Aphids do attract ladybugs!

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The migrant ladybug that stayed on the potted brinjal plant after it was moved to a new part of the garden.

A few months ago, I marveled at the sight of a ladybug feasting on black aphids on my winged bean vines. While it confirmed what I’d heard about having to have the pests before the beneficial insects came to feed on them, all I saw at that time was the one ladybug. I wanted more.

Then, a little more recently, I thought I recognized a ladybug nymph in what has become my plant nursery area. Unfortunately, I lost track of it and couldn’t confirm whether or not it eventually transformed into a ladybug – but I’d like to believe it did.

In the meantime, I know that at least one ladybug travelled with one of my potted brinjal plants that initially grew near the winged bean trellis. It was part of an experiment to see what growing conditions would suit aubergine plants best, so I placed the potted plants in different locations around the garden. Anyway, that ladybug stayed with the plant most of the time. It wasn’t always there, though.

The start of the yellow aphid infestation - it got worse in a matter of weeks.

And then, a few weeks ago, I was irritated to see that yellow aphids were starting to spread on that plant. When I flipped the leaves over, the undersides were liberally speckled with tiny and not so tiny yellow aphids that increased in number with each day. I initially squished them, but eventually gave up because it didn’t seem to be doing any good.

Besides that, I also noticed little black dots that may not have been aphids. I recalled that other creatures that prey on aphids lay their eggs amidst the infestation so that when their young hatch, the food will be right there. So, I left the yellow aphids alone and let nature take its course.

Fast forward to this week where I’m making my usual rounds, visiting my plants to see how they’re faring, and then I notice something new on this brinjal plant’s leaves…

A very well fed ladybug nymph amidst yellow aphids beneath an eggplant leaf.

It looked like what I had originally suspected to be a ladybug nymph, and it seemed to be very happy roaming among the depleted number of yellow aphids under a leaf! I was so excited that it took a while to realize there were more of these longish black insects on other leaves all over the plant! That sealed the deal for me and I am declaring them ladybug nymphs for sure!

A closer look at the alien-like ladybug nymph

They really don’t look anything like adult ladybugs. Their bodies are long and oddly ridged like crocodile skin. Okay, maybe the heads look a bit beetle-like and they have six legs. But that’s it. You’d never guess that these creatures will eventually transform into cute, round beetles.

Well, these babies look happy and well-fed, and I’m very happy to have been able to provide them food, and hopefully a place to call home. So I’m now even more sold on the concept that letting pests establish themselves will bring in the pest-eating cavalry. Yee-haw! 8)

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Growing the Red Lady papaya from seed to fruit

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Our most fruitful tree with the ripening fruit at the bottom!

It’s been a long journey, but we’ve finally reached the conclusion. In August 2010, I planted the first Red Lady papaya seeds. They germinated within days, and I thought it would be just a couple of months before they matured and started flowering.

Well, the plants grew well, but kept me in suspense for months before the first began to bud in January 2011. We ended up with four healthy trees, three of which are hermaphrodites (I assume, since they produced fruits without a male papaya tree around when they matured), and one male tree.

And once they started flowering, the trees kept it up for a few months before they finally began to set fruit. It wasn’t until late May that we finally saw the first little fruit on the tree. The other trees, growing at slower rates, started budding only towards the middle of the year – in fact, the last one just began to fruit in September!

Unbelievably to me, the fruits take about 4 months to mature on the tree. The first flower to set fruit bloomed in mid-May. We harvested the mostly-ripened fruit at the end of September and kept it wrapped in newspaper to ripen fully. Leaving it on the tree much longer would have tempted the birds to start pecking at it.

The very first Red Lady papaya harvested in our garden! Looks more like a pumpkin, doesn’t it? :P

The harvested fruit – not the biggest growing on the tree – weighed in at just below 500 grams. It was quite a round fruit, the skin blushing a healthy deep orange colour.

To our surprise, it didn’t have any seeds when we cut it open. In retrospect, I’ve heard of this happening when there are no male trees around to pollinate the flowers. We will observe future fruits to see if this happens again. However, seeds are unimportant as I understand this is a hybrid and planting from seeds of this generation will not yield fruits of the same quality.

Red Lady papayas are supposed to have red flesh. Ours was basic papaya orange. But then it was also small, by the standards mentioned on the seed supplier’s website. Nevertheless, it was sweet! I presume that the first fruits, like eldest children, are guinea pigs – the result of the parent’s first attempt at reproduction. About 3 fruits up on that first tree is a much bigger, longer fruit. Maybe it got pollinated, or the parent tree finally got the hang of producing fruits.

Or maybe I need to fertilize the trees more aggressively. They had a good mulching when I first got my ton of compost, and again when the first layer of mulch decomposed. I also occasionally douse them with the fertilizer of the day, when I remember.

What we saw when we cut the fruit in half – no seeds!

Maintaining the trees is fairly easy. Papaya trees do not like to be over-watered, so I didn’t trouble myself watering them unless we’d had an entire week without rain. As mentioned, I also did not fertilize them regularly. What I had to be religious about, however, was checking them daily for mealy bugs. While I used a white oil spray before they set fruit, I now remove the mealy bugs by hand, squishing them on the plants in the hopes that the scent of their dead brethren will scare away other mealy bugs. I can wish, anyway! If, however, I find leaves that are too infested, I cut them from the tree and dispose of them immediately.

Something I noticed was that the two trees that get the most sunlight produce more fruit. The last fruiting tree, not well placed in a somewhat shady location, sets fruit few and far between, and is a magnet for mealy bugs and black mould. I had another half-grown tree, also grown in a partly shady location, that was so infested with mealy bugs that I culled it.

My conclusion: plant the papaya tree in as sunny a location possible. So while we wait and see how the subsequent fruits turn out, I consider the our growing of the Red Lady papaya trees a success.

© 2011 curiousgardener.com All rights reserved.


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September garden babies

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I call this "Super Luffa" since it's shaped like an 'S'

As September draws to a close, I’m looking back at the new additions we’ve had in the month.

More red okra and angled loofahs are on the way.

More aubergine fruits are developing. I wish I had labeled the plants better, because I can’t remember which are the short purple fruit plants, and which are the long green ones. The only thing to do is wait and see, I guess! The good thing is, I’m now able to identify pollinated flowers from the way the petals drop off and the calyx slowly begins to swell with the new fruit.

I have some unexpected sunflower plants growing from seeds obtained from my stunted Kong plant. After harvesting the seeds, I had thrown the handful of them into an unused planter where, on the surface, they were exposed to rain and sun for a few weeks before some started sprouting. I don’t expect much from them since they hail from a stunted parent. However, one can never say no to having sunflowers growing in the garden.

Young white snake gourd plant

Other plants grown from seed this month include two varieties of snake gourd – I find it highly ironic that snakes have made an appearance the same month these plants started growing… coincidence? The plants are the regular green variety as well as a white one.

I also managed to grow two winter melon plants from seeds given by Novice Gardener. Along with the snake gourd plants, they are awaiting trellises to be put up for them to grow on – but will get first go as they’re bigger than the snake gourd plants. One has to make such drastic decisions…

The spiky stems of the Kiwano vine

Surprisingly, I managed to grow one Kiwano plant from seeds given by a friend. Neither of us has eaten this fruit, and it’s grown as a curiosity. Judging by the leaves and vine, it appears to hail from the cucurbit family as well – a vining plant that lives up to the name of the Horned Melon. I may not have seen the fruits yet, but let me tell you, the vines are incredibly spiky! The plant grew almost 2 metres long before I finally made it a trellis, and the process of unwinding the tendrils and vine from the supports they had latched onto, and then transferring them to the trellis was a very scratchy one for me! Anyway, that plant is in its new home and with luck, we will have flowers and perhaps fruits to report in October.

And speaking of cucurbits, we have some new cucumber plants growing as well. These are supposed to be local short cucumbers, and one white cucumber plant, the latter also courtesy of Novice Gardener.

Bittergourd and winged beans harvested this month

As always, there were several bittergourds. Yes, I paid more attention to the vines this month, but still missed a few fruits. Subsequently, I now have a couple more young plants…

We also harvested our first four-angled beans – all three of them. :| I’m still waiting for the “prolific blooming” to make its appearance… Honestly, what is with these vines?

Last but not least, we’ve plucked the first Red Lady papaya to finish ripening in the safety of the house. Any longer and the birds would have started feasting on it. I didn’t want to cover it up on the tree because there are mealy bugs around, and they probably would relish any covering that they could hide beneath. No matter what I do, they just keep coming back to the trees. However, they’re being controlled, and our prospective papaya harvest looks good.

All told, September has been a pretty good month!

© 2011 curiousgardener.com All rights reserved.


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Caterpillar attack on the loofah plant

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One of the caterpillars eating up the flower buds on the luffa vine. There were sticky threads criss-crossing the buds.

I’ve been keeping both eyes on the angled loofah plant ever since caterpillars started feasting on the flower buds several weeks ago. They seemed to have given up, so I was happy – especially as the two vines grew bigger and started branching out and producing more female flowers. In the last week, I was quite happy to have helped pollinate no less than 5 female flowers. Everything was going well and the fruits were growing at what seems to be their phenomenal rate of growth.

Then, two days ago, I noticed some tiny black caterpillar droppings on a leaf. Looking upwards, I saw one of those dastardly green inchworm-like caterpillars on the underside of a leaf. I disposed of it and checked for more siblings, but didn’t see any. Of course, that didn’t mean there weren’t any.

The poor baby ketola that had to be culled after being eaten by a caterpillar.

Then, yesterday, I noticed that the ridges on one of my baby loofahs were broken. A caterpillar had been eating the outside of the fruit! And the culprit was still there! Using a fallen leaf, I tried to nudge it away, and wouldn’t you know it, the caterpillar was busy burrowing into the fruit! After dislodging it, a nice, round hole stared back at me. There was nothing to do but remove that fruit, because I didn’t know if there were more pests inside it, and I didn’t want it to sap growing energy from the vine. It irritated me that one of my babies had been ravaged like that.

A scrutiny of the area revealed two more caterpillars – both on the clusters of male flower buds. These creatures have the best colour camouflage ever – it’s almost impossible to spot them! So now I have to double my checks, in case any of the other fruits are compromised. Why can’t things just go smoothly?

© 2011 curiousgardener.com All rights reserved.


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