Tuesday, June 14, 2011

An exciting day in Baobabia

I watered the baobabs.

Gasp!

Seriously, I'm really paranoid about it. I grow a bunch of different plants here, but they're all more or less made for this climate. Or they would be if I wasn't in zone 0a. But baobabs? Baobabs don't even have a "zone", certainly not in Canada. I don't even know what kind of soil they normally grow in, but I'm thinking Canadian-made potting soil is fairly rare in Madagascar. And how much does it rain on a baobab in its normal habitat? I don't even know.

The planting instructions said to "keep the soil moist until sprouting." So I've been checking the top of the soil every day with my hand. Today it was a little dry, so I put 250 mL in each planter. It absorbed really really fast and didn't drain out the bottom.

Hmmmmmmm...

Normally, I water my plants until water comes out the bottom. That's how you know that more would be too much.

Hmmmmmmm...

What to do? They're baobabs. Do I saturate the soil, or do I just moisten it? What would a real baobab gardener do?

Hmmmmmmmm...

I gave them 500 mL each, then it drained. Now I'm worried that they're quietly rotting under the dirt and I won't even know about it for another five months and two weeks.

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