One thing I would like to throw out of my garden

As much as I love my garden, I hate one thing associated with it - its the increasing number of reptiles. As I expand my garden, so is the increase in the number of these reptiles, especially the Lizard. And they have a bad habit of jumping from the garden into the house. The very site of a lizard on the wall is so repelling.

My other hobby - low-cost web hosting services

In addition to gardening as a hobby, I also provide low-cost web hosting services. How I got into this is a long story, and to cut it short, i write about it in a nutshell here ..the charges of all web hosting providers are exorbitant and far above the actuals. With a bit of researching, i found that I could do a profitable business by charging mere 2000 Indian Rupees per site including a domain name(of course, assuming your site is going to be fairly medium sized.). I got (and thankfully, am still getting) several requests and am glad that I am operating a business in a win-win model.

Plants - Traditional Worship in India

As I was surfing on the web to read about flowers and plants used in worship in India, I came across this wonderful article titled - PLANTS - Traditional Worshipping by a team of scholars from the Indian Journal of History of Science (Dated Aug, 1982).

Added to the Garden - an exotic and aromatic Origanum majorana

I am looking forward to increase the varieties of flowering plants in my Garden and as part of the hunt, I went to a new nursery in Anna Nagar, Chennai. Every nursery has its own, nice collection and this one too had a unique plant - the Origanum majorana. More commonly known as the Maruvu in Tamil( Names in other Indian Languages: Hindi:Marwa Bengali:Murru Kannada:Maruga Kumauni:Bantulsi Malayalam:Maruvamu Punjabi:Marwa Sanskrit:Maru Sindhi:Murwo, Maru Urdu:Marva khusa), this is an amazing herb/plant that has a beautiful, pleasant and mild aroma. The leaves are really small and the plant itself can go happily in a pot (though I have planted it on the ground to fill a void in one corner of the garden).
While the leaves are commonly used as offerings in prayer or strung together with other flowers like jasmine to make nice aromatic garlands that are offered to the divine, some research on the web shows that they are also dried and used as a spicy addition to food (but I doubt if this is done in India). The plant has settled comfortably and I am keenly looking forward to seeing the flowers spring up from it. 

Unable to grow capsicums - Pl. help troubleshoot

Usually, I have been writing about success stories and good yields from my garden. However, the one crop which is really dodging me is the capsicum(or are they called bell-peppers?). I love the green ones and right since last year, I have been sourcing seeds from various places and trying them out in different patches of my garden. However, the seeds are not even sprouting. Is it a curse or am  I missing some detail? Really look forward to those who have been more successful to help me with this.

Tube roses - A new entrant into my garden

The tube roses is an aromatic and white flower, so beautiful, especially when strung into a garland. I happened to visit  a nursery which had the tube rose bulbs and grabbed a few of them and now, they have joined the roses, jasmine, oleanders and other flowers in my garden. The flower, also known as Nila Sampangi locally (in Tamil) or Rajani Gandha in Hindi, is offered to God,especially in the form of beautiful garlands, often interspersed with roses and other darker flowers.

Corn grows so easily

Corn is so delicious and recently, we bought some corn, made a variety of delicacies and had them. I dropped a few corn seeds in the garden. A brief spell of rains that followed ensured that the seeds caught on and I have about 10-12 corn babies growing in the garden now. I really am not sure how long its going to take to become corn boys(or girls), but each day, I can't wait to open the door in the morning, rush out and check on them.

Pomegrante - A wonder fruit

I love pomegranate. Unfortunately, a small part of the fruit had become rotten and I dumped the pods in my garden. And lo,after a month, small shoots appeared.

That was a year ago. Even as I tend to the little pomegranate trees which have become about 2-3 feet tall, I read about this article in today's newspaper which claims that the pomegranate is a wonder fruit which fights off a host of diseases, right from the dreaded cancer to dental plaque. One more thing that we all dread is a flabby stomach. It was really heartening to read that a glass of pom. juice every day fights off the accumulation of fat.
I eagerly look forward to the Pomegranate trees in my garden blooming fast.