Our first seeds grown November 14th 2023

The seed pods of this bok choy have, over the last two weeks gradually swelled. So I thought it would be good to bring them indoors to dry out completely and see if they are ready for saving.

As you can see, quite a few of the pods look as if they have been attacked by insects of some sort.

Further inspection showed that one of the pods was almost completely filled by a caterpillar! Which of course had eaten up most of the seeds and was crawling out of the seed pod. Presumably going on to the next stage of its development into a butterfly or moth.

I think there will be some seeds, but not very many. I am also not sure whether they are/will be ripe enough to grow new plants.

In Buddha Garden we dry a lot of our seeds during the hot season when there is no rain and a lot of hot sun. There is nothing like that here in Malaysia which, being near the equator, has a very similar climate all year round. There is high humidity and a lot of rain which is not the best environment in which to dry seeds. I will have to find a different way of making sure the seeds ripen and dry here. And of course try to stop the various insects of making a meal of the seeds before I can get to them.

Watch this space while I ask around and try out various things!

Its good to have got to this point of having seeds because this was the primary aim of the nursery - to find out what grows here and to grow and save our own seed.

I was very pleased to see that of the four durian seeds I planted a few days ago, one has a large shoot.

I planted four more durian seeds this morning which are larger and looked much healthier than the previous ones that I planted. Once again I have to wait to see how they grow.