5.11.10

Water Spinach


Do you have days when you have just posted something and felt that you have 3 more interesting topics that you wish to blog about?


Do you experience days where no topic nor photos seem appropriate or good enough to be posted?

When one is constipated, usually a high fiber diet with lots of water will get things moving again.
With blogging constipation, I decided that Water Spinach may be the solution.


Water Spinach is a creeping vine.

To the Chinese, it is called Ong Choy.
In Malaysia, we call it Kangkung.
It is also known as Water Morning Glory or Water Convolvulus. 
It's scientific name is Ipomoea Aquatica.


I was hoping to show you some pink water spinach flowers but today there are only white ones.


This one reminds me of a rising star.


Interestingly, giant mushrooms grew amongst the water spinach.


But the colours for this post remain green and white and I thought may be rather boring.


A butterfly tried to liven up the situation but did not brighten up the colours.


This is one of the many lovely seed pods.


The Water Spinach leaves were narrow and elongated when I grew them last year as food for a turtle.
Eventually the new leaves became heart-shaped.
The stink bug is a pest that suck the sap of the leaves.


This tiny metallic green fly prey on smaller insects.


Do you see a minute black spot on the water spinach leaf above?
I believe it is a black lady beetle that feeds on whitefly eggs, scale and spider mites.
It hopped away before I had a chance to focus on it.




Just when I gave up about colours for my Water Spinach topic, this little butterfly came over to rest on its leaf.


I suspect these butterflies prefer the nectar of the Basil flower more than those from the Water Spinach but one of them must heard me calling out for colours.
Thanks to Autumn Belle, these butterflies are called Cycad Blue.

What do you do when you have blogging constipation?
Would it be Wordless?

40 comments:

  1. I want to put here a very very big smilie, but it is not possible! I thought at the start you are very serious, but when constipation gets in i started to suspect something is looming at the end. Haha! That is really true, but i haven't experienced long contemplation with my post as most of them are spontaneous, when i thought of posting something i just do it, and then yes, i realized "oh i forgot another photos which should have been the best one for that post". I think i don't get blogging constipation 'coz i always eat kangkong (same term here though different spelling)! We only have the pink variety though, havent seen the white. Seriously speaking i appreciate these photos, they are so vivid and detailed. I like your camera, hehe (not your eyes, coz you'll not part with them). May i know what's your camera, it's lovely even for macros. BTW, i have lots photos of that buttefly too, but i also don't know its name. There is one which even have bigger mimic eyes at the back wings, than that one. But my photos are not as vivid as yours, my hands are not that stable.

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  2. This is a really good post. I thought it was a great topic and the images fitting. I did not see any constipation, only good writing that kept me interested until the end. Humorous, too. I know the plant, but never heard it called Water Spinach.

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  3. HI onenezz
    I bought the dill plant at a nursery in Sg Buloh,and its not often I find it. That was the first time. it cost RM8 or RM9.00 only.

    I am very interested to take a look at pic of your pac man pegaga. Can u direct me to the blog or email me a pic?

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  4. I have kangkung but they have not bloomed yet, so I don't even know what colour the flowers will be. Maybe no blooms because I have cut away the leaves for cooking. Your white kangkung flowers are lovely.

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  5. Andrea, Firstly, I was serious. I have not post anything for a few days. Sometimes I even get comments constipation. I have both varieties but we usually feed our neighbour's rabbits with the pink one. Maybe that's why it stopped blooming. AB also asked about my camera. It's Canon Ixus 870IS. I tried to search for the name of that purple butterfly but couldn't find it either. Fyi, my hands are not stable too but usually my lens is extremely close to the insect I am taking. I have photos of other minute insects on the kangkong leaves but I didn't post them as they were unclear due to unstable hands.

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  6. Donna, Thank you for the enema you sent. Haha!

    Cina Fong, Thanks for the info. My dill is in the seedling stage. Hope it will look like yours soon. When you do a search on pegaga, you'll see two varieties; one round leaf like yours and the other, has a mouth like pac man.

    AB, You are right. It won't bloom since you have been harvesting the leaves for cooking. Well, I like the flowers and seeds more than cooking. You are definitely a better mom.

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  7. What a pretty white bloom! I enjoyed looking at your photos. :)

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  8. Water spinach sounds so much better than swamp cabbage. :-D
    We call it kangkong locally, very similar to your kangkung. I don't think I've ever seen it with flowers, though.

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  9. Wow, if that is the result of your blogging constipation I gotta get me some of that! This was a great post - very funny. I love the shot of the seed pod especially. Have a great weekend!

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  10. Beautiful pictures! And so interesting to see all those beautiful insects and plants I have never seen before. I find them very colourful.

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  11. I love the white flowers against the green foliage almost like morning glory except for the colour, anyway they are in the same family right? Lovely micro shots of the flowers n insects..

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  12. I loved the green and white theme you had going. No water spinach in Canada but we do grow morning glory and other relatives.

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  13. Beautiful post and photos!
    hope your blogging constipation is no more

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  14. Hi Amy, Bom, Cat and Denise, Do you notice the first alphabet in your names?

    A B C D.

    Just to add:
    Edible - The leaves are edible.
    Flowers - You see the flowers because I seldom harvest them.
    Grateful - I am glad and grateful that you dropped by.
    Harvest - Harvest it more often than I do.
    Infinite - I can go on infinitely as I am having a comment diarrhoea.

    Puteri, Yes they are like morning glory. I have Mt Fuji Morning Glory. They are beautiful but fragile.

    Patty, Thanks. It wasn't that bad after all, yeah?

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  15. My dear, I think the purple butterfly is called a cycad blue.

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  16. Gorgeous photos, and love the one with butterfly and other critters..

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  17. AB, Thanks a lot. Really appreciate the name of the butterfly. I have been searching for its name with the wrong description.

    Icy BC, Thanks for dropping by. Glad you like photos of critters like I do.

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  18. I like to eat kangkung with the famous cooking style for it~kangkung masak belacan! My kangkung seedlings are 2 weeks old now.

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  19. Syrup of figs is what my mum used to give us for that problem One lol.

    One keep a note of anything interesting you would like to write about and then when you get those moments go check on the list and see if you can get some inspiration from it. I could write blog posts every day about plants and gardening but I just don't get the time plus I like to keep in touch with other bloggers especially those who comment regularly on my blog aswell. I post almost daily on my photography blog while my gardening one only gets 1-2 posts a week at the most.

    Your photos are amazing no wonder.....Cannon lenses are the best.

    I loved the macro shots of the wee critters - is that white one with all those legs a dreadful mealy bug? We have a form of that plant here too - its common name is bindweed and it's definately not something I would want in my garden as it's invasive here.

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  20. Regarding the pegaga, there is another similar plant which is inedible only for ornamental purposes, the leaves are round like a coin, the one I hv is edible with indentation but not like pac-man. Wld love to get a pac-man specie but have not been successful in finding it.

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  21. Simply love your photos! With different tiny creatures on the blooms and the leaves! Certainly doesn't look like someone was dealing with blogging constipation. Happens to me sometimes, then I also look around for something that's blogworthy:D

    The water spinach here has lavender blooms. locally it's known as kolmou. Your photos are fantastic!

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  22. Mesmerizing photos! There, I've been redundant and joined the throng of appreciative commenters:]
    The white bloom looked so much like a Datura... poisonous! Water spinach is totally new to me.
    Alice

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  23. I never heard about this plant. I like its simple beauty. Great pictures! As for the blogging con...., what an interesting question! I have so many photos that I could post every single day two-four times or even more often. I keep reminding myself that life is bigger than blogging, bigger than gardening and try to keep an interval between the posts.

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  24. Hi Onenzz

    Re: the artemisia, I always thought its a mosquitoe plant but the scent is very weak. Then I found out from my neighbour's filipino maid that she uses it for salad. I hv seen her harvesting it and drying it as herb too at the back of the house.

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  25. Onenezz.. (apologies spelt yr name wrongly just now typed too fast) :)

    Where can I get the pac-man pegaga. Its rather cute I want it also. Pac-man was my first computer game, used to be addicted to it haha..

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  26. Oh ok.. I thought u have a picture of the pegaga in your garden which I am interested to look at. I hv yet to see it in anyone's garden actually its always the one with indentation or round (round i hv been told is inedible but some claimed its edible so hv to be careful)

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  27. Don't worry when the postings dry up. We'll always come back when the mood strikes again! Your photos are always interesting. I love to learn.

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  28. I hv always love the pegaga just that the incident with the leeches put me off but since I learnt of its rich history and that it can be grown on dry soil or rather just moist I am all for it.

    The pac-man pegaga is terribly cute and I wld love to hv a pot wld make my day :)

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  29. Very funny post.....yes, I sometimes realize I have too much to say or write about in one post and have to break it down....so there are million titles that sit there as I add info and pics to them:) You take really great pics....I like the shiny little green fly:) For constipation, I recommend a good cup of coffee;)

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  30. What a great post and such beautiful photos! I find the days when I can't come up with anything to write (when I'm blog-constipated, as you might say) are the days when I find something really cool or inspiring to blog about. I've never heard of Water Morning Glory and when I first looked at your saw your photo of the white flower I thought it was Moonflower - a relative of the Water Morning Glory for sure! Thanks for the informative and beautiful post.

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  31. Hi One. The water spinach is quite a beauty. I at first thought it was a morning glory. I am surprised that you looked up the Russian Olive tree. Colorado declared some years ago two tress to be nuisance trees: the Tamarac Tree and the Russian Olive. The Tamara grows along streams and river banks and spreads rapidly and sucks a lot of water. The RO is considered a noxious weed. Anyway, your photos are beautiful, crisp and clear. cheers. ann

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  32. Nice kangkung! The white flowers also. Regarding those white mushrooms... they grow in my pots during prolonged cool/cloudy weather.

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  33. Never seen the flowers of a kangkung before! Looks like the white version of the morning glory!

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  34. Have heard of verbal diarrhoea, but never of blogging constipation. It could find it's way into the Oxford or Chambers Dictionary.
    Nice pictures though.

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  35. Superb post.
    So glad I found you.
    I shall enjoy having a look round.
    Thanks.

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