A FINE DAY FOR A FRUGAL PARLAY

Parlay is such a fine two dollar word to use to impress your friends. Use it in a conversation and your friends will be rightly blown away with your worldly sophistication. Say it long for added effect as in Par' Laaaaaaaaaay. Say it ten times fast to impress yourself with your own sophistication when your bored.

Anyway this post explains the principal of how to turn a simple garden asset to great advantage. The maneuver being the parlay. With proper forethought the results can be quite impressive.

Here's an example of how it works.

In early December I received this Aechmea Gamosepala plant as a birthday gift. A very neat Bromeliad and the cost was FREE [gift] to the Sandpit garden budget.

Now it just so happened that this bromeliad had three new pups growing from the Mother plant when I got her. I removed the three pups and planted them in separate containers. This was the first Parlay. From the one Bromeliad gift I now had four bromeliads.

Let's do the preliminary garden math. One free plant retail value for instance let's say $5.00. Parlayed into four separate plants 4x$5.00 makes the value $20.00.

Fast forward from last December up to the present.

Here is one of the four plants present day. It is time to separate the pups from the Mother Bromeliad once again.

In fact it is past time for this plant as the pups are now almost as big as the Mother plant.

This is where the planning part comes in to play. The pups were coming for all the new plants and they would need separate containers to harvest them into.

When a neighbor down the way did some landscaping he removed his new plants and promptly threw out all the plastic containers his plants had come in.

Yes, Thank you for the donation to the sandpit. The free pots will look more better used in the sandpit than discarded in the county landfill. They are a perfect size for the pups new home.

Collecting the pots from the garbage and storing them away fits right in to one of my frugal gardening rules.

NEVER PAY CASH WHEN IT'S FREE IN THE TRASH

As far as the new soil to plant the new pups in a visit to the compost bin gave me all that I would need. Once again at no cost.

As a filter to keep the soil in and let the water drain I use simple screen in the bottom of the pots. Works better than that barrier stuff they sell and you can buy a roll of window screen for less. Better yet save your old screen to use it in the bottom of your pots.

After removing the Mother bromeliad from her pot it was time to harvest the pups. With a knife I just cut straight down from the top slicing the pups away trying to get a little of the root stalk with each pup removed.

This one plant produced six new pups.

Each new Bromeliad pup gets it's own pot.

Of course my loyal garden assistant Odette is always close by to give advice and pounce on any bug that may be uncovered and flee during the replanting.

As the pups get re potted I like to give each one a support. This is due to the winds that come during the intense summer storms we have here in South Florida. It supports the Bromeliad until it can get established and holds it upright so the leaves will catch water to feed the plant. I use recycled bamboo stakes cut short and tied snug to the base of the Bromeliad with sisal twine. Works great!

And for the group picture all potted up with a bit of mulch added to keep the rain from splattering the compost soil.

There is the Parlay. This one plant became seven. Add the other original three left that I have not got around to harvesting their pups and there are now ten Bromeliads so far.

Back to the calculator. 10 plants x $5.00=$50.00. 10 free new pots salvaged from the garbage say $1.00 each retail=$10.00. Free soil from the compost bin say retail $3.00. Total value not spent $63.00. Total tax paid to the State and every other Government entity with their hand out= Zip!!!

See the Parlay---There is hope. We can achieve a frugal garden full of wonderful plants without busting the family budget at the garden center. All it takes is a little fore thought.

Starting plants from seeds, propagating plants from cuttings and pups and exchanging plants with other gardening folks. Finding items to reuse and recycle. Making your own rich compost to nourish your soil and plants.

It is all subject to a plant parlay for your garden.

PARLAY= To maneuver { an asset } to great advantage.

Wishing you a successful Parlay,

--Sanddune--

SIMPLER EACH DAY

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It occurred to me today that the 2010 challenge is really becoming second nature. Quite a bit of my garden is established and returns each year by itself with minimal care.

These Amaryllis plants have been in the garden for years. They return to bloom every spring. The bulbs are sending up their bloom shoots now and in several weeks the garden will be covered in their blooms.

The seeds that were started last year are growing fine without the use of chemical fertilizer or pesticides.

This one is a Gaillardia Aristata or Blanket flower grown from seed.

I stuck it in an old recycled pot ,added compost from the bin, and added some wire to make it into a hanging basket.

All it gets now is water and an occasional shot of compost tea. It appears happy and is also sending up flower shoots.

Matter of fact for my plant something each week goal I started four more of

the Blanketflower seeds today.

By starting seeds each week it gives a continual stream of new plants to put out in the garden.

Since these are perennial wildflowers they should come back for more than one year.

I can then collect and save the seeds and will not have to buy the seed pack again to start new plants.

That is the goal of frugal sustainable gardening.

This is a cutting that came from my Mandevilla vine.

It should give me a new plant for this summer.

It was also put in some compost from the bin and some newspaper mulch added to hold in the moisture.

This week some of my older sprouted seeds went out into the garden on so I could reuse the yogurt cups to replant more seeds.

One of the new plants from seed that went out is this Grampa Ott Morning Glory.

It is a Bavarian type Morning Glory that was brought over from Germany in 1883.

The seeds were given to Diane Wheatly [Ott] in 1972 by her grandfather. Thus the name Grampa Ott.

I planted this one by my old tree stump and hope that it will grow to cover some of the stump.

If it does well I will be able to collect seeds from it . See what I mean about the challenge becoming second nature.

--Sanddune----