The Borage has been blooming for quite a while now and i thought this picture was especially pretty with the pink transition towards the edge of the petals. Its pretty how such a small flower can be so ornate.

Reminds me a lot of the passionflower, which i would love to get a hold of.

Hopefully i'm able to get some seed off of it so i can plant it next season. the seed packets are like 4 something for a pack over at park, which is expensive if you ask me.

i found that even if they sit for only a year that a larger fraction of the seed isn't viable anymore. for example: when i planted okra the first year practically every seed germinated. this season i used the same pack from before and i got about 1/2 the germination yield. i want to say they were planted at the same time but i think i stuck these in the ground a bit earlier. i still think the age of the seed was a big factor.

One thing to note is that these things grew HUGE for me. they out grew the tomatoes in height almost (over 4 feet). Plus the stems are hollow so if they topple over they get stem damage and break open a bit - an invitation for who-know-what kinda critters. i bootleg staked them for the time being but next season they need to be planted much further away from the tomatoes (like at least 2 feet with the way the tomatoes have grown). A lot of them are not getting adequate light b/c the tomatoes are shading them so much.

and this is the suspected culprit of eating my tomatoes. I imprisoned him inside a little pot with a borage plant inside and covered it with a plastic bag. Stuck it in the shade and was going to let him (or her?) do what it does so i could understand a bit more about it. know your enemy right? but when i went to go look for it a few days later i couldn't find it anywhere... i only saw a ton of 'pitter poo marking the fact that at least the little punk was eating well. I'm hoping he is just buried in the dirt somewhere and didn't escape thru the tiny holes in the bottom of the pot and back into my tomatoes! those holes are sooooo tiny though, many times smaller than it is. i don't know but i haven't seen any more new visible damage to the 'matos.


I think that once finals are over (which i should be studying for now, i know, lay off) i'm gonna buy some bougainvillea and try that. They love the hot horrible weather we get and i think they're relatively easy to propagate.