Showing 101 - 110 of 128
Facing the curling questions
B Magazine, Normita Thongtham, Published on 20/10/2013
» In last week's column, I mentioned that reader Alan Platt sent me an email saying that his potted bamboo plants needed constant watering. If they go without water for 24 hours, their leaves curl up into thin needles and many drop off, and he once returned from a three-day trip to find them totally bare.
When they can't stand the heat
B Magazine, Normita Thongtham, Published on 13/10/2013
» A mother sent me an email from the UK to say that she was coming to Thailand in November and would like to bring vegetable and flower seeds for her daughter, who lives in Rayong. "She mentioned growing plants in pots and I suggested that she plant vegetables in her garden. What would be the best flower and vegetable seeds to take there? I would appreciate any advice you could give me," she wrote.
Hedging your bets with bamboo
B Magazine, Normita Thongtham, Published on 06/10/2013
» When we talk about reafforestation and greening the environment, the first thing that comes to mind is to plant trees. Millions of trees have been planted as part of environmental awareness programmes initiated by conservation groups, government agencies, and companies wishing to improve their corporate image. But I have yet to hear about bamboo being used to rehabilitate degraded forests.
For plump fruit, Starve the tree
B Magazine, Normita Thongtham, Published on 29/09/2013
» Five years ago I planted a Moringa oleifera tree, known in Thai as marum, on one side of my house. It began flowering when it was about three years old and since then has been flowering heavily most months of the year. Although I have seen insects pollinating the flowers, they never developed into fruit.
Dam if you do, Dam-if-you-don-t
Life, Anchalee Kongrut, Published on 24/07/2013
» The farming village of Sa-iab in Phrae province has been known for its staunch anti-dam protests. A visit to the village gives one a sense of entering a quasi-autonomous area. At the entrance, strangers are regularly asked to present their identity cards and sometimes questioned, but the obvious sign is a banner warning that officials and those who support the Kaeng Sua Ten Dam _ now the Northern Yom Dam and Lower Yom Dam _ are not allowed to enter the community.
Making a dam difference
Life, Published on 02/07/2013
» Mother Nature has been cruel to the people of Ban Limthong, a Buri Ram farming village in the Northeast.
Primordial plants bring beauty and health to the modern world
B Magazine, Normita Thongtham, Published on 09/06/2013
» Selaginella, collectively known as spike moss, are not your ordinary kind of plants. Classified among the "lower plants" for their lack of flowers and seeds, they belong to a group which dominated the Earth's surface long before flowering plants and trees made their appearance. Fossil finds trace their origins to the Carboniferous period 290-354 million years ago. As a genus, they comprise more than 400 species worldwide.
Weathering the change
Life, Anchalee Kongrut, Published on 15/05/2013
» Small ants carry their eggs at a certain time of the year, usually in the middle of May. For traditional farmers, the migration heralds a change of season. Within three days, rain will start to pour and farmers will till their soil and sow seeds for rice or other crops.
No spring here, But summer's a blooming delight
B Magazine, Published on 21/04/2013
» It's springtime in the higher latitudes, and as the winter snow thaws, plants and trees spring up from their long slumber and bloom in all their glory. I had a chance to feast my eyes on spring flowers in the US when a friend sent me photos of daffodils, roses, lilies and other flowers blooming in his garden. "This one suddenly sprang up in its pot on my front porch," he wrote of a specimen unknown to me, with its tiny flowers growing from the plant's leaves. Without leaving Bangkok, I also enjoyed springtime scenery in Europe through photos sent to me by another friend. Prunus trees and shrubs blanketed by flowers, and rhododendrons, irises, tulips, daisies, daffodils, lavenders and countless other species of plants in bloom in private gardens and public parks, along streets, and on mountainsides and fields, literally took my breath away. Also a sight to behold were vast plains carpeted by wild flowers of different colours _ red, yellow, orange, pink, blue and violet _ which reminded me of a trip to Gstaad and the Eggli Mountains in Switzerland years ago.
Coffee with a difference
Life, Arusa Pisuthipan, Published on 17/04/2013
» When Blake Dinkin first developed Black Ivory Coffee, he thought it was going to be as simple as feeding coffee cherries to elephants, allowing them to be digested and excreted, and the outcome would be even better coffee beans. He was wrong.