Stalking jungle fowl

Honing my stalking skills on the local jungle fowl in my back yard.

Interestingly this looks to me like a two rooster one hen combination. So much for all that only one rooster to the hen house stuff.

Things work differently in the jungle. Of course. Or maybe it is that polyandrous Polynesian thing.

This group visit Halemahina most mornings for a good few hours.

I was glad to see that though she made herself comfortable, the trio seemed to take care not to disrupt the germinating beans.

I also watched while they picked off a fuzzy white mealybug type infestation on the Poha berry and generally cleaned up the place.

I do hope they like big slugs. It is challenging to get a perspective, but jungle fowl are not terribly big.

Imagine: all this handsomeness and useful in a garden too!

Then, just to confirm how successful I was at becoming invisible, or making them comfortable with my presence,  they all did the preening thing. I got some great pics of headless chickens. Without the blood.

October garden notes

After a really hot, dry September where the garden almost came to a standstill, it has been a joy to see the garden bejewelled with raindrops again.

The little black piko kalo is, at last, showing signs of thriving,  putting out some few, tentative new leaves. This was the only plant which I watered through the mini drought. Not to be a drama queen or anything, but in a rainforest climate zone, and gardening on lava rock with no depth of soil to retain moisture, three days without rain IS a drought.

The second planting of Japanese Eggplant from purchased starts from the Garden Exchange in downtown Hilo,  have begun to bloom with avengeance.

The lower leaves on the plants are showing a bit of fungus, perhaps because of the slightly shady, less than optimum location.

The lower angle of the change-of-season sun means this particular section of the garden is shaded in the early morning and then again in the afternoon.

 I am hoping for a better fate for these babies, though they were planted late in the season.

My first planting of the year was completely destroyed just at the point when the fruit was ripening, when a neighbour accidently dropped a tree on that section of the garden.

I have another volunteer garden room mate. I do not know whether this is of the pumpkin, squash or watermelon family and probably came from kitchen waste compost. I have been told these do not easily set fruit in the damp conditions.

Right now this is a very adventurous roomie sending out runners to case out the lie of the land. At first I thought the leaves were suffering from a fungus. As the plant grew I realised that this was not a disease but a very attractive part of the package.

In September I had an almost total crop failure on an admittedly sparse planting of green bean seeds. Probably this was a combination of drought, slugs and using old seed which crossed with my canoe a few years ago, and which might not like the high humidity storage conditions.

I purchased a brand new packet of seeds from Aina Ola Seeds (Hamakua Seed and Supply Company) in Honokaʻa right on this island. Interestingly I cannot find a website for this company though they do often crop up (har har) as a recommended company in seed supply lists.

The Aina Ola seeds sprouted within a couple of days. Serious slug patrol on guard. Of course I have these germinating in not very old mulch and horse manure mix which might not prove be the best or most nutritious growing medium.  I am experimenting with beans as a pioneer crop for the new garden areas where I am trying to create my soil.

The second big bunch of Hurricane Iselle survivor bananas which finally fell (yes fell ooops! but not too many squished) was variously dried, frozen, eaten fresh and given away.

They donʻt look like much but these are the sweetest snack on earth.

Lava and lavender. Lizards too.

I could smell it as I pulled up at the bank of mailboxes where I get my snailmail. Lavender.

A friend across the water had a good season in her garden. One thing led to another. I received a lovely plain brown wrapper package which perfumed up the neighbourhood.

I have made up six little sachets with half of it so far.

I know it looks like a lizard, and lizards are important,  but sometimes I think of this design as a crocodile.

My reptilian brain leading again. Smells will do that to me.

Blood moon encore

In April this year I had ringside seats on a total eclipse of the moon and posted about it here.

The show returned. October re-run was just as stunning.

I had gone to sleep, thinking the eclipse event over the midnight hours was too late for me. The neighbourhood dogs going wolf woke me.

Barking turned to whining and whimpering as the moon became a soft membrane, bloody yolk thing. Embryonic. Birthing mystery.

At the point of greatest darkness I went back to bed, grateful for Channel Los Lobos.

Peekaboo mountain, moon and sunset too

A lot of clearing is going on in the vacant lot on the west side.

This has given me a peekaboo view of Mauna Kea the Magnificent, the mountain which has my back. I am grateful. I always knew the mountain was there but now I can sometimes see a bit of her outline.

Sunsets with crescent moon too.

And on to night

Papaya notes: September

September was record-breakingly hot, with days and days of no rain. The garden, accustomed to daily showers, struggled and gasped for moisture.

I used up my little frontporch rainwater catchment tank just on the kalo going around in the early morning and late evenings with my little can of water.

In spite of the drought, recovery from the hurricane continued.

My fav ancient Polynesian had told me to cap the broken stem of the papaya with an old tin can and it would sprout again. I did. It has. Magic.

Where would I be without my conduit to local knowledge? Indigeneity is the way through the morass of modernity. Truly.

Some lower broken areas on the papaya stem have been bound with plastic bags (my invention - this did not come from the fav ancient Polynesian) to try to prevent rainwater pooling in the hollow trunk, and causing rot.

The myriad papaya saplings which have volunteered all over the garden are blooming at around six foot. I estimate they are about six or eight months old but I did not record their advent very accurately. They just joined the happy throng at some stage.

Papaya flowers are subtly perfumed with a scent just like that of fresh cut papaya fruit. At this height, it is possible to get my nose in close to get a good deep lungfull of it. Living dangerously, of course, because the little red fire ants like to be in on everything in the garden.

The various saplings do have slightly different flowers. I have yet to meet a papaya expert who can interpret these phenomena to me. I also suspect that I have various cultivars of papaya.

Patience and kissing the joy as it flies. Simultaneous lessons from the garden.

And the crescent moon.

Gratuity

Well hello to you too!

Getting in touch with the exquisite aspects of the reptilian brain is never more easy than waking up in paradise