Weekly Photo Challenge: Beginning

This week’s theme might be obvious, but I couldn’t help it — it’s a simple and common word, yet can evoke very powerful, emotional images. Let’s see beginning through your lens!

Beginning? That sounds easy enough but the more I planned this photo challenge, the more I realized that my beginnings were actually just points in a cycle.

It started with some seeds, a gift from my neighbor. They grew into very nice plants.

The plants started budding and then flowers emerged.

More and more flowers appeared.

Then, the pea pods grew and started to fill out.

Then, this week, I had my first guandu! These are the seeds, or at least some of them will be. We will eat the rest.

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It all started with the wonderful papayas I love. I tossed the seeds and peels in the yard for the birds and iguanas. Later, many of the seeds sprouted. This is the biggest plant.

Then, I noticed there were flowers on the plant. But, each flower only bloomed and fell, leaving nothing behind.

This week though, I saw some little fruits!

The plant continues to flower, so hopefully fruits will continue to form.

Seeds –> Plants –> Flowers –> Fruit –> Seeds — and so it goes. Papayas are very popular with the birds so hopefully they will leave some for me. I have six good looking guandu plants though and expect to have guandu for months to come. Some of them will be saved for seeds to begin it all again next year.

By the way, guandu are pigeon peas. I’d hardly heard of them in the US but they are extremely popular here. They come in green, green with speckles, and black. According to my neighbor the black ones have the best flavor.

About Kris Cunningham

We live in David, Chiriqui Provence, Republic of Panama! This blog is about some of our experiences in our new country.

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2 Responses to Weekly Photo Challenge: Beginning

indacampo says:

January 9, 2014 at 8:42 pm

I find the flowers on the guandu very pretty. They also attract birds that eat the peas. I collected some seeds last year about this time but never did get around to planting them. I don’t really know where they would fit anyway. Great interpretation of “beginning”!

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- Kris Cunningham says:
  
  January 9, 2014 at 9:51 pm
  
  Yes, I love the flowers too. I haven’t heard complaints about birds eating the peas but there are so many in the neighborhood, hopefully there are plenty for everyone. They are big plants though and need a fair amount of room and lots of sun. Is there an empty lot on your block? Here, it seems like any empty lot is fair game for guandu, or sometimes other food producing plants.
  
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