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The very romantic rose garden on the coffee farm

7/21/2012

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My very romantic rose garden is taking shape in surprising ways.

Having established that it is not peligroso para mi.... i.e., a problem for my husband that I have hearts all over the garden, our gardener is going to town on the theme of romance.   Apparently, for local men such bold symbolism could be very problematic.  No worries here.

His creative spirit is running free out there in the roses.  I have heart shaped beds and heart shaped stone shapes in the middle of beds, beds with just red roses and so on......  I like it quite a bit.....and it is still early days.

Progress is a little slow.  I am OK with that.  Time to put in some practical improvements like a mechanized irrigation system.  

Should be ready for showtime around Christmas.
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My intriguing flower arrangement on the coffee farm

7/17/2012

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Courtesy of our artistic gardener, this is a flower arrangement of a red rose in a bottle of water. Now sitting on my mantlepiece. 

It has attracted much attention in the house over the last few days.  Visitors Panamanian and foreigners seem equally curious.   

Apparently the possibilities of keeping flowers in bottles of water are endless - the single red rose is a simple rendition.  This way blooms will keep without oxygen in water for weeks.   



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Practical rose gardening

6/27/2012

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Guess what I found in my rose beds this week? Watermelons, tomatoes and .... any idea what that is in the picture looking for all the world like a very large weed?   

I am told, it is actually a very important herb for burns.  If you have a little accident with the stove or ironing then a few leaves of that will be very useful.   As I am the only one who will do the ironing.  That is OK.   

(Although there are ladies to do almost every domestic chore in Panama, most do not iron.   Legend has it, ironing will make your face all twisted and crooked.  So the chance of a Panamanian lady getting burns from an iron are small to nonexistent).

Gardening and gardeners here are practical folk.   Useful things are allowed to flourish even is the aesthetic is a stretch.  I have mint mixed with begonias and Sugar cane at the back of a flower bed.    It is part of the charm of my rustic garden in the coffee.

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How to buy roses at unbeatable prices from the lady in the pink hat

6/16/2012

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Today, we went on a road trip to the other side of the Volcano to buy roses for planting.  It is now raining hard, time to plant.

The 'other side' might as well be another world, people do things differently:  Ladies proudly doing their shopping in cylindrical spongey curlers, gentlemen having their hair cut on front porches, men plowing with horses and some with old tractors.  We followed a little corn truck going around delivering corn husks for Fathers Day in return for money, or in at least two cases I noticed for small red peppers or a sack of onions.

Almost at the end of the road, there is a very nice Señora and her daughter, who sell roses for $2 a plant;  200 yds down the road at the junction with the main road, the same plants $3;    In Volcan, the town a few miles down the mountain,  behind the municipal market. the same roses are now around $3.5; And by the time they have travelled to Boquete in the market they are $5.  It has taken me sometime to work out the price dynamics of roses as well as the identity and location of the Source.

The Source wore a pink hat and was drying her laundry around the rose bushes in the morning sunshine.  She has some very large mother plants, a great book about rose cultivation she was happy to share by a lady called Alvaraz and a garden full of healthy young rose plants.  

We purchased 112 plants, were gifted 3 and given a discount on a large pot of a rarer purple blue rose.  It took half a tank of gas and 6 hours with a stop for lunch.  For a 60% discount, break-even point for me (I like a good lunch), is at around 20 plants.  All assuming you enjoy visiting the 'other side', which I do.




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Happy Easter: Roses on the coffee farm

4/5/2012

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Some of my beautiful roses.   I am slowly cracking the code for growing excellent roses here.   More rigorous pruning than in temperate zones - at least two nodes back each time.  Also, raised beds, irrigation and lots and lots of fertilizer.   Next week they will get a dose of my organic fungicide and hopefully soon some home made mulch.
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No need to apologize: I was only teasing when I said it looked like a sign for a brothel

3/31/2012

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Our gardener started this morning with a long apology for any possible offense.  It was quite difficult for me to understand what he was saying apart from 'disculpe'.   

There was no need to apologize, I love my stone heart shaped rose garden on the coffee farm. Let me say, I am not offended in the least.   I, particularly  like the plans to fill it with the dark red rose Black Prince and also the large red rose Madame and throw in some pink ones as well.  I was only teasing yesterday when I said it looked a bit like the sign for a Push or Brothel, of which there are many in these parts.   Gardens should have humor and stories to tell. 

Our farm has many rocks.  Some were hurtled over here by the volcano and some came with the river.  As the saying goes - When you have lemons; make lemonade.  We have rocks and we are making them into raised beds and making a large rose garden.

The stone heart is the brainchild of our gardener.  He has used one of the very big boulders that was hurtled over here by the volcano and found its resting place in my garden as the top of the heart.  The rest of the raised bed is river rock cleared before we plant new coffee.  It will  hold about 40 roses and I think will end up being the centerpiece of the rose garden.  Can't wait to show my friends.
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Coffee bushes look terrible at this time; Roses quite good

2/20/2012

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After the harvest a little break from coffee, well not really......ready to post about pruning, cutting, planting and more.  In the meantime, roses doing very well in the sun, cool nights and breezy days.  Particularly like this monster coral pink hybrid tea.
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Snakes and Roses: New Year curiosities on the coffee farm

1/2/2012

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I was admiring my amazing multicolored miniature rose; The large blooms on the blue rose and a pretty little pink blush..........when another curiosity grabbed center stage.    Not sure what kind of snake , it was orange and black on the back and beautiful glistening mother of pearl on the underside.    
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Nest of snakes eggs in my rose garden: Happy Mothers Day

12/7/2011

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The mother must have laid them over night.  In the morning  we found 6 eggs sitting in a fairly obvious large hole.   No idea what type of reptile mother laid them but the gardener thought snake and probably coral snake.  I was out there dead heading the roses yesterday in flip flops and had not seen anything.   My rose garden is made of five enormous raised beds made from the local rocks filled with soft soil and irrigated with drip hoses.   Great for roses and snakes it would seem.    
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My rose garden is where my home is...on a coffee farm right now

9/21/2011

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Who does not love roses? Building rose gardens here in Boquete, Panama.   I'm bringing on old fashioned varieties in the greenhouse which I think will do well here in the tropics as well as some knockout that should be robust here.     Looking forward to many happy times growing roses under the tropical sun. 

  





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