It's official. One of my house plants is old enough to vote. Now I know that most people do not know how old their plants are. Tell me: How can that be? (You don't know either, right?)
It's the Grapefruit tree. Of course, I didn't find her, she found me. One day in November 1990, I was eating a grapefruit. (duh.) One of the seeds was already sprouted. I shoved it into the soil of the nearest potted plant, a very maternal philodendron. It grew and it grew. By the time it was 7 or 8 years old, she lived in a huge pot, and I tried to get her to spend the summers outside, and her winters on the porch. She suffered severe winter kill in her 8th year. Nothing budded in the spring. I was whacking her trunk off to make it easier to get the body off the porch, when .... TOO LATE!!!! I saw the green rim of live just beneath the bark in the very terminal cut I had made. I was miserable. I dragged the tree outside, and went back for the pot. That's when I saw the tiny leaf budding an inch below the cut. She wasn't gone after all.
She just had to start over. I don't prune her. My Big Guy keeps talking about how she needs a good clipping, take out those crossed branches, thin out the limbs where they are too close. I can't bring myself to do it. Who does he want her to get pretty for? I say, leave her wild. She looks good to me.
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4 comments:
I say you put some lights on that tree and lay some fruit underneath like she dropped it, but, make it unusual fruit.A pear,a banana....
or the plastic fruits you have as ornaments on your Christmas tree. Add a few pine cones too.
Then invite the town to witness this miracle.Plant this story and watch it grow
Dear Nola- She's had lights on several christmases, also plastic fruit and vegetables (because that's what I have for tree decorations) and tinsel. You just better take care of that banana tree....
I'm impressed! A friend gave me a an apple seedling and a tangerine seedling on arbor day two years ago and although I think I finally killed off the apple seedling, the tangerine plant is still thriving (although, I don't know if it's technically thriving when it's only 6 inches in height). You'll have to share your secret!
I have a christmas cactus that is at least 32 years old. It doesn't always flower at xmas anymore (sometimes in Feb) but that's partly because I keep forgetting to water it. It desperately needs a bigger pot, but it's already too big.
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