Our home garden

April-May months are spring in Europe and hot summer for us, in India. One would look for juicy fruits in the afternoon, to beat the heat. We have grown a few flowering plants and fruit-bearing trees in our small garden and, to our delight, all are yielding a variety of coloured flowers and fresh juicy fruits. The trees, flowers and fruits are symbol of affection, devotion, contentment and abundance.
Our ancient sages and saints often said, ‘Vruksho rakshathi rakshithaha’, meaning - if we care them, trees and nature will protect us. That is, if we don’t think positively and simply disrespect the nature, there may not be contentment and happiness in life.

First, fruits:

We have three varieties of mango, Amrapali, Ratna and Totapuri, all organically cultivated. Our trees are 3-8 years old, yielding crop fairly well this year. Amrapali, a hybrid between Neelum of south and Dashehari of north in India. The fruits are fairly big in size, green to cream-coloured, thick-skinned and with golden-red, fleshy, sweet, fibrous pulp inside, when ripe. In taste, I would rate Amrapali as ‘king of mangos’. Our ‘Ratna’, a hybrid of Alphonso and Neelum, is also  yielding well this year. Round fruits, each about 300 g in size, are golden-yellow in colour and audaciously sweet when ripened! The ‘Totapuri’ is only 3 years old and first crop this year. The fruits are conspicuously beaked and large in size. We have enough to satisfy ourselves and to share with friends.

 

 

We have 2 varieties of banana (elachi and kejee), a red-coloured pomegranate (Punica granatum) and a fleshy and juicy white to cream-coloured  aromatic jamun (Syzygium jambos). Our sapota and guava are just coming up; may take a year more to yield in plenty.  I and my wife are spending some good time caring our trees, organically. Watering the plants is my wife's daily take. These lovely plants are responding to our pulse and affection, with good yield. What else we would look for......?

Our jamun tree is very, very special; a very high yielding tree with hundreds of fruits. The branches are alarmingly bent with heaviness of fruits in bunches. Indeed, enough to satisfy all children of our Society.

 

(D. Jayaram Bhat and Vasanthi)