Archive for the ‘Flowers’ Category

The Weeds of Our Yard

Sunday, January 22nd, 2012

We went down to Home Depot in Mayaguez (the nearest main city with all the modern amenities you could think of) and picked up a trimmer and some more supplies to finish putting screens on the windows of the cabana. Then Britton got to work trimming the whole “front yard”.

It’s not really a yard in the same way you would think of a lawn in the states. The front area is more of a parking place, but with all the growth from the last 8 months it made it like a yard. Before he whacked the heck out of it though, I wanted to check if there were any plants that I knew of that were good. I still don’t know all my tropicals as well as I do my backyard Colorado plants, but I can tell a mango tree from a citrus or a banana (and there are a lot of mango seedlings too!).

So without further ado: Like sand through an hourglass, these are the weeds of our yard. :-) Please help me find out what these are or correct me if I’m wrong in my guess:


Not sure what this is, but it’s really pretty!

The Traveler’s Palm has about three babies sprouted at the bottom of it.

We found more sprouted coconut palms and the one we found and planted last time we were here looks to be doing good.


Here’s the one we planted last time we were here. I know these are coconut palms but does anyone know the type? I think they are the “water coconut” variety and not the meat coconut. How can you tell the difference? How can you tell when they are seedlings?

Anyone know what this is? Is it edible?

Mother-In-Law’s Tongue -this is a houseplant in the states but here it is a yard weed!!

There’s a ton of these types of plants on the steep side of the property. I’m thinking maybe Ornamental Ginger plant? Is the ginger in ornamental gingers edible or good for you?

These aren’t weeds, but they are Mandarin Oranges we found on a tree on the property!!

This one looks just like houseplants I have seen often. Not sure of the name though.

This is just what we found on the first 1/4 acre. We still need to trim down a little further and see the plants we planted last time and take off some of the vines from other fruit trees that we know of on the remaining 3 3/4 acres! It’s amazing how just looking at weeds can be so fascinating. I guess that’s why we go places out of our comfort zone. We learn something new from even the smallest things.

Coffee Beans in Colorado?!

Saturday, November 5th, 2011


Schnoodle with some of the various tropical plants in our house -coffee tree is furthest left

We have had a small coffee plant for the last few years.  In the summer we put it in the humid greenhouse and it grows well.  Then in the winter we bring it inside, where it lives..but doesn’t exactly thrive.   Just this year it started to bloom.

Cassie played the role of the honey bee and pollinated some of the blossoms by hand.  We hadn’t thought much of it until just the other day when we saw….Coffee beans!


Colorado Coffee Beans

We will continue to let them grow and I doubt we’d have enough even for a single cup of coffee, but it’s still fun and having tropical plants around us invokes thoughts of Puerto Rico.  Of course the coffee plants in PR are a hundred times more fragrant and bigger!  Perhaps if we have enough beans/seeds we will try to grow another tree or two here in CO.  When we get to PR we might plant a whole acre of them!

This is a coffee bush in Puerto Rico (makes our Colorado coffee beans look silly)

Colorado Fruit Trees

Sunday, July 31st, 2011

The yard has burst to life in this summer heat. We have been gradually trying to shift our yard into a perennial food source instead of either having an annual garden (which we’ll do also) or just a lawn of grass and flowers that are nice but not edible.

So here is an update of some of our trees and some new additions:

Last year, 2010 we planted a fruit cocktail tree. This is what it looked like:


Fruit Cocktail Tree of Plums, Nectarines and Apricots in 2010


Today! It has grown about 4 feet in a year!


It even has plums already!

Our peach tree is doing well too. It hasn’t grown as tall as the fruit cocktail tree, but it’s gotten really full and bushy. I was noticing that the leaves of the peach tree are similar to mango trees. The fruit is somewhat similar too in color, taste and texture. I wonder if they are related botanically. Things that make you go hmm.


Here it is (to the right in front of the porch) last year


Peach Tree Summer 2011

We also planted some apple trees. We have two “Lil Big” Honeycrisp apple trees which are extra dwarf apple trees that are expected to only grow 6 feet max. The other apple tree is a 5-in-one apple tree. There are supposed to be five varieties of apple grafted together like the fruit cocktail tree. That maximizes our small space in the backyard to be a diverse food producing area. Still no apples or flower blooms yet though.


The Lil Big Apple Tree is in front and the 5-in-1 apple tree is behind

In addition to the trees though, we do have tomatoes coming in. The pepper plants are doing ok and I think we might get some cucumbers too. Also Omeleto is an egg-laying machine. Even though her eggs are smaller than the old chickens, she lays a lot more consistently. I love leghorns for this quality. Plus since we hand raised her she is not as skittish as old Omelette was. Summer is such an awesome time in Colorado. Lots of food, fun and flowers too! I wish I could do this year-round. Oh, wait. We can…in Puerto Rico! :-) I can’t wait to check on our fruit trees down there. We planted a mango tree, corazon tree, and guava. Hopefully they are growing good now!


Green Tomatoes

Grasshopper Gluttons

Wednesday, July 27th, 2011

We have a ton of grasshoppers out front in our flower beds. Whenever we walk past the flowers you can just hear them jumping to hide somewhere else. So Britton and I decided we would harvest this chicken delicacy.

When we fed them to the chickens we thought they would go nuts. But no. The chickens liked them, but were not as enthusiastic about them as I thought they would be. It was as if they were saying, “yah, we get those all the time out here”. But they still ate them all! Good protein and omega-3s for our eggs! Circle of life and all that.


Yum! A jar of grasshoppers :-)

Plentiful Peppers (and Other Things)

Thursday, July 7th, 2011

An intern at work has a family farm in Evans and he brought in two huge tray-fulls of pepper starts. They all look really healthy and hardy. He told everyone to take as many as we wanted. I took about 30 plants! Britton and I planted them all around the garden area yesterday and in the front flower garden too. I’ve never had too good of luck with pepper plants, but my mom says to just put grass clippings around the base of them to keep the humidity high near them and they will do well. We’ll see! I love peppers, so I hope it works out!


The pepper starts in the garden


One close up


Here are the three not-so-baby pullets under the tree staying out of the rain. We’ve named them: Omeleto (Omelette 2), Barock (the Barred Rock), and Little Foot (the smaller version of Greenfoot).


Flowers are still blooming like mad