finding Happiness in the garden

I had no idea my garden was so trendy! The colour of the year is blooming itself silly in my garden.
Oh yes, feast your eyes on the most cheerful, vivacious colour ever. Tangerine Tango is what Pantone calls it. I call it Sheer Pep!
Doesn't it just put a zing in your soul and a swing in your step? They definitely got the Tango part right. Electrifying!

I think if Happiness had a colour, this would be it. Not the insipid pale-pink kind of happy.
No way! this is the in-your-face, ecstatic to the core, bursting-with-happiness, beaming-from-ear-to-ear, hopping and skipping and dancing, vibrantly giddy kind of happy!

And I'm finding all kinds of variations on the theme all over. Don't you just love this pop of colour? Ornamental Musas have a way of being eye-catching even in a garden crammed with colour. But put them in the midst of green foliage and wham! it just pulls eyes to them instantly.

Any plant which is a butterfly and bird-magnet as well as being low-maintenace, ranks very high on my list of must-haves in the garden. With the lantana you get all this plus cheerful colours too.
I have a wild lantana bush growing in the middle of my vegetable patch . It's grown and grown, like the legendary porridge in the magic pot, till it's spilling all over the place. It takes up a good 10' x 20' (or more ... definitely more) of the space but I'm a bit indulgent with it. After all, it's the perfect spot to lurk near in hopes of clicking butterflies. So I let it grow wider but not taller. I keep it pruned (or rather, hacked) to a controllable 6' height or I would have a lantana tree blocking out afternoon sunshine from my orchids.
The one in the photo above, however, is more well-behaved and is bred to stay humbly close to the ground. And I lovvve that colour!

The Pagoda Flower (or Clerodendrum paniculatum) is another burst of colour for the garden. I love mixing it up with shorter plants and then again, it looks great in masses of its own kind too. Like wave upon wave of orange-red fireworks.
Now picture that against a grey stone wall. Or even a stark white-washed wall. Or with a green grass backdrop ... so dramatic!

Oh, and the butterflies love them too. Do you really need any more reasons?

Need more of the 'shake-awake' factor?
If anything shouts "Drama!", it just has to the Anthurium. This one doesn't exactly fall into the Colour Trend of the Year category, but really ... does it need to?!
I love the glossy, brilliantly-hued spathes that sizzle their way to centre-stage each time. Every time.
And know what I love even more? That they're low-maintenance! At least in tropical gardens, they are. And their blooms last and last and last. Perfect for the busy gardener who juggles a hundred chores every day, don't you think? Happiness!

If bright colours are the trend this year, this must be in the Top 10! I love the uber-bright, soft as a powder-puff bloom of the Wax Jambu. I love the fruit too (naturally!) but the flowers are a great taste of yumminess in store.
Did I say taste? The flower is edible too, as any little kid in tropical lands will tell you. It has a slight sour tang which makes it too tempting to leave alone. I remember raiding the Wax Jambu trees in my childhood garden and nibbling on the blooms. My mom never objected because she loved it too. In fact, I think she's the one who introduced me to this tangy flavour.
The squirrels did protest, though. Long and loud!

It's not just colours that make me happy. Growing my own food puts me firmly on that path too. But it's a bursting-with-pride kind of happy.
Leafy greens are some of the easiest edibles to grow. So are the leafy reds. Doesn't the red amaranth growing among the green palak look festive? Especially in Mumbai with the mellow winter sun gleaming on them? Perfect holiday colour!

This Common Sailor butterfly doesn't have the brilliant colouring which seems to be favoured this year.
Or does he? Once he folds his wings you just might be surprised. Take a look here .
Hmmm.... maybe he's a pirate?

A bit drab, did you say? But then, butterflies embody the Happiness factor in any garden (or anywhere else for that matter). Even a sober Grey Pansy butterfly basking in the winter sunlight is enough to make my click-happy fingers tremble with excitement. Love those colours against the vibrant green of the lantana and banana leaves!

And I love those fake eyes on his wing-tips, goggling at the world. Brilliant! Any attacking bird would be misled into going for those 'eyes', giving the butterfly enough time to break free and escape. I love it when the underdog outwits the bigger, tougher adversary!

But if you want to find pure unadulterated happiness, take a tip from this Psyche. She stuck her whole head (not just her proboscis) deep ... way deep ... into this Vinca, immersing herself wholeheartedly into the moment. Until ...

..... aaaahhhh! BLISS !!!

Monsoon blooms

Monsoons are made for Dendrobium orchids. I'm convinced of this. This season, like no other, sees my collection of orchids plump themselves up, fluff their petals, green their leaves and get all dressed for the greatest event in their calendar (and mine) ... the grand 'Bloom-your-heads-off Spectacle'!
Which means that in Mumbai, late-July onwards sees a lot of activity and barely-suppressed excitement in the orchid gardens. The flowers are coming!

They come in all shapes and colours but these twisty petalled ones always remind me of the antlers of a Black Buck antelope. Can you see the resemblance too?

This Gardenia has been giving me some sweet dreams lately. I had cut a few flowers to keep in my room some time back and by the time it was ready to be changed, it had already rooted in the vase! I couldn't find an empty pot for it so I then stuck it in a small plastic bag of soil outside my bedroom window, thinking I would find a permanent spot for it later. Before I knew it, it had grown through the bag and had locked itself in place . It obviously liked that spot so who am I to argue? Now its blooms scent the evening air sweeter than the most expensive perfume.

My Brunfelsia bush is in full bloom now. I love the way the colours change from day to day and its very quaint alias , Yesterday-Today-Tomorrow.

My Anthuriums have woken up from their summer stupor. They love these moist days

Look at them go! They're putting out new roots left, right and centre. This is the perfect time to start multiplying them. I'll be cutting them just below the new roots and replanting them.
So from this one plant I can get about three ... the portion with the crown of leaves and the new roots, plus the part remaining with the roots sunk into the soil, which I can again cut across horizontally into two round chunks.
Chunks about 1" tall and with roots are good enough for a new plant. New shoots soon sprout from the nodes and as long as they have viable roots too, I'll have some more gorgeous anthurium plants.

The rainy days had me indoors with nothing much to do except cleaning out a lot of stuff I had stored away in various cupboards. I found this wall-plaque I had made years ago when I went for a terracotta workshop. Isn't it odd how our surroundings pop up in all our creative attempts? That's my cashew tree and all the crows who seem to have taken larger-than-life proportions!

Meanwhile, under the cashew trees, some of my favourite monsoon plants are popping up ... Curcumas! The whole area is a play in green and purple right now. I didn't plant these; they've been there for centuries I think.
So has that wild ixora you can spot between the Curcumas. It is not in bloom yet . Maybe it fears being totally overshadowed by its absolutely flamboyant neighbours!
Imagine pitting yourself against this!

Anthurium anthem

For sheer flamboyance and in-your-face attention grabbing, few flowers can beat Anthuriums (Anthurium andreanum). I think I'm a little prone to drama myself because I love growing these very sophisticated-looking beauties.

Of course, it really helps that they are some of the easiest plants to grow in the tropics. Just give them bright shade (which makes them the perfect indoor plant) and a medium that doesn't choke them to death and they really take off. Here in Mumbai, I grow them potted up in a mix of river sand and broken chunks of brick but I've heard of them being grown tied to trees too... they're epiphytes, after all.

I first saw anthuriums being grown in my childhood home. My grandmother loved plants and the more exotic they were, she would try her best to get hold of at least one to work her magic on. Anthuriums were not really easily available those days but somehow she managed to build up a decent collection which was the pride of the garden and the subject of much oooh-ing and aaah-ing from visitors.


The anthuriums available nowadays seem to be unlimited in colour and size. I've seen them in all colours from brilliant red to bubble-gum pinks (see the photo above), pure whites, vivacious oranges, and even brown, green and yellow. The absolute favourite though, seems to be the bright red anthuriums.

Their brilliant colours make them a favourite among florists. That, and their longevity . The flowers I cut from my garden to brighten up my rooms, easily keep looking their best for at least 2-3 weeks in just plain water and no added floral preservatives. And that's saying a lot!



The very colourful, textured spathes (that's what they are called) are actually modified bracts. If you want to see the actual flowers, you've got to search for them on the spadix (that's the fleshy white part of the 'flower'). See those little bumps on the spadix in the photo above? Those are the flowers.
Hmmm.... you may want to get the magnifying glass out if you want to spot them.
(By the way, ignore those whitish faint splotches you may see on the flowers and leaves, will you? That's from a liberal dose of neem oil applied rather enthusiastically by the guy who helps me with this.)


The spadix can be quite colourful too, changing from yellow to white as the flower matures and then to green as it ages even more.
Somehow I find the white anthuriums very tranquil , unlike its red counterparts which seem to literally vibrate with drama.



If a flower is called the 'sweetheart flower' it has to live up to its name, don't you think?


Sometimes, just sometimes, you find a plant that likes to add a few twists of its own. A couple of my plants sometimes are a little confused whether they want a spathe to become a leaf instead. The result is a large leaf with splotches of colour in them and a spadix which sticks to the crown of the plant.
I have no idea whether this a mutant version but it is definitely interesting. It doesnt seem to be caused by any disease because the plants kept close to it show no such inclination. Sometimes the splotches of colour literally fill the leaf-spathe and it looks like my plant has a spathe which is about a foot long!

Just about the only minus point I can think of in the anthurium is its lack of fragrance (which those prone to allergies may applaud) . But I'm sure the numerous anthurium breeders are working on that. Till they come up with a solution, I'll just enjoy the visual drama.