Resources for purchasing tropicals when we're ready

I've gotten some of these referrals over and over by now from several peeps, so they must be the "go to" sources.

Plant It Hawaii concentrates on fruit trees. Their website is packed full of pictures and growing instructions. http://www.plantithawaii.com/ open by appointment only and also has a reportedly awesome semi-annual plant sale.

Big Island Association of Nurserymen, reportedly they have a semi-annual plant sale that is a must go to as well. http://hawaiiplants.com/

Hawaii Fruit Lovers Nursery for rare fruits, nuts, palms, etc. http://www.fruitlovers.com/indexen.html

This place looked interesting, specializing in azaleas and rhodies http://www.whitecloudnursery.com/

I saw this place on our last trip to the island and on the way to Volcano and thought that I'd like to stop sometime. Akatsuka Orchid Gardens and have also been told several times about Rozettes in HPP and about Paradise Plants down by Walmart.

I also want to support my local neighbors if they are trying to make a living or earn extra from their efforts. Here's one: http://eveningrainfarm.com/our-nursery just down the road from Sea View in Kapoho area.

My favorite way of finding plants are gifts from friends and neighbors, found at yard and garage sales, or found at farmer's markets. This way one can usually get lots of planting details and tips.

And when all else fails and you're trying to find inexpensive prices Walmart, Lowes and Home Depot often have good stuff.

I did read something, somewhere, regarding suggestions on making sure your newly acquired plants didn't come with unwanted pests, including coqui frogs, fire ants, slugs and I don't know what else - but I'm sure there's more. One suggestion was to rinse the plants thoroughly, or even put it in the shower and shower them up to a certain temperature. I'll have to research that more though, as I could see scalding tender tropicals or killing the plant. It's my understanding that its very easy to transfer fire ants as they can be in the dirt pots the plants come in, once they establish themselves on your land, it's quite an ongoing battle. The same with the frogs, them sneaky lil' buggers!

I love the idea of recycling used pallets as a building material

So much free wood - so little time. Seriously, many companies just discard pallets. I gotta get me a list together (OMG yes another list) of companies in the surrounding area that are willing to get rid of these - for free. I'll post more when I do.

But in the mean time, here's more inspiration:

This page has a TON of pics and ideas for building structures using pallets. I love the posts about making a chicken house out of pallets and stuff from freecyle.
http://summerville-novascotia.com/PalletShed/

Building a fence out of pallets: (not a big fan of the end result looks of this, but I could see using them for screening in certain areas)
http://summerville-novascotia.com/PalletFence/

Or what about art projects with pallets? I'm sure I could sell artsy garden related signs painted on pallet wood at my shop. (note to self - try to convince artist friend Willow to paint some for me) http://palletproject.blogspot.com/ this link has some funky art using pallets.

Heck if we were really into it, and Thomas would NOT cut off his fingers, we could build some really attractive furniture out of pallets, such as found on this site http://www.palatablewoodworking.com/projects/PalletTable/PalletTable.html

Other links from PunaWeb I don't want to lose.

I hate to just keep adding links from PunaWeb, but there's just so much darn good info I want to save.

In this particular thread someone asks about planting for privacy screening, many good suggestions followed. http://punaweb.org/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=9867
I'm thinking that if we land on a small lot, which is likely, we will be considering privacy screening immediately. I like the look of a mix of attractive fencing along with tropical landscape. I'm sure we will fence around our outdoor shower, just to save the poor neighbors the horror, with wooden fencing, or possibly wooden posts and framework then bamboo screening along with some clumping bamboo plants. KathyH on the above thread had some great suggestions for bamboo that is quick growing and not invassive (never knew there was such a variety but there's several). I also like the suggestions of planting bushes like Ti, which has a lovely red variety, that tend to grow easily and fairly quickly yet they get leggy, so planting something lower growing to fill in the under-story is a great idea.

I also posted an older thread on PW regarding what to plant for part-time enjoyment. My meaning was that Thomas and I will only by on the island for a number of years part-time, likely during the months of October and April to begin with, and then maybe adding January, then transitioning into being there from October or January through the early part of May. At least that's the plan right now. ANYWAY, we both really want to plant tropical fruits and trees, yet we don't want a bunch of fruit falling to waste when we are not there to keep up on the mess. The responses on this thread offer some great suggestions. http://punaweb.org/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=9233

This next thread also had some great information on choosing avocado varieties for year round production and type. We had two wonderful avos sent to us by a friend, OMG we soooo enjoyed them. I took them up and down the block to show them off, then we took pics of it with Ruby just to show how big they were. This got us pretty darn excited about gardening in HI.
http://punaweb.org/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=9807

Oh heck with it, I'm gonna post a few more links to PW threads all in this one blog post as this is all great stuff I plan to return to. Easier to have it in one place than searching PW for it again. So here's more!

This one is about starting plants from cuttings and also discusses starting Plumeria trees from cuttings
http://punaweb.org/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=9609

This one is about Hapu'u ferns which I just love (not sure why I like them though as I really don't like some of the ferns that grow at my farm in WA, except the maiden hair ferns)
http://punaweb.org/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=9898

This one was on purchasing a greenhouse and ended up discussing "screen houses" and how to put one together instead of purchasing a costly greenhouse. This proved interesting because a lot of folks in East Hawaii are not using greenhouses and screenhouses to elevate heat, but more for environmental control such as to lessen the impact of hard driving rains, to keep bugs and snails out and to control temps, and other ideas.
http://punaweb.org/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=9376

This one has a few suggestions for books to purchase for growing tropical fruits in HI. I posted this on PW because I really wanted to buy a few books to have to research during our time in MT and to make plans for planting in HI.
http://punaweb.org/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=9224

This post had some good info on the effect of VOG on plants, what folks were noticing as far as the types of plants affected and what tends to happen on the East side of the island verses the west side - interesting. http://punaweb.org/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=8368

Well guess that's all for now

Growing tea

The more I think about growing, processing and enjoying tea, the more my entreprenuerial brain starts to buzz... for those of you that know me... well, you know the drill.

I think even though there is a large learning curve, growing and processing tea, is probably easier to deal with than growing and processing coffee. I'm sure it's less investment capital. Also, tea does ok at all elevation in East Hawaii, but does really well in the wet higher cooler elevations... hmmm.... that's kinda what we're lookin at.

Interesting article on growing tea in Hawaii published in West Hawaii Today.  http://westhawaiitoday.com/articles/2007/06/24/features/features02.prt

Totally weird, I had NO idea Tea was a type or variety of Camellia plant, Camellia sinensis, an evergreen bush. Similar to all those huge Camellia bushes/trees I have at the farm in WA. Tea bush however does not like cold weather and tends to be found in the tropics and much warmer locations. The new leaves are harvested and dried for the enjoyable beverage, it can also be used as an edible in stir-frys and steamed veggies. Once the plant is established, little is needed except pruning for new growth and to control shape and occasional feeding.

Well, ask and you shall receive!! I posted on PunaWeb about growing and processing tea, Dr. Weatherford responded with info leading me to this link http://www.ctahr.hawaii.edu/oc/freepubs/pdf/NPH-9.pdf A full guide to small scale tea growing and processing in Hawaii. COOL!

Also a link the a PW thread about growing tea
http://punaweb.org/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=2613&SearchTerms=tea

Tea farms dot the Big Island, small operations, some bigger. Until we can play with growing our own, we will search for our small tea farmer to support. I do have to say however, I'm not a big fan of any farm that charges $25 for a tour... makes purchasing their tea and getting to know your farmer too commercial and too expensive. Some of the Big Island tea companies are content staying small boutique tea operations, much like a very small winery, offering tastings, tours and teas - I like that. Here's some links
http://ahualoa.net/teafarm/   http://www.moonrisetea.com/   http://www.teahawaii.com/ http://www.bigislandtea.com/  http://www.onomeatea.com/ http://www.maunakeatea.com/

Lastly, here's the link to the Hawaii Tea Society, great info and resource. Think we are gonna join. http://hawaiiteasociety.org/index.php?option=com_frontpage&Itemid=1

WAIT! Here's one more! http://ahualoa.net/tea/ a document titled "Tea Notes" maintained by Ben Disco of Ahualoa Tea Farm, packed full of info and resources and links... I'm thinkin I wish I would have found this before researching and typing all of the above! But it was good education.

Growing coffee

http://punaweb.org/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=5398&whichpage=1

Good thread discussion RE growing coffee and finding equipment on the BI. I'll post more on this soon as we're very interested in trying to grow a little of our own - would be cool.

http://captaincooktrading.com/index.html maybe a place to purchase small scale processing equip.

Shipping stuff.... to Hawaii... wow - lots of money

Ok.. posting this, but not done with this post, will return to edit with more info.....

Great info from our friends Mike and Liz:
Honolulu Freight will also ship your car loaded with stuff; they did ours from Seattle. The driver's seat area must be free but the rest can be packed to the gills, and the whole thing gets loaded into their container (by them). You just drive it to their yard. On this end it was waiting for us at Kona Trans in Hilo.

They have all the info on their website.

aloha, Liz
"The best things in life aren't things."

Link to further discussion with other companies providing frieght services.
http://punaweb.org/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=8383&SearchTerms=shipping,containers

We've decided to explore Honolulu Frieght, I'll report back, because we want to load our pickup truck (which has a lockable canopy) to the gills and ship that, whatever fits goes, whatever does not fit stays. We would then purchase whatever else we needed on the island.

OK, just got off the phone with Seattle Honolulu Frieght, YES we can ship our truck fully loaded to the gills with our stuff... but at a price! $2500. Whoa - ouch. We'd have to really pack tight and make it worth that much much money. Our friends shipped their car over for just under $1200, but couldn't have anything in it and it wasn't put into an enclosed container. Things to think about.

Yep, just checked Matson shipping from Seattle (Pasha doesn't ship out of Seattle port) and for vehicle the size of our truck going to be $1072 and possibly some odd fees. But, everything that is not bolted down to the truck, inside and out has to be removed.

Growing Bananas

I'm wanting to document all I'm learning about tropical fruit/plant growing. We are enamored with the small Brazilian Banana or Apple Banana one can find in abundance on the island. Bananas have been discussed quite a bit on the PunaWeb blog and I want to save these threads as there is a lot of good info in them.

http://punaweb.org/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=8463&whichpage=1&SearchTerms=bananas A great thread on growing bananas and  different varieties.

A thread regarding variegated bananas. We saw these bananas cut up on a plate with the beautiful variegated skin still on and we were quite impressed and curious about them. After reading more about them however, we probably won't pursue growing this variety as we are not going to be there enough to pamper it.
 http://punaweb.org/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=9217&SearchTerms=growing,bananas

A fellow punawebber named Allen Goodson  sent me some great photos from his banana farm he had back in the 90s. He's provided great info on variety and how to grow.