Thursday, January 23, 2020

January 23 Garden & Kids Club Update


The weather here at Delice has extremes of wet and dry this time of year. A few days ago the morning temperature was a chilly 52’F and at noon about 75 with humidity (or lack therof) of 35%, probably lower depending on the accuracy of our gauge. Now we are in misty clouds and have had almost an inch of rain, which is a big help to the young trees scattered over the fenced-in 10- 15 acres. The rains ended in early November, so some of the avocados and malay apples were badly wilted and sun burned. The only common local fruits are avocado, guava and citrus, all not very drought resistant when young. Apple and egg fruit trees are definitely more drought resistant and the apples can go dormant if it is too dry in the winter.



The nursery grew well while we were gone. Now it is time to pot up and push (with fertilizer) the smaller trees so they are ready for planting or sharing in April or May after the good rains start.


This seedling mango variety has  new leaves that look like plastic

The strawberries were also suffering from the drought but still producing a few fruit and perked up after watering.

Photo from summer, yacon on right side
Yacon is a sunflower relative from the Andes mountains. It makes a root that looks like sweet potato but it is crisp, juicy, and slightly sweet. It is eaten cooked or raw and also related to, similar to Jerusalem artichoke. I doubt it will catch on, but you never know and there might be a specialty market for health or diabetics in Port au Prince since it is non glycemic and sweet.

Yacon root

The squash didn’t have time to develop much before drought hit so most of them were small and not many per plant. This year we plan to plant earlier and should get good harvests. 



Kids Club is going well at Fauche with continued large attendance. The garden/nursery workers say it is dry again this year but the lawn in the photo looks good and green.






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