TERRACOTTA WATERING POTS AND WATER SPINACH UPDATES

Gavin from The Greening of Gavin, has installed a few of these himself recently and most of mine are now in operation too. I did as Chaiselongue from Olives and Artichokes did too, and put a tile on top. My plan is to put a single dripper into each , all joined by thin black poly pipe, so they will fill twice weekly, automatically. When it is very hot I can also fill them with the hose any time, since they are a receptacle ......how ridiculous.....but if you can't beat them, use their silly rules to your advantage!...Or do both.

Around each pot I have sown 6 bush beans quite near the pot rims and then further out I have planted out the various chicory seedlings Deb gave me. Since I took these photos the beans have started to come up and  I have also mulched the area with straw.... not everybody's ideal mulch but I have used all my own mulch already and I like straw because its light colour reflects the mid-summer heat.

Also this week, the water spinach or kang kong, has grown enough good, strong roots in a vase to begin growing quite a lot of leaves. Notice how its roots and stems now go right to the bottom of the vase (photo at right) and the leaves are growing tall and straight. 

Now it is time to pot them up and put them out into the tubs of water which I will slowly fill as the plants grow.Eventually, the stems and leaves will fall over and float on the water surface, sending down more roots from some of the leaf nodes.

   

 

Evidently kang kong is related to sweet potato and both of these I saw growing prolifically in Wilson's community garden in Singapore. I have been unable to get any of my 3 sweet potatoes to sprout yet this year....they just stay persistently and stubbornly uninterested in reproducing themselves. My plan was to grow them as a living mulch under the capsicums, and harvest the leaves regularly for salads since the leaves are delicious and far easier to grow than the tubers and are something you can't buy at the markets.