Tale of a mustard plant

The mustard plant in full bloom in my kitchen garden conjured up visions of large fields in Punjab/Haryana and even in Leh (Ladakh), during the short spring in the Indus valley.



The warbler and the tailor bird started visiting the mustard plants in the morning. They seemed to relish some white powdery substance from the back of the leaves-the leaves were now nearly white with morning frost and not good enough for making "sarson ka saag". So I let them be and started watching the birds. Only small birds came, warbler (almost daily) tailor bird and an occasional white eye.





Then one day, I noticed the leaves getting eaten up by large worms. The birds stopped coming on the plant. Even the babblers and bulbuls ( who I found were particularly fond of worms) gave the mustard plants a miss. The worms grew bolder and bigger.



I tried spraying neem oil, since by now, I was determined to let the mustard seeds ripe. The worms were apparently not moved.

Then, within a week, the temperatures started going up. The morning sun hotted up. One such hot morning I found the crawlies all down from the plant moving around in all directions.



I looked up Google. The worm had a name-diamond backed moth worm, which normally affects mustard leaves and cabbage leaves. The leaves were all eaten up, but the seed pods were intact. So I can still hope to get some home grown mustard seeds.

To help or not to help....

When I photographed this plump larva on the small lime plant, I had visions of it metamorphosing into a beautiful lime butterfly.


Two days later I saw that a group of babblers had entered the garden and were busy scouting for food with their sharp eyes focused on plants like a search light. Watching from the kitchen, my first thought was "should I drive them away, because I could see that there is little chance of the lime larvae escaping attention.

Then the thought came "Who am I to play God, after all the babbler has as much of a right to live as the larva. So I watched.

Sure enough, within minutes, the loudest and and biggest babbler had got his prize-a plump green larva in his beak- the very same one which I was waiting to see the transformation into a lime butterfly. All visions of the flitting butterfly crushed in a moment!

Few days later



This white eye chick has just fallen from its nest. It is so motionless, yet a mild quiver of the body says it is alive. I resist an urge to pick it up and put it on a nearby tree. Soon I hear the frantic parents on another tree.



White eyes are usually very muted in their songs-one has to strain the ears to hear them while they are foraging. But just now the parent birds were ballistic- flying about and chirping continuously. Again I watched from a distance.



As if motivated by the coaxing of the parents, the chick flew a short distance. The coaxing continued and the chirping shriller.



About half hour later, I found the chick had managed reaching the nearest bush-a jasmine plant. It kept sitting there while the parents came with morsels of food.



So this story ended happily- it was clear that the chick had overcome the fall and was on its way to start life again.

Birds Love the Anaar Tree!

The Anaar tree which bears the Anaar (Pomegranate) fruit is valued in Ayurvedic and Unani systems of medicine. The fruit and its rind have nutritious values and healing properties. The pomegranate is native to the region of Persia and the Himalayan ranges of India.



The bird community seems to realize the value of the pomegranate fruit. Of all the plants and bushes in my garden, the Anaar attracts maximum number of birds at all times.
The soft spoken "white eyes" and the chirpy "bulbuls" relish the red fleshy seeds.





The squirrel, evening brown butterfly and common Castor butterfly are the other regulars I have observed at various times.






Go ahead and plant an anaar tree in your garden!

Flower power to beat the heat

Temperatures are soaring from 42 degrees Celsius ( 108 degree Fahrenheit)to 46 degree Celsius(115 degree Fahrenheit) in Delhi and Chandigarh. It is a struggle to keep the garden smiling. The Mayflower bushes bloom with their smooth pink flowers.



The Zenia blooms of various shades remind us that these hardy flowers do not mind the soaring heat. But the Lily flowers bloom at 5 AM in the morning and wither away before 9 AM in the morning. Their flower petals are fragile and cannot bear the heat.



The North west monsoon seems to have given this part of the world a go-by. Ladies Fingers oblige in the kitchen garden with a good show; but the spinach, coriander, beans and others which have sprung up from the earth during the monsoon drizzle, threaten to die away if the rains refuse to come.




The tailor birds, sun birds and white eyes are getting impatient to start their nests.



We are all waiting for the rains.