OUR SORELY NEGLECTED MORINGA TREES

Well, I have severely neglected my blog, especially when I speak about our beloved Moringa. Life get SO BUSY sometimes, and the urgent often takes precedence over the important. 

Our Moringa trees are thriving, although they did not like the cold snaps that we have had recently, here in Florida.  It "sort-of" confuses them, and the leaves turn yellowish, and curl up. As soon as we have a few nice days, when the weather is warm, they recover. 

At present, both our Moringa Oleifera trees, and our Moringa Stenopetala trees are baffled, as they don't know if they should grow, or go into hibernation! 

We love their bright, green leaves, and the way we feel when we eat them. When we cannot eat the fresh leaves, due to time constraints, or cool weather, we eat our organic Moringa leaf powder, instead! 

Here is how the leaves are supposed to look: 

 
Ours don't look quite like that, right now... 

Hopefully, the weather will warm up, and STAY warm, and then we will have our deep green leaves back, again!

If you are not familiar with Moringa, take a few minutes to educate yourself about the intense nutrition contained in their little leaves. Our main website is: I Love Moringa and we also have Moringa Matters

Both of them are filled with lots of information about our very favorite tree - the Moringa tree!

FIXED FROZEN COMPUTER

TWO SIMPLE FIXES TO SAVE YOU COSTLY COMPUTER REPAIRS 

#1 - In the last few months, we have had some major thunderstorms in our area, and one tropical storm. During the storms, we lost power several times. Our HP computer would NOT reboot - all we had was a blinking green light at the back, and the computer simply appeared to be "fried". With the computer plugged in, we tried removing the side panel, disconnecting the main power supply, disconnecting the USB connector closest to the front of the computer, and then plugging the main power supply back in, and the USB connector. Usually, that worked. The last time, it didn't. 

Some "angel" posted online a "quirky, sounds-too-easy-to-work" fix. It really sounded too easy. It was easy. It worked. 

We left the computer tower plugged in, got our hair dryer out, and put it on hot, full blast, and heated up the back of the computer, where the main power supply is. It is near the fan, where the main electrical plug goes into the computer. I felt like an idiot, but after 1 1/2 minutes, it worked. The light stopped blinking, and glowed steadily, and the computer booted right up! 

The second time it happened, it took about a minute. The third time it happened, it took about 2 1/2 minutes, but it worked! It seems like a long time to hold that heat on your computer, but for some unknown reason it works. We are eternally grateful to the person who posted that fix! THANK YOU! 

#2 - Today, I noticed that our free trial of AVG had expired. I thought I had downloaded the FREE AVG, but mistakenly downloaded the FREE TRIAL of the AVG full-blown program. I did not wish to purchase it, so I ran an uninstall, from the Add or Remove Programs, accessed through the Control Panel. 

THAT was a mistake. I don't know exactly what I did wrong, but when the mandatory restart of my computer started, it was frozen on the American Megatrends black screen, with all of the data on it. No matter what buttons I pushed - F8, F11, F4, Delete, ESC, etc., nothing would budge. It was stuck on the American Megatrends screen, for 20 minutes or more. I pulled the plug on the computer, waited, put it back in, and the same thing happened. I spent about 40 minutes reading online about it, on my laptop computer, to no avail. Nothing seemed to work, despite reading tons of "geek" suggestions at reputable sites.

Everything was fine, until I removed the AVG program. Finally, in desperation, I unplugged the printer USB cable, and the yellow internet cable. Voilá! I then saw the regular Windows boot screen, clicked on the Windows XP Professional Edition, and the computer was back to normal, all things restored. 

I hope this helps someone who encounters the "American Megatrends black screen of death". It was such a simple fix, and the computer is running better than ever. A word of warning - beware of how you uninstall AVG's free trial of their paid program. I thought I was heading out to get a new computer!

Moringa for Mulch

 

Moringa as Mulch

Here are some of our Moringa trees, that need to be cropped. I have been too busy to do it, but they have no weeds down at their bases, because when I harvest leaves, I toss the chopped up branches down underneath them. Talk about easy mulch! Talk about cheap mulch! I have never had such results with mulch purchased at Home Depot, or Lowes, or from a garden center - not even close! 

Now, of course, you have to have Moringa trees to do this, or know someone who does. They might just be willing to donate a lot of branches to you, as they should have more than they need. When we have too many branches to have the time to strip off the leaves, we have occasionally just chopped up the limbs, leaves and all - and put them down underneath the trees. However you do it, Moringa is an excellent product for mulch.

How To Eat Moringa, How To Plant Moringa, and a lot of other How-To's

Just putting a link up, so that you can learn all about how to eat Moringa, how to plant Moringa, how to eat Moringa leaves, how to use Moringa leaf powder, how to eat Moringa seeds, how to use Moringa oil, and how to use Moringa blossoms.

We have hundreds of thousands of words, online - about Moringa. To save everyone a lot of aggravation, and time, we consolidated several articles on Moringa in one place. The main thing, about Moringa of any kind - Moringa Oleifera, Moringa Stenopetala, Moringa Ovalifolia, or any other variety - is: you need to start eating it!

Recently, we heard that someone was able to keep his diabetes under control, by eating two Moringa seeds a day. Has anyone else had this experience? If so, please let us know. We are fairly easy to find, online.

We Grow Moringa Oleifera and Moringa Stenopetala in Florida

Do you want to grow Moringa in the United States? You can - we grow it here in Florida, and despite our recent cold winters - it grows! For a really sustainable source of edible landscaping, the Moringa tree is an excellent choice. Planted a few feet from your back door, or your front door, for that matter - you can harvest edible greens for your meals - within minutes!

When the weather is warm, above 70°F, plant your Moringa seeds. They grow so fast, that you can start harvesting leaves within two weeks of planting. Now, THAT, is if you live in a very temperate climate. Where the weather is cooler, it will take a bit longer, but once those Moringa seedlings take off - you will be hard pressed to keep up with their bounty.

Should you live in the northern part of the US, you can, with a little bit of extra planning and care, grow Moringa, too! If you have access to a greenhouse - you are "set". They love humidity and heat, and thrive on the sunshine. If you do not, you can prune them back severely, and keep them in large potting containers, with an ample supply of plant lights.

Since Moringa leaves provide all the essential amino acids necessary for human life, a Moringa tree growing on your property, can provide excellent nourishment to you, year-round. For more about growing Moringa trees, eating Moringa leaves, pruning Moringa trees, and how to add Moringa to your diet, check out the links below:

• More About Moringa on My About Me Page
• I Love Moringa
• How to Prune Moringa Trees

Read about Moringa, and see how it can enhance your diet, and beautify your yard - you'll love it!

How Do You Prune Moringa Trees?

One of the nightmares, of growing Moringa Trees, is that they can rapidly get out of hand. If you intend to eat their leaves, and harvest their pods - you have to be able to get to them!

From seed, a Moringa Tree can easily grow 20 feet tall, within a year - given the proper growing conditions. That makes for a difficult harvest! They just reach for the sunlight, with all of their might, and before you know it - the leaves are out of your reach.

Listen up - it does not have to "go that way"! There is a very simple process involved, for keeping any Moringa tree pruned to a reasonable height, and here it is --- pinch or chop off, every other top growth, and always, always - prune from the top!

Once our little Moringa seedlings are about 12 inches tall, I start pinching off every other top growth of leaves. That encourages Moringa leaves to sprout out, all down the trunk of the seedling. You can do that many times, while the seedlings are still in their pots, and before long - the trunk gets "woody".

If you do not pinch off every other growth, you will have a very tall, spindly Moringa seedling - which grows into a very tall, spindly Moringa tree. That is not conducive to easily getting your hands on the Moringa buds, blossoms, and leaves.

Once the Moringa seedlings are about 18 inches tall, I start chopping the branches in half, lengthwise. We strip off the leaves, and eat them, or dry them, for future use. You must trim them this way, or all you will have, is an extremely tall tree - with its harvest waving up in the air, far above your head.

With Moringa trees of any variety, the more you prune them, the better they grow - and the stronger the tree!

More about this, at this link: How to Prune Moringa Trees

Does Anyone Else Feed Their Guinea Pigs Moringa?

Recently, we acquired two male guinea pigs. One is young, the other is mature. They get along just fine, miraculously! We grew to love them both, very much, and then the younger one started showing signs of not being quite "right". This is our little guy - isn't he cute?

He routinely manufactured 50, that's right, 50 pellets - within 15 minutes. I have owned many, many guinea pigs, and never encountered THAT before. He also did not seem to gain very much weight, in comparision to the food he devoured. We think his digestive system is "awry".

Then, he started coughing, and being listless - almost to the point of death. He shivered, and sneezed, and would "go limp" when we picked him up. For a "squirrely" guinea pig like this little fellow, that was not a pleasant site to see. Usually, he would be "bouncing off the walls" - endowed with enough energy for 5 guinea pigs.

I researched every site I could, to help him. Never, had I seen anything remotely close to his symptoms. He did not want to eat, or drink - even blueberries were spurned. We noticed that he started breathing loudly and rapidly, and acting like he was choking on something. Because he tends to eat his bedding - lots of guinea pigs do - we started keeping him on old bath towels. That seemed to help. We also stopped giving him timothy hay, because every time he appeared to recover - he would eat a lot of hay, and drink water, and start coughing again. We switched to alfalfa hay, with the same results. He would eat hay, and within hours, the cough returned.

No more hay for him, we decided. That seemed to help, but it did not get him "up and running" again. So, because we already knew the basics:

• fresh water
• top quality guinea pig pellets
• dark, leafy greens
• no iceberg lettuce - ever
• small tidbits of fruit
• Vitamin C in their food or water

we decided to try something else. His little body was just not "behaving" like most guinea pigs' would.


Because I grow Moringa, and it is used in some countries for animal fodder, I thought it certainly wouldn't hurt anything, to feed him some. The only other time I had seen a rapid decline in health in any of our other guinea pigs, was when I was very, very young, and fed one of mine a lot of iceberg lettuce. She developed diarrhea - fast - and died. I learned my lesson.


I thought it would be easy to find references online, to people feeding their guinea pigs Moringa, but I was mistaken. Because it grows in the Philippines, in India, in Guam - just to name a few of the countries, and people there have guinea pigs, I expected to find references galore! I could not find any. There was no place that said people feed their guinea pigs Moringa - so I really was leery of giving him any of it. He was in such bad shape, though, I thought anything was worth a try. Almost fearfully, I tendered some fresh Moringa Oleifera leaves to our sick little guinea pig. He liked that - a lot! He ate them rapidly, and started to show a bit of interest in life. I then gave him some of our dried Moringa leaves. That was devoured, also - stems and all.

So far, our little guy is looking good. I know we are not "out of the water" yet, with him. His digestive tract is just "screwy". Time will tell. We hope he completely recovers, and thrives, as both my husband and I just love him!


What I would like to know, is - does anyone else feed their guinea pigs Moringa?