ARTICLE : SUCCESSFUL EXPERIMENT

 

SUCCESSFUL EXPERIMENT

 

LT COL NOEL ELLIS

 

29/IV/2022

 

Being a lover of the Hibiscus, one was never satisfied with just one colour. Different colours, textures, shades and sizes kept joining our family. There was no place in India from where we did not pick them up. Even the online portals were explored.

 

Passing by a nursery always made me jam the brakes, just to have a ‘Dekho’. My better half kept telling me to stop being a glutton. How could one resist the temptation if one saw a new variety? Imagine how plants would talk to each other asking, Are you from Pune? No, I am from Bangalore. Bombay wala would bum in, ‘me Mumbaikar, kasa kaye’.

 

Would the other hibiscus plants feel jay if one grew a cutting? I am not sure. I used to feel happy raising them as my very own. It was more than daily care and looking after. From the soil mix to manure, from watering to sunlight and shade, from placement, to the pot selection all done to the best of our ability.

 

In my previous location, one started a hibiscus drive. More than a thousand plants were planted all over the colony because people were stealing hibiscus from each other’s gardens for offerings. There were complaints and heart burns, which did not leave a good taste.

 

Be that as it may, those one-foot saplings turned into five-foot bushes. They bloomed and bloomed well. One realised that there were far more colours and variety that one had in the personal collection. Being a novice, the best way to spread happiness was to plant a cutting as an ‘experiment’.

 

It started from the selection of the right branch. It had to be as thick as your middle finger. It also had to be woody and not immature or green. The cutting one took should not spoil the shape of the main bush was the rider. Rainy season was ideal for planting. The secateur had to be disinfected and clean. It appeared as if one had turned into a surgeon.

 

Parallel preparations of the pots had to be done. I made my own combination of the potting mix. 50-50 of homemade compost and soil from the old empty pots was the ratio. Rooting hormone was ordered online.  One had to wait for two seasons for the plants to mature and give out branches fit for cuttings. Imagine my patience and control.

 

Then the moment when branches were clipped. Some loose mud was applied to the cut branch on the bush. People told me to remove all the leaves. I did for a few. They were further snipped to about nine-inch cuttings.

 

The base of the cutting was precisely scraped to expose the light green part. That one-inch exposed part was immersed in root hormone and shoved in the pot. Ideally it is six inches in between two cuttings, I ignored and shoved six cuttings to each pot. There were not enough empty pots.

 

Fresh cuttings had to be placed in shade for the first few days or at least the time till the first sprigs sprouted. Then depending on the intensity of the sun they had to be moved to where the sunlight would help them grow.

 

First two days the leaves remained green. Third day onwards the leaves started to droop and lost their shine. In a couple of days, the stem was just a stick jutting out of the pot. No leaves remained. Fingers crossed, days turned to weeks and weeks into a month. Then one saw a ray of hope.

 

Out of more than fifty cuttings at least forty showed signs of life. One could see new sprigs sprout. Those small green protrusions started turning into leaves was bliss.

 

Three factors were not in control, winds, rains and cats. As time went by, out of the forty a few wilted. A clear sign of over watering. Forty reduced to thirty. Winds would topple some pots, spreading all its wares on the ground. Rain would wash away the rest, so thirty reduced to twenty. Finally, the last nail was the cats. To avoid rain, they would enter the green house and frolic, knocking down a few. Thirty came down to twenty-five.

 

The ones which still had withstood the vagaries of weather and cats were now ready to face the sun. Two more died due to the exposure. Time now came to shift from the coast to the deserts in December. The odds were against them, but still how could one leave them. Here they came and the winter chill hit them hard; three more perished.

 

Winters changed to spring and now it’s peak summer and only ten are left. One special one bloomed today. Can you imagine our happiness when the experiment became successful? I wonder!!!!!!!!!

 

JAI HIND

© NOEL ELLIS