Sun and Earth

It's been a while since I last posted here. Since then, I have moved out of my college dorm and relocated the plants to a fair and sunny lawn in the suburbs. I left them in containers, however, because I plan on moving them again in a few months. There have been many other changes and lessons taken throughout the many weeks that I haven't posted.
First, sadly, the apple seed I was planting grew to about a centimeter and then suddenly started to shrivel up and die. Theories abound as to the cause of death, ranging from not enough sunshine (I only moved it to a sunny spot a few days after it poked out of the ground), unsuitable soil (although that's probably false, since I used potting soil, which the other apple seed grew in), and poor genetics (feasible, but I'm skeptical, since the apple seed did in fact germinate). I will need to find more apple seeds to plant, or else my original apple tree will neither be able to cross-pollinate nor bear edible fruit.
On the issue of the importance of sunshine, I think I just realized the extent of it. Between the time that I moved the plants out of the city and settled them outside in the sunshine, they were sitting in my shadowy room. Mere days after bringing them inside, all sorts of things went wrong. For instance, the leaves that the tall avocado tree sprouted weeks prior suddenly shriveled up and fell off. The other large avocado tree began to consume the energy in its pit, causing it to turn dark brown and contract. The tomatoes also started to sag, and some of the peppers died. The apple tree also lost a few leaves. That's when I realized I had to put the plants outside. Since then, I've seen improvements. The apple tree approximately doubled its height, growing larger and greener leaves. Everything looks more or less healthy.
But the most dramatic effects were manifest in those plants that got more soil as well. Three weeks ago I had to leave the country and, being in a huge rush, I simply pulled the basil plants out of the soil and threw them in a box filled with potting soil. Covering the plants with some soil and drenching them in water, I assumed that most, or nearly all, of the (tiny) basil plants would die. Coming back today, I found that, indeed, only a handful of plants survived. However, these plants were absolutely massive compared to their original size. They must have multiplied their mass by at least fifty times in those three weeks. The combination of plentiful earth and abundant sunshine really worked wonders on these plants.
Similarly, most of the pepper plants died, as I mentioned before. The remaining plants therefore had a bigger share of the soil and, combined with some great sun, tripled or quadrupled their size. I also moved some of the tomato plants (only the ones that were in a small cup and looked sick and purple) to a larger container with more soil. They also grew a substantial amount while I was gone.
To be exact, this "soil" was dug from the side of a very minor creek, underneath some large trees and flanked by man-made concrete walls. Over the years, there has accumulated a large and smelly black mass of rotting leaves and many, many earthworms by this creek, since there is nothing to remove the compost from between the concrete walls. With the help of a friend, I used this (presumably) nutrient-rich (and oxygen-poor) compost as soil for the small tomato plants and also for the large avocado plants.
While I saw improvements in the small tomato plants, the avocados look pretty much the same. In some ways, they even look worse. For example, some of the leaves on one of the plants have turned yellow or even white in parts. I don't know what is wrong with the plants. I don't think that the problem is too intense sunlight, as so far it has only helped the other plants apparently. Perhaps I didn't cover the roots of the plants enough. Or maybe the soil is not appropriate for the avocados. Maybe they need more oxygen in the roots, or just sandier soil.
Some questions remain, but overall I have learned two important lessons. First, plants usually benefit from strong sunshine, and can die if they are without it for even a few days. Second, plants usually do not grow past a certain height if they are limited in the soil they can occupy. Hopefully this summer will provide an opportunity for the plants to grow substantially.

Pepper Cycle

Sometimes I like to let weeds grow together with my peppers to help me figure out why my peppers are not healthy. Over the past few weeks, many of the peppers have started to die. Even a little weed that appeared a couple of months ago stopped growing and eventually died. About two weeks ago, however, I noticed two blades of grass growing about 8 inches apart in the pepper container. (Which is interesting, because the soil hasn't been exposed to the outside for almost a year). The blades of grass are growing very fast and are even sending out new blades. Meanwhile, the surviving pepper plants are also growing faster than usual, and three of them have started to bloom (which is also interesting, as the plants can all apparently calculate 8 months to the day since they were born). I am starting to think that the growth spurt is due to the extra soil that is available since the other plants died, or the increase in sunlight as summer is approaching.
Some of the tomato plants have also started to develop new stems, but their growth is slow possibly because of the limited amount of soil that is available.
The pumpkins and basil plants are also growing nicely. The pumpkins got very large and blossomed about 2 weeks after they sprouted, after which a few of the plants quickly died. The basil plants are not growing as quickly, but they seem healthier.
The apple plant has developed many new leaves and also looks pretty healthy.
About three weeks ago I put some olive pits, date pits, and apple seeds in soil and began to water them constantly. The olive pits and date pits quickly became overtaken with a bit of white-colored fungus, and have since not sprouted. The apple seeds I also assumed were dead, since they have not sprouted in so long. However, I noticed yesterday that one of the seeds germinated. This has given me some hope that the other seeds will also sprout, despite the long delay.

Some New Lives

A few weeks ago I planted my holly berries. Some of them I planted without taking the seeds out of the berries, and for others I planted only the seeds. Of the dozens I planted, none have sprouted. I still don't know why they are not sprouting. Perhaps they need to pass through a bird's digestive system before they can germinate.
The pumpkin seeds sprouted and are looking quite healthy. Soon I will need to transplant them to a larger container.
One of the old tomato plants has apparently reproduced. This is a picture of the new stem, which seems to have emerged from the roots of one of the 6 month old tomato plants.
Soon I will plant the seeds that I had in the refrigerator for half a year.

Tomatoes To Materialize

These are the developments over the past month: I moved one of the avocado pits to a container with soil. Meanwhile, one of the avocado pits that I moved to soil earlier seems to be really healthy and is quickly gaining height (this is the plant I dubbed the "survivor" because it survived being dropped on its roots a few times, had its roots dehydrated, and endured other traumatic experiences). I now have two or three avocado plants that are healthy. The plant whose health is in question is actually the tallest (and the oldest) one I have, but for some reason its leaves are drooping, it is not producing any new leaves, and its pit is browning and crumpling in on itself. I don't know whether this is because it reached a critical age or if it's because the avocado is just unhealthy.
The apple plant is growing nicely. The strawberries, however, are growing rather slowly, and all but two died. On the bright side, I think I know why soil becomes hard (which I think caused some of my plants' deaths). Basically, soil can be either clayey or sandy. The clayey soil binds together with water and becomes hard, while the sandy soil does not. To prevent the soil from becoming hard, I would probably have to mix it with some sand. This would explain the glass or plastic-like pieces that are put in potting soil.
A few of the pepper plants died. Fortunately, I was surprised to see that when some of the plants lost all their leaves, their stems stayed green and firm. A couple of weeks later, they sprouted new leaves.
I planted a few new plants. The little ones are basil plants which I got from seeds. I also planted pumpkins, although they haven't sprouted yet. A few days ago, I plucked berries from what I think is a deciduous holly and an American holly. I planted the seeds from the deciduous holly, and will soon plant the ones from the American holly. Also, I planted a new batch of tomato plants, and tried to record their growth.

Changing into Genes that Fit

This entry is about survival of the fittest and variability in genes.

A while ago I came to the realization that 1. Plant offspring are very diverse, and 2. Some plants are just not fitted for survival.

This is how it happened:

A few weeks ago, I lost a bean plant that was the offspring of another bean plant that died. They both looked very unhealthy. I was at first sad that the offspring bean died.

In the past, I have grown things on an individual basis (a few beans, a few avocados). With the growing of many tomatoes and many peppers, and now many avocados, I was able to see the differences in health among plants.

The first thing I noticed was that one of the avocado plants that sprouted didn't look good. Its leaves were pale and drooped, and soon started to brown at the tips (like some of the other avocado plants). What distinguished this plant was that the browning spread throughout the leaves, even until one of the leaves became completely dark and wilted. The conditions that I was growing this one were identical to the others' conditions. The conclusion I drew was that this avocado was simply of bad genetic material.

Shortly after, I started noticing that the tomatoes also varied in their healths. Some of them grew to be large but then died, even though they are side-by-side with sibling tomatoes, in the same conditions.
Similarly, all of the pepper plants came from the same parent plant, and are grown in identical conditions. Despite this, some of the pepper plants look pretty bad, while others look good. I concluded from this that there is a lot of variability in the genes of new plants; on average they resemble the parent plant, but they will be distributed in all directions of it.

The benefit of the variability is that it's probably not too difficult to engineer plants, especially if they have short life cycles.

Also, I don't feel as bad when I lose plants as I once did. My reason is that the plant is not suited for survival, and its death entails an improvement of the gene pool.

From the 20 strawberry plants that I had a few weeks ago, only 2 survived (although a third one just sprouted a few days ago). This is a good thing, because if the two plants survive and reproduce, their offspring will be healthier.



The avocado pit that broke in half and sprouted a while ago is developing interestingly. It seems that the side of the stem that's supported by a pit is developing faster than the side of the stem that has no pit under it. I am curious to see how this develops. If the problem corrects itself then it might actually be in the avocado's best interest to be broken in half and planted separately. That way, two plants can develop instead of just one.

Appaloosa

After weeks of not posting, I have so much to show and tell that I have to break it down into two entries.

First, the apple progress. The two apple seeds that I put in the soil are, like the peach and cherry pits, unresponsive. I am not sure whether they are even alive but, nevertheless, I will be patient. Sometimes seeds sprout really late.
On the bright side, the apple that germinated is thriving. I took a picture of it every day for the past 3 weeks, and compiled the pictures into two animations. The first one is from the past 18 days, and the second one is from the past 13 days.

I came to a realization about apples a few months ago (when I got the apple seeds) that I'd like to share. I was in Almaty, Kazakhstan back then, and observed two things about the city. First, I was told that the city used to have apples that were legendary in size, color, and scent. An old lady described two apples as weighing a kilogram (about one pound per apple), with a scent that was strong enough to make the entire apartment smell like apples. (Sadly, the apple trees were all cut down during the city's expansion). Second, the area is known for its horses. The entire culture is based on them, and, not surprisingly, the people were the first in the world to domesticate them. So, what do horses and apples have to do with each other? Here's the logic: Horses like to eat apples because they are high in energy and horses like to run. Apples, like all plants, like to occupy as much space as possible, and therefore prefer to be spread out. Apple seeds survive and, in fact, germinate more easily when they pass through horses' digestive systems. We have a fantastic symbiotic relationship. Apple trees produce apples that are large and easy to spot, and horses eat them and spread their seeds far and wide. In time, the horses spread apple seeds from apples that are larger, brighter, and stronger in scent, eventually causing Almaty to have legendary apples.

I would like to bring back the Almaty apple. Unfortunately, since it takes at least ten years for apple trees to start producing fruit, breeding such an apple would take a lifetime. The bright side of this is that, as I will talk about in the next entry, I recently came to the realization that plants' offspring can be pretty different from one another. This variation would mean fewer steps in breeding apple trees, making the legendary apple closer to hand.

Infantile Inflictions

Yesterday morning one of the apple seeds sprouted out of the soil. Sadly, while I was taking pictures of it this morning, I dropped its container from five feet and a bunch of the soil and the seed came out. Fortunately, since the soil is so soft and the seed is still so young, I was able to spear its root back into the ground. Hopefully it'll be okay, but I'm worried that the part that I speared into the soil was only half of the root, and the rest broke off in the ground. The pictures are from last night, this morning, and this morning after I put it back in the ground.

The strawberries are looking good. I think there are more than fifteen now (last time I counted there were over 20, but a few of them looked bad). A big problem I have is with watering them. Even the equivalent of one fat well-placed raindrop pummels them to the ground. A tiny splash of water is enough to rip the plants from their roots. Their stems are a bit wider than a hair. I found that the only way to water them is by taking a drop of water on my fingertips and placing it at their bases. A spray bottle would probably work too, but I don't have one. Hopefully they'll grow up soon, so that I can be less careful with them.

There are pictures of avocado plant tips. They are all from different plants, but they show the process of an avocado sprouted new leaves.