Mango in the Compost

Sometimes magic happens. I've been making a new bucket of compost and a couple of weeks ago right in the centre, I couldn't have placed it better myself, a small seedling with long soft purple-bronze leaves grew.

I couldn't for the life of me think what it could be. I racked my brains trying to remember what I'd put into the compost; there'd been cut flowers, fruit and vegetable peelings and so on and so on. I scoured my books and images in Google. The problem is that there aren't so many photos of seedlings. Finally, a picture that looked just like my little plant came up - it was a mango, and I had been eating a mango a few weeks back.

The leaves are still soft with a bronze tinge.

The leaves are greener than they were at the beginning.

I'm glad I persevered as it's beginnings are quite different to what it looks like now. Now, it looks like many green seedlings, but in the beginning its three long leaves dark-coloured leaves were very soft and could have you believing that it didn't have enough water. I knew that there was plenty of water, so I thought I'd wait and see.

Sure enough, the seedling's leaves are now sturdy and sticking up as normal leaves do. They've also changed colour to a rich green. Very nice. However, I have to find my little plant a new home in due course as it will grow far too big for my balcony and apparently it likes a deep place to send it's main roots down.

But for now, it's looking very beautiful in my compost.