Living in a top-floor flat wouldn't suit those with green fingers, but it suits me fine not to be mowing the lawn every week in summer or scraping up piles of leaves in the autumn. I do, however, have a rather large windowsill in the kitchen, and it would be a shame not to use it. A few years ago, it was full of chilli plants, but it was a battle to get rid of the greenfly (although diluted washing-up liquid in a cheap squirty-bottle thing from one of those pound shops did the trick). The final straw was when I bought a rather nice chilli plant from a dedicated chilli plant farm - it turned out to have a few stowaways - really unpleasant black flies that soon infested every plant in the flat and proved impossible to remove.
As a result, the last couple of years have been relatively plant-free. I have a small Aloe plant that has spawned seven or eight baby Aloe plants, but they look so happy snuggled up in the original pot that I don't want to disturb them... Then, along came a DIY Bonsai kit for Christmas, which remained in the "pending" pile for a while. With the new house due to be started at the Edge of Exmoor, I suddenly thought that the trees in the kit could be grown to full size for the Ians' new garden! So - out came the kit. Red Maple, Mountain Pine and Silver Birch - a nice trio.
The initial batch was four of each species. The stratification process began on 10 February 2016; seeds were soaked overnight then planted in the special compost pellets in the kit, the pellets were put into perforated plastic bags and off they went into the office - cool and light, but not direct sunlight. Two weeks in the office were to be followed by six weeks in the fridge to simulate winter (trees like that kind of thing, apparently), before going back into the office to germinate.
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| Reaching for the blue |
Surprisingly, two of the Mountain Pine seeds germinated during the first two weeks in the office. They are now on my windowsill and the original leaves (needles) are now being joined by more, tiny needles. The rest of the seeds are still in the fridge - no signs of life there yet!
A couple of weeks ago, I started off the rest of the Red Maple - they went into the fridge today, and I started soaking the remaining Mountain Pine seeds this morning. At least I have two trees growing, so that'll be a start for the Ians' garden - although I bought myself one of those little Bonsai pots, you know, just in case those green fingers grow back again.
