A Year Ago Today…
…I was in Barbados and it was day 3 into our 35 day trip to the Caribbean. We took the bus from Christ Church to the capital city, Bridgetown. Meat donut. Your choice of sausage or minced meat. We got the coconut.
Places
A floralogue of sorts. A record of my travels as a gardener to far away gardens and new places visited.
Sorrel, Ginger Beer and Midnight Mass
About two months before our Caribbean trip, I posted here on You Grow Girl reaching out to anyone who could help connect me with other gardeners living on the islands I would be visiting. This is how I met Celia. We exchanged emails before the trip and then met up in Dominica. It was all …
Air Potato
I was introduced to this “potato that grows above the ground” on an organic farm tour in Dominica. It was one of the plants we were most excited about, but because we only got the Patois name (and it turns out I heard that wrong, too), were never able to identify it. Davin and I …
Let’s Try This Again
The other day I posted about a datura that wasn’t a datura that I thought had been given the patois name “Agouti Umbrella,” but is not in fact the “Agouti Umbrella” even though it certainly looks like it could be one. The fern-like moss shown in the above photo is the real “Agouti Umbrella” aka …
In Search of My Grandmother’s Garden (A Visual Presentation)
This coming Monday I will be giving a presentation to the Parkdale Horticultural Society on my epic December/January 2009/2010 trip to the Caribbean. I’ve assembled a range of images from plants, to food, to some personal insights from all three of the islands we visited. There is a special emphasis on Dominica, in part because …
Agouti Umbrella
In Dominica, you might just see a giant Datura Brugmansia (I was told they are sometimes called “Agouti umbrella“*), flush to the breaking point full of drooping, soft peach flowers. Chances are good that you’ll see this on several occasions, in varying locations, and always the same colour. I saw this one on a steep …
Pillow Cotton
I couldn’t resist sharing another image from the presentation I am working on and will be giving later this month. This is Giant Milkweed (Gossypium). The only time I saw it on the trip was when we travelled to the north end of Barbados to visit the Animal Flower Cave. The cave was a must-do …
Bromeliads in the Valley of Desolation
Later this month I am giving a presentation to the Parkdale Horticultural Society on my trip to the West Indies. In preparation, I am striving to finish scanning all of the film photos I took, not including the Polaroids, because frankly, I’ve got to draw the line somewhere or I’ll never be done. I’m doing …
Barry’s Garden: Panorama
Click on the image to see full-size. The other day I showed a few stitched panoramas taken of the Yardshare Garden using an iphone and an app called AutoStitch. Today’s photo was taken in mt friend Barry’s backyard. One of my favourite features in his garden this summer are the ‘Mahogany’ nasturtiums that have been …
Essence Fragile
We’ve finally had all of the film from our Caribbean trip developed and I now have the arduous task of scanning it all before the end of September (27th), when I will be giving a presentation, here in Toronto, of some of the botanical images. I took this photo while on a tour of an …
One Day in Barbados
It’s about as hot as the Caribbean out there this week, if not hotter, so I thought I’d dip back into the pool of photos I took on the first real day of our month long journey through the Caribbean this past December. I still remember the giddiness we felt knowing that we had over …
Seasoning Peppers
In the Caribbean, that’s what they call peppers that look like hot peppers but aren’t. Although, I have also heard the term used with hot peppers, too. I suspect they really are hot, just not by West Indian standards. All of these were hot, let me tell you, and incredibly aromatic. But hot, ho yeah, …