Gardening s

April 2000 Table of Contents

GARDENING
by Jack Hardy

When American poet T S Eliot wrote "April is the cruellest month..." he was aware of the pain associated with birth. Spring is the time when the agonies and rites of renewal occur. In a lighter sense, the Bahamian gardener will also agree with Thomas Stearns as he or she applies embrocation after a session mowing the lawn and exercising long unused muscles. Yes, the grass has picked up and the lawn will be your taskmaster throughout the summer. Weeds also respond to the rising sap and proliferate. Insects you had forgotten about return to make a joyful (to them) reunion.

April is the month when you can actually go swimming without being a tourist or taking a deep breath before plunging into the ocean. It is also the month when we must resign ourselves to summer and all that means.
Many vegetables we grow are temperate and do not do well during warmer months. There are tropical and heat-resistant varieties available that aid us to a certain extent, but the regular vegetable garden is over for home gardeners as far as sowing regular winter crops is concerned.

The dedicated (or compulsive) gardener can turn his plot over to okra, black-eyed peas, black beans, cow peas, watermelons, sweet potatoes, hot peppers, collards, chayotes, Molucca spinach, Calabaza pumpkins, eddo, cassava and other field and native crops, but the days of regular tomatoes and lettuce are over.

Citrus and fruit trees should be fertilized if that has not yet been done for the year. Spring, summer and autumn is the regimen. Flowering shrubs such as Hibiscus should also be fertilized because they will be blooming their hearts out all summer and need some encouragement. Remember to always apply fertilizer when the soil is soaked. Wait for a rainy spell and apply your fertilizer when you know the soil is as wet as it is going to get.

Plant Calladiums and Callas right now because they will surge straight into action and give you a summer of striking beauty. Leave them be and they'll come back year after year in tropical abundance.

Spring is cutting time, when you can replicate just about any flowering shrub in your garden. Always take cuttings from wood with bark, not green-skinned. Make the bottom cut just below a growth node and keep your cuttings to a modest ten inches, planting the bottom half. Coleus and Croton are two plants which can be rooted in water so long as you change it regularly.

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