cottage garden feel. That's the best thing about landscaping it does not require extravagant plants.....
Dahlberg-Candytuft-Larkspur-Hollyhocks


Dahlberg daisy, linaria and nemesia were completely flopped by rains. I operated them by shearing them completely and amazing they have responded back......Lesson for me is that there are some annuals that can be enjoyed twice if sheared. In this regard the biggest disappointment was stock.....Out of my list of plants to be tried again.



Lesson 2 (False colorful Seed packets)
Second lesson that i have learned is not to believe on the authenticity of local seeds packets. Germination might be okay but Infamous Abdul Saeed store Karachi and Channan din's seed packets depicts numerous color on their packets, in the end it turns out to be one odd color only. Larkspur turned out be blue and white only....


Companions Planting.....Snaps and phlox proved to be a reasonable duo, Phlox very well knows how to find its way for sunlight ..


Hollies are more than ten feet high now. I think that is because of early sowing. They were sowed in August.



There is beauty beyond flowers......