• LIFE

  Reach for your buzzers

  B Magazine, Normita Thongtham, Published on 10/07/2016

  » I know that bees gather nectar and pollen from flowers to produce honey to feed their young. As they fly from one flower to another they pollinate the flowers. I also know that there are beekeepers who raise bees for their honey. The bees are let out in the morning to gather nectar and return to their hives before nightfall.

• LIFE

  All I need is the air that I breathe

  B Magazine, Normita Thongtham, Published on 20/11/2016

  » 'Please introduce air plant farms in the Bangkok area," an email I received recently requested. I am sure there are hobbyists growing air plants in their gardens or balconies, but because of high land prices, I doubt it if there are plant nurseries in Bangkok. Be that as it may, I went to my favourite haunt, the Chatuchak midweek market, last Wednesday to ask around.

• LIFE

  Surviving the desert

  B Magazine, Normita Thongtham, Published on 25/09/2016

  » In last week's Green Fingers, I mentioned that most plants absorb carbon dioxide and release oxygen during the day but sansevierias do just the opposite: They purify and freshen the air at night while we are asleep. How do they do it?

• LIFE

  A date with destiny

  B Magazine, Normita Thongtham, Published on 06/03/2016

  » If I remember it right, Thais started to plant Phoenix dactylifera, or date palm, in the 1980s. I have never heard of the trees successfully bearing fruit, so I put it down to the climate.

• LIFE

  Getting cross about pollination

  B Magazine, Normita Thongtham, Published on 06/12/2015

  » I was standing in the back yard when I noticed bees and other insects hovering over the flowers on my coconut tree. This part of my yard is cemented and the coconut tree was planted in a big, woven plastic container and placed in one corner to provide shade. After many years the plastic disintegrated and as the coconut had grown very big, we could not transplant it to another container.

• LIFE

  King of the hills

  B Magazine, Normita Thongtham, Published on 13/09/2015

  » For the past few years, Thai consumers have been enjoying temperate fruit crops, vegetables and herbs like never before. Depending on the season, avocados, strawberries, peaches, pears, persimmons, plums and passion fruit, as well as aubergine, broccoli, brussel sprouts, cabbage, carrot, leek, peas, potatoes, tomatoes, zucchini and Japanese pumpkin, to name just a few, are available fresh from the highlands of northern Thailand.

• LIFE

  More on mangoes

  B Magazine, Normita Thongtham, Published on 06/07/2014

  » I have eaten mangoes all my life. I have seen mango trees since I was a child, for it was one of the most common fruit trees in the Philippines, where I grew up. When I was in high school and an examination was coming up, I’d climb a tree that my grandfather had planted in our compound and review my lessons while sitting in its branches. But it’s only now that I realise how little I knew about mango trees, and why the tree in our family compound seldom bore fruit.

• LIFE

  Cloning a cash crop

  B Magazine, Normita Thongtham, Published on 04/05/2014

  » After reading about mulberry and its many health benefits in Green Fingers recently, Kanneegar Pindavanija came upon the idea of promoting it as a supplementary cash crop for rubber plantation or orchard growers. “While waiting for their rubber or fruit trees to grow, agriculturists can plant mulberry between the trees and earn money from either harvesting their fruit or leaves,” she wrote. Ms Kanneegar wants to know where saplings for such a purpose can be bought cheaply.

• LIFE

  Tree foundations vs building foundations

  B Magazine, Normita Thongtham, Published on 18/05/2014

  » Trees around the house make the surroundings cool and lessen the air-conditioning bill. They provide privacy and screen the house from the heat of the sun and dust. However, trees grow big, and planted too close to a house or building, they can cause problems in the long run. A big branch of a large tabebuia tree behind my brother-in-law’s house once broke in strong winds and landed in a neighbour’s garden. It missed her roof by a couple of metres and, luckily, it did not hit someone.

• LIFE

  Stop the madness _ let roadside trees reach their full glory

  B Magazine, Normita Thongtham, Published on 14/07/2013

  » I was travelling along Rama IV Road last week when I saw that some of the Pterocarpus indicus, known in Thai as pradoo, trees on the roadside had flowers. Pradoo usually flower in April and it is now July, so these were late bloomers. Especially spectacular was a tree across the streets from Chamchuri Square. It was small but it completely shrouded by flowers, which was unusual as pradoo shed their leaves two or three months after the end of the rainy season and develop new ones before or during blooming time in the summer, so the golden flowers are always accompanied by lush green leaves.

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